Names
Tobiase R.
(Rudolf Tobias, 1873-1918)
First professional Estonian composer, whose Julius Caesar was also the country’s first symphonic work. Face on the front of the 50-krooni banknote with the Estonian Opera House on the back (for information on Estonian currency, see Krooni). Previously Slobodka (1908), Slabodka (1910), Slobotka (1921) and Slobodi (-1923) with the latter’s starting date unspecified, after the 19th-C expansion of Peter I’s Russian quarter, or ‘Слобода’ (sloboda), around today’s Roheline aas and Poska for servants and other employees at Kadriorg Palace (see Vana Slobodaa).
Tohu (1] Toht; 2] Tohk; 3] Tohu)
1] Birch bark; 2] Stern of small boat; and 3] Mist, haze. The earliest-known written document in Finno-Ugric – Tohtkiri (birch bark letter) No.292 – was carved on birch bark in the first half of the 13th C in a dialect of the Olonets Karelia region. Although its meaning is far from clear (jumolanuliinimiži | nulisě[x]anoliomobu | [xu]molasudьnipoxov[i], QED), it seems to involve God and arrows, and may well be an incantation or ‘thunder spell’; Tohtkiri No.403, incidentally, has been said to be a “Finnic-Slavic business travelers’ lexicon” although with only six words cheat-sheet may be a better description. Street forms a loop off Kase, so 1] is the most likely.
Tolli (Toll)
1) Customs, duty; 2) Inch. Clearly the former, named after the Tallinna Tollimaja (Tallinn Customs Building, 1786-1873). Street once known as dwerstrate (1430) suster dwerstrate (1505) (i.e. the street crossing the nun’s street), then apparently nameless until the end of 17th C. At No.8 of this street in 1817, today’s city archives and then the customs house, was the epicenter of Tallinn’s juiciest scandal, a customs fraud involving one Diedrich Rodde III, merchant, lawyer, reluctant Blackhead, passable freemason, US consul, learned alderman, potential mayor and fiscal scallywag. Attempting to alleviate the treasury’s coffers of some 100,000 rubles, somewhat more than the city’s budget, but too little apparently to grease enough palms, and the plot was out. Friends, family and nobles alike were shipped off to Siberia while, inexplicably, Rodde was simply banished to Saaremaa.
Tõllu (Tõll)
Earlier or alternative name of Suur-Tõll (Big Tõll), legendary beer-drinking and cabbage-consuming giant who lived on the island of Saaremaa and spent much of his time throwing rocks at people, notably Vanatühi, Lord of the Underworld, literally ‘Old Empty’ (but perhaps with a side-hint of everlasting greed, covetousness or soul-bulimia, see kõht on tühi in Intro) although sometimes translated as ‘useless old bugger’. Parallel to Leigeri, his brother on Hiiumaa.
