Ruhnu

Ruhnu Parish
Ruhnu vald

Municipality of Estonia

Flag

Coat of arms

Ruhnu Parish within Saare County.

Administrative centre

Ruhnu village

Government

• Mayor

Jaan Urvet

Area

• Total

11.9 km² (4.6 sq mi)

Population (01.01.2015)

• Total

• Density

8.2/km² (21/sq mi)

Website

ruhnu.ee

Ruhnu (Swedish: Runö; Latvian: Roņu sala) is an Estonian island in the Gulf of Riga in the Baltic Sea. It is administratively part of Saare County but is geographically closer to the Latvian mainland. At 11.9 square kilometres (4.6 sq mi), it has currently fewer than 100, mostly ethnic Estonian, permanent inhabitants. Prior to 1944, it was for centuries populated by ethnic Swedes and traditional Swedish law was used.

The first archaeological artifacts of human activity in Ruhnu, assumed to be related to seasonal seal hunting, date back to around 5000 BC. The time of arrival of the first ancient Scandinavians in Ruhnu and the beginning of a permanent Swedish-speaking settlement is not known. It probably did not precede the Northern Crusades in the beginning of the 13th century, when the indigenous peoples of all the lands surrounding the Gulf of Riga were converted to Christianity and subjugated to the Teutonic Order. The first documented record of the island of Ruhnu, and of its Swedish population, is a 1341 letter sent by the Bishop of Courland which confirmed the islanders' right to reside and manage their property in accordance with Swedish law.

Ruhnu was controlled by the Kingdom of Sweden (1621–1708, formally until 1721) and after that by Imperial Russia until World War I, when it was occupied by Imperial Germany (1915–1918). After the war, despite some local initiatives to rejoin Sweden, and territorial claims by Latvia, the islanders agreed to become part of newly independent Estonia in 1919 (possibly due to the existence of a Swedish minority in Estonia). According to a census taken in 1934, Ruhnu had a population of 282: 277 ethnic Swedes and 5 ethnic Estonians.

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Wikipedia