Vormsi

Vormsi ( German Worms, Swedish Ormsö ) is 92 square kilometers, the fourth largest island in Estonia. It is both a rural community in Lääne.

Description

Vormsi belongs to the Moon Sound Islands. The island is located between the second largest Estonian island of Hiiumaa and the Noarootsi Peninsula. Separated from the mainland of the three -kilometer wide Wose Sound ( Voosi kurk ).

Vormsi is now inhabited by around 350 people. In the summertime, from the village Sviby a ferry twice a day for a twelve kilometer port city of Haapsalu on the Estonian mainland.

The Estonian name of the island is derived from the Swedish Ormsö ( " Snake Island "). Since the 13th century, Sweden colonized the island. Until the Second World War, the number of residents increased to up to 3000. 1944 almost all Swedish -born inhabitants fled before the advance of the Red Army across the Baltic Sea to Sweden.

Today testify the place names of the Swedish history of the island: the eight island villages hot Borrby, Hullo, Kärrslätt, Norrby, Rälby, Saxby, Sviby and Söderby.

In Hullo, the island's capital, the church was built in 1632 and a cemetery are a few centuries old stone crosses. In Saxby in the northwest is the lighthouse built in 1864 on the island.