Streetsign reading "Tallinn Streets dot com" Header

Work in progress

A pile of ro ad signs half-trashed and piled up on a building-site, to indicate the site is in construction.

Website under construction, a couple of entries still pending, no photos with the streets yet, layout not finalized...

This started with a book (last few pages under review) and so far 1889 of the 1891 articles entered, 1 or 2 links may go nowhere.

Logo of the Tallinn Children's Hospital Foundation

The Book

All author earnings of A Rambling Dictionary of Tallinn Street Names to be donated to the foundation or donate here.

If anyone could help or advise as to the legal mechanism, it would be appreciated, thanks!

The Website

Not intended at the beginning, the present website is taking on a life of its own, with plans for relevant discussion forums, picture galleries and, over time, more non-streetname entries.

In theory, it will be funded by advertising relevant to people in Tallinn, to be determined.

A percentage of profits (also to be determined) to be donated to the foundation. 

Contact

Photograph of Simon Hamilton in Pikk street, Tallinn.

Apparently, a company that uses its owner's name is considered more trustworthy because they put themselves on the line.

This is me, in Tallinn this spring (2025), on a 3-month spree to check details, take photos (about 12K), explore (ave. 15K/day), and so on. I think I covered every street in Kesklinn (apart from Mõigu), most of Põhja-Tallinn and some Kristiine.

For information, please contact Simon at this address dot com, thanks!

Names

Tallinna (Tallinn)

Capital of Estonia, said to be derived from Taani Linn, Danish town / castle (linn thought to derive from a proto-Finnic *litna), first recorded as Talyna in 1536. Other suggestions have included Talu-linna (farm / house / farmstead town / castle) and Tali-linna / Talli-linn (winter town / castle), and Tallide-linn (stables town / castle), none of which really make sense, so please see Kopli...

Tallitorn (0) Symbol designating a Point of Interest.

Stable (as in horses’) tower. Dates back to around 1380. See also Assauwe torn.

Taludevahe (0)

Between / Among the farms. The farms in question being those in Tiskre. Farm group. See also Tedrepere.

Talve (Talv)

Winter. Alternative nominative is tali (see Tallinna, but don’t believe everything you read in the papers…). Leads onto Helbe whose Nõmme counterpart used to be a Suve too. See also Kevade.

Talviku (Talvik)

1) Yellowhammer, Emberiza citrinella, a member of the bunting family. Nominative often talvike, also known (in earlier times perhaps) in vernacular or dialect forms as jõhviklind, (cranberry bird); kadakasass (the parent term kadakasakslane or ‘Juniper German’ indicated an Estonian mimicking higher social-status Germans [see Dominiiklaste, Nurmenuku and Uus-Kalamaja]; from MLG Katesaße – Kate, peasant farmer’s or day-laborer’s hut or cottage + Saße, residence – for cottager or slum- or hovel-dweller); kaerasööja (oat-eater); kollane varblane (yellow sparrow); külmatihane (cold tit); talitsiitsitaja or tsiitsilind (tali=winter, but where the tsiitsi comes from is anybody’s business: unlikely to be from Frisian tsiis for cheese but poss. just reflecting the birdcall). Talvik:talviku is ‘umbellate wintergreen’, Chimaphila umbellata, and, for non-hibernating farmers of the past, a cow born in winter. Part of the Lilleküla bird-name group of streets. See also Tedre.

Tambeti (Tambet)

Father of the hero of Bornhöhe E.’s novel Tasuja (The Avenger), written aged 17-18. Tambet was a yeoman (free) farmer, imprisoned, left to rot and eventually die in a dungeon by Oodo, German (hence bad-guy nobleman) childhood friend of Jaanus angry at the unjust state of affairs (plebs getting ideas above their station), killed in turn by Jaanus, the eponymous avenger, during the Jüriöö Ülestõus. Appropriately, a fictional street or perhaps footpath alongside a questionable railway track in the hinterland of Peterburi, along with Tõrviku and Tõivu. Sadly, between the first edition and the present one, the road announced in 2008 seems to have been left to rot and eventually abandoned. No sign of it anywhere, despite the neighboring Jüriöö park next door.

 

 

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