Estonia’s fights for freedom during the twentieth century were in large part a reaction to nearly 700 years of foreign rule. Before 1200 the Estonians lived largely as free peasants loosely organized into parishes (kihelkonnad ), which in turn were grouped into counties (maakonnad ). In the early 1200s, the Estonians and the Latvians came under assault from German crusaders seeking to impose Christianity on them. Although the Estonians’ resistance to the Teutonic Knights lasted some twenty years, the deficiency of a centralized political organization as well as inferior weaponry eventually brought down the Estonians in 1227. The Germans, moving from the south, were abetted by Danish forces that invaded from the north and captured Tallinn. Together with present-day Latvia, the region became known as Livonia; the Germans and Danes settled down as nobility, and the Estonians were progressively subordinated as serfs. During 1343-45 an Estonian peasant uprising against the German and Danish nobility prompted the Danes to relinquish their control of northern Estonia to the Germans. After this resistance was crushed, the area remained generally peaceful for two centuries.

Commerce developed rapidly because Estonia’s larger urban centers at the time–Tallinn, Tartu, Pärnu, and Narva–were all members of the Hanseatic League, an organization accomplished by merchants of various, mostly German, cities to protect their mutual trading interests. Still, foreign rivalries over the strategic Livonian region began to reemerge in the mid-sixteenth century as the fighting capacity of the Germans diminished and that of neighboring Muscovy began to increase. The ensuing twenty-five-year fight for control of Livonia was precipitated by an invasion by Ivan IV (the Terrible) (r. 1533-84) in 1558. The advancing Russians wiped out the disintegrating forces of the Teutonic Knights and nearly succeeded in conquering the whole area. Swedish and Polish intervention reversed the Russian gains and forced Ivan eastward, back behind Lake Peipsi. Peace between Sweden and Poland in Livonia was also slow in coming, with Sweden eventually winning most of the territory by 1629. By this time, decades of war had caused huge population losses (in some areas, over 50 %), affecting urban and rural areas alike.

The Bolshevik takeover in Petrograd in November 1917 extended to Estonia as well, until Germany occupied Estonia in February 1918. Most of Estonia’s other political parties realized they were caught between the two forces and agreed to begin an active search for outside support. Representatives were sent to the major European capitals to secure Western recognition of an Estonian declaration of freedom. As the Bolsheviks retreated from Tallinn and the German occupation army entered the city, the Committee of Elders (or standing body) of the Maapäev declared the nation independent on February 24, 1918.

Centuries of struggle to retain its identity and achieve independent statehood are the hallmark of Estonia’s history. Human habitation in the area dates back to at least 7500 BC, but the first forebears of the present inhabitants were Finno-Ugric hunters who probably arrived between 3000 and 2000 BC.

The region was dragged kicking and screaming into written history by the Drang nach Osten (urge to the east) of Germanic princes, colonists and traders in the 13th century, and Estonia soon fell under foreign rule, a dark period in the country’s history that was to span seven centuries.

Germanic dominance was soon supplanted by Lithuanian hegemony, in partnership with Poland, which lasted some three centuries until Polish influence began to dominate in the 16th century. Then followed a protracted tussle, during which Germanic groups, Swedes, Russians and Prussians exerted their influence - and ambitions - on the region. By the end of the 19th century, the Russians were the dominant power, but rising nationalism and a policy of Russification made them increasingly unpopular.

The fight to emerge as an independent nation seemed to have been won in 1920 when Soviet Russia signed a peace treaty with the parliamentary republic of Estonia, recognising its independence in perpetuity. But, caught between the ascendant Soviet Union and expansionist Nazi Germany, Estonia soon lapsed from democracy into authoritarianism, and prime minister Konstantin Päts took over as dictator in 1934.

The Nazi-Soviet non-aggression pact of 1939 secretly placed Estonia under the Soviet sphere of influence and the Soviet authorities began nationalisation and purges that saw up to 60,000 Estonians killed, deported or forced to flee. That’s why some Estonians mistakenly saw Adolf Hitler’s troops as liberators when they invaded the USSR and occupied the Baltic states in 1941.

Estonia lost around 200,000 people during WWII and lost its independence yet again. The Soviet reoccupation of 1944 ushered in a period of Stalinism highlighted by the collectivisation of agriculture and the killing or deporting of thousands of Estonians.

But throughout the decades of Soviet domination, Estonians still hoped for freedom. In the late 1980s Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev gave substance to their hopes and a mixture of pent-up bitterness and national feelings fuelled mass demands for self-rule. In 1988 huge numbers of people gathered in Estonia to sing previously banned national songs in what became known as the Singing Revolution. An estimated 300,000 attended one song gathering in Tallinn.

In November 1988, Estonia’s supreme soviet passed a declaration of sovereignty; in August 1989, 2 million people formed a human chain stretching from Tallinn to the Lithuanian capital of Vilnius, many of them calling for secession. In August 1991 Estonia declared full independence, and the following month the country joined the United Nations and began to consolidate its new-found nationhood.

A protracted border dispute with Russia eased in 1997 with the signing of an agreement that remains unratified. But relations with the former imperial masters haven’t been completely smooth since. In 2000, the two countries undertook a series of diplomatic explusions as a result of espionage allegations.

Estonia became the first Baltic country to start direct accession talks with the EU in 1998 and formally joined in May 2004, just two months after its official entry into NATO.

Estonia has been populated by the native Finno Ugric Estonians since prehistory. It was first christianised when the German “Livonian Sword Brethren” and Denmark conquered the land by 1227. Subsequent foreign powers that controlled Estonia at various times included Denmark, Sweden, Poland and finally (1710 de facto, 1721 de jure, see Treaty of Nystad) Russia. However, the upper classes and the higher middle class remained primarily Baltic German until roughly 1918; the Germans who had stayed then were either forced by Hitler or later Stalin to leave during or after the end of World War II.

Following the collapse of Imperial Russia after the October Revolution, Estonia declared its independence as a republic on February 24, 1918. It maintained this independence for twenty-two years, and the very same parliamentary government was reinstated in 1992, after the collapse of the Soviet Union. It included a parliament called Riigikogu, elected by all Estonians age 20 or above. In 1934, the parliamentary government was replaced with a more centralized, authoritarian system by President Konstantin Päts.

The country was included in the Soviet Union in June 1940, as a consequence of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. Many of its political and intellectual leaders were repressed or killed. The country was occupied by the Third Reich from 1941 to 1944, when Soviet forces reconquered it. Estonia regained its independence on August 20, 1991, with the Singing Revolution and the collapse of the Soviet Union. August 20 is now a national holiday in Estonia.

The last Russian troops left on August 31, 1994, and Estonia joined NATO on March 29, 2004 and the European Union on May 1, 2004.

Estonia signed a controversial border agreement with Russia on May 18, 2005, slightly redefining the border they had been using since 1991, but the implementation of the agreement is still subject to the approval of both the Estonian Riigikogu and the Russian Duma, the respective parliaments of both nations.