History of RussiaThe history of Russia begins with the histories of the East Slavs. The traditional start-date of specifically Russian history is the establishment of the Rus' state in the north in 862, ruled by Varangians. Staraya Ladoga and Novgorod became the first major cities of the new union of immigrants from Scandinavia with the Slavs and Finns. In 882, Prince Oleg of Novgorod seized Kiev, thereby uniting the northern and southern lands of the Eastern Slavs under one authority, moving the governance center to Kiev by the end of the 10th century, and maintaining northern and southern parts with significant autonomy from each other.
RuhnuRuhnu (Runö; 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 , it currently has 150 oficially declared inhabitants Ruhnu Parish has the smallest population of Estonia's 79 municipalities. Before 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.
HiiumaaHiiumaa (USˈhiːʊmɑː,_ˈhiːəmɑː, ˈhiːumɑː) is the second largest island in Estonia and is part of the West Estonian archipelago, in the Baltic Sea. It has an area of 989 km2 and is 22 km from the Estonian mainland. Its largest town is Kärdla. It is located within Hiiu County. Hiiumaa is the main island of Hiiu County, called Hiiumaa or Hiiu maakond in Estonian. The Swedish and German name of the island is Dagö or Dagden ('Day' island) and Dagø in Danish. In modern Finnish, it is called Hiidenmaa, literally 'Hiisi's Land'.
EstoniansEstonians or Estonian people (eestlased) are a Finnic ethnic group who speak the Estonian language. Their nation state is Estonia. The Estonian language is spoken as the first language by the vast majority of Estonians; it is closely related to other Finnic languages, e.g. Finnish, Karelian and Livonian. The Finnic languages are a subgroup of the larger Uralic family of languages, which also includes e.g. the Sami languages. These languages are markedly different from most other native languages spoken in Europe, most of which have been assigned to the Indo-European family of languages.
Lääne CountyLääne County (Lääne maakond or Läänemaa, literally "Western land"; Wiek; Rotalia) is one of the 15 counties of Estonia. It is located in western Estonia and borders the Baltic Sea to the north, Harju County to the north-east, Rapla County to the east, Pärnu County to the south, and the island counties of Saare and Hiiu to the west. In January 2009 Lääne County had a population of 23,810 – constituting 2.0% of the total population in Estonia.
