Tallinn and Canberra

We just came from the eastern visit at home of very nice people from Canberra. Thanks Carla!

After great eastern hunting, visiting Parliament house and national museum plus long talks with Canberrian I am all loaded with fresh informations on this region.

Australian have build up their capital by themselves relatively recently. The spot was chosen as a result of the fight between two big cities Sydney and Melbourne (in the half distance between them). They both wanted to bear a name of capitol. And maybe that is why it is still very confusing issue. Since we Europeans hear more often about Sydney we can't remember what is the capitol of Australia : )

In Estonia it is clear. Tallinn is the biggest city and at the same time it is a center of political and cultural life in this small country. It gained its present name and status after IWW on 24.02.1918 -only 5 years after Canberra was given officially its name on 12.03.1913.

In Europe the meaning of the place names is usually very speculative since they are very old. Most probably Tallinn stems out from "taani linn" whats means danish city because it was possessed and rebuilt once in XIII c. by Danish Kingdom. I like the version that Tallinn derives from "talu linn" what stands for a farm castle. It explains better the character of the nations. They are still hard-working and nature loving people. With Canberra it is easy. Australians adopted Aboriginal name of that valley between mountains:

Canberra means simply "meeting place".