Home
Kirde (Kirre)
North-east, north-easterly. Also noordoost or nordost among sailors. See also Kagu.
Kirilase (Kirilane)
As McCruiskeen would say: “quite a pancake this one”. After a long process of elimination, given its almost totally lepidopteran neighbors, we can almost certainly exclude the following fancies: a) a ‘k’ omitted from kiriklane, churchman; b) a farm or farmer’s name derived from Russian first name Kiril; c) a neologism or poetic term for a typesetter, writer or font-worker (kiri is a letter, writing or print); and d) despite the tendency to nickname this popular little bug, kirilind is the closest we get to lepatriinu, or ladybird. As to the moths and butterflies, there are piles of them, matching the street to varying degrees. The closest match may be kiriöölane, with kanarbiku-kiriöölane, the ‘beautiful yellow underwing moth’, Anarta myrtilli, or sinika-kiriöölane, the ‘small dark yellow underwing’, A. cordigera, both common to Estonia. The next tempting candidate is one of the festoon butterflies, although both are unlikely. In adjectives, the ‑lane ending designates appurtenance: an Estonian, for example, is an Eestlane, and in zoology, the ‑idae ending designating families is rendered ‑lased in Estonian so, since they’re obviously butterflies, the kiriliblikas could be called kirilased (nominative plural), hence kirilase (genitive singular) which would be all very nice and QED, except that Euroopa putukad firmly annotates lääne-kiriliblikas, the Spanish festoon, Zerynthia rumina, as Eestis ei ole: in Estonia ain’t none; as to lõuna-kiriliblikas, the southern festoon, Z. polyxena, this is even listed as a wrong answer to the local “Who wants to be a millionaire” question “which of the following is an Estonian butterfly?” and you can’t argue with that. So: streets in Spain, Turkey and certain parts of NE Moldavia would be fine but Tallinn, no. Having said that, a little voice does nag, “Yes, but there’s no Islandi in Estonia either...” It could also be a shortened form of kasekirilane the Kentish glory moth, Endromis versicolora which is common in Estonia. Not lastly, but that’s as far as I’m going, there’s a half a page or so of kirivaksiklased which vaguely fit the bill, but only vaguely. Definition unfinished. Probably, though – since kirju:kirju (not a million miles from kiri:kirja) means variegated, mottled, many-colored, etc., see Leediku – any old mottled butterfly or moth. (Bottle of wine for the first realistic answer backed up by credible evidence). Part of a lepidopteran group. See also Kuldtiiva.
Kitsarööpa (Kitsarööbas)
Narrow-gauge railway line (see Kitsas and Roopa). Back in the day, due to lower costs, narrow-gauge lines were laid for industry or relatively low passenger needs. The first one was not in Tallinn, but serviced the Kunda cement works, some 100 km to the E. At 750 mm, almost half the width of the 1435-mm standard-gauge lines, costs were significantly lower, as were speeds: the maximum authorized being 25 versts / hr (see Versta). Here, the street-name refers to the line servicing Peter the Great’s Naval Fortress (Merekindlus, see Vabaduse puiestee) with a 9-km-odd foot- and bicycle-path, starting (approx..) at Kõrgepinge and winding more or less S (oddly, unnamed) for about 3 km to Tähetorni then (named), E to the junction of Vääna & Pärnu where the Nõmme-Väike, aka Nõmme-Kindlus, station used to be, then N and E ‘along’ the former narrow-gauge track towards Rahumäe station, another one-time narrow-gauge hub, continuing E and maybe merging with Kurni and Orava before ending at the Liivametsa/Kalmistu Junction some 50 m from Liiva station, yet another one-time narrow-gauge hub.
