St. Olaf’s Church, or St. Olav's Church (), is a

Baptist Baptists are a Christian denomination, denomination within Protestant Christianity distinguished by baptizing only professing Christian believers (believer's baptism) and doing so by complete Immersion baptism, immersion. Baptist churches ge ...

church in

Tallinn Tallinn is the capital city, capital and List of cities in Estonia, most populous city of Estonia. Situated on a Tallinn Bay, bay in north Estonia, on the shore of the Gulf of Finland of the Baltic Sea, it has a population of (as of 2025) and ...

Estonia Estonia, officially the Republic of Estonia, is a country in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the Baltic Sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, and to the east by Ru ...

, believed to have been built in the 12th century and to have been the centre for old Tallinn's Scandinavian community before the

Kingdom of Denmark The Danish Realm, officially the Kingdom of Denmark, or simply Denmark, is a sovereign state consisting of a collection of constituent territories united by the Constitution of Denmark, Constitutional Act, which applies to the entire territor ...

conquered Tallinn (Reval) in 1219. Its dedication relates to King Olaf II of Norway (also known as Saint Olaf, 995–1030). The first known written records referring to the church date back to 1267. It was extensively rebuilt during the 14th century.

History

St. Olaf's was originally a

Roman Catholic Church The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

. However, during the

Reformation The Reformation, also known as the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation, was a time of major Theology, theological movement in Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the p ...

it became part of the local

Lutheran Lutheranism is a major branch of Protestantism that emerged under the work of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German friar and Protestant Reformers, reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practices of the Catholic Church launched ...

tradition. As a result of World War II, the church was left without active congregation, and the Soviet occupation regime handed the building over to

s in 1950. Since that time, St. Olaf is a Baptist church that continues to conduct services. From 1944 until 1991, the Soviet

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used St. Olaf's Church's spire as a radio tower and surveillance point.

Legend

There is a legend surrounding the construction of this building; The citizens of Tallinn wanted to build the tallest church in the world, but since there was a curse that ensured the death of anyone who finished its construction, no one was willing to do the work. Then a stranger appeared who asked for a large amount of money to do it. Since the city could not pay this sum, the foreigner proposed the following challenge: if they found out his name, he would forgive them the debt. For this, the Tallinners sent a spy to his house who heard Olev's name in a song his wife sang. They waited for the foreigner to finish the construction and when he was putting the cross on the tower they shouted to him from below, Olev the cross is crooked, he got scared and fell to the ground with a toad and a snake coming out of his mouth, which denoted the demonic possession of this man. This fact is reflected in a mural painting on one of the sides of the church.

Height

A medieval craftsman claimed it was 84 fathoms tall. One source assumed he was referring to Rhineland fathoms, which would've made it 159 metres tall, which would be the tallest building in the world at the time. Although he was probably referring to local fathoms, and in 1590 the total height of the church tower was probably 115.35–125 m. The tower has been hit by lightning around 10 times, and the whole church has burned down three times throughout its known existence. After several reconstructions, its spire now stands 123.8 meters tall.

Organ

The organ was built between 1840 and 1842 by a German organist Friedrich Hermann Lütkemüller and installed by Johann Eberhard Walcker and three other assistants from the Walcker organ building company. From Lütkemüller's autobiography from 1869: * “During the construction of the two large works for St. Petersburg 1838-1840 and for Reval 1840-1842, my training progressed more and more, so that during Walcker's eight-month absence I was able to be entrusted with the management completely independently. The intonation and tuning of the Reval organ was already my work. I went to Reval with three other assistants alongside Mr. Walcker to set up the organ for the St. Olai Church in Reval.” * “The organ in the Olai Church and an eight-legged work in the country were installed in four months. I also intoned another organ in Reval, which had been repaired by a local organ builder Tanton and to which we had brought various new registers and who allowed me to carry out the entire tuning because I could do it more confidently and better than he could..." A renovation took place in 1914. The instrument has 76 registers, 3 manuals and a pedal. The actions are pneumatic.

Images

Tallinn asv2022-04 img76 StOlaf Church.jpg, Night view Iglesia de San Olaf, Tallinn, Estonia, 2012-08-05, DD 01.JPG, Church portal Iglesia de San Olaf, Tallinn, Estonia, 2012-08-05, DD 02.JPG, Interior Iglesia de San Olaf, Tallinn, Estonia, 2012-08-05, DD 05.JPG, Interior Iglesia de San Olaf, Tallinn, Estonia, 2012-08-05, DD 14.JPG, Interior Iglesia de San Olaf, Tallinn, Estonia, 2012-08-05, DD 19.JPG, Church tower at day Tallinn asv2022-04 img75 StOlaf Church.jpg, Church tower at night Tallinna Oleviste kirikutorni muna ja rist.jpg, Spire with cross Spires of St Olaf's Church, Tallinn.jpg, The spires of the church Staircase of St Olaf's Church.jpg, The staircase in the centre of the church

References

External links

Tourist Sights in Estonia
{{DEFAULTSORT:Saint Olafs Church, Tallinn 13th-century churches in Estonia Churches completed in 1519 Churches in Tallinn Baptist churches in Europe Gothic architecture in Estonia Kesklinn, Tallinn 13th-century establishments in Estonia

Tallinn Old Town