Cultural gem: Struwe 2

Behind a somewhat forgotten exterior at Struwe 2 lies a cultural-historical gem whose walls conceal ultra-rare books and an extraordinarily rich past. It is home to the Naturalists’ Society – founded in 1853, it is the oldest and only continuously operating scientific society in the Baltics.

From 1829 to 1840, the house was home to G. F. Parrot, son of the university’s first rector, a professor of physics and medicine, and one of Russia’s first mountaineers. It was right from this spot that his famous 1829 expedition to Mount Ararat began. The house has also hosted naturalist Alexander von Humboldt, writer Khachatur Abovian, the father of embryology Karl Ernst von Baer, and linguists F. J. Wiedemann and Johannes Aavik.

Struwe 2 is one of just ten wooden buildings to survive the Great Fire of Tartu in 1775, and the only remaining structure marking the historic beginning of Tähe Street. It was first mentioned in records in 1758. Between 1803 and 1805, it housed the university’s – and indeed all of Russia’s – first anatomical theatre. After World War II, the building served as a kindergarten attended by writer Jaan Kaplinski and human rights activist Mart Niklus, among others. In the 1970s and 1980s, it was home to the addiction treatment department of the Tartu Psychoneurological Hospital.