The Kaali Meteor Crater

The Estonian island of Saaremaa is without doubt one of the most beautiful parts of this northern Baltic country. Cloaked with sweet-smelling pine forests and studded with grassy meadows and rich farmland, its more than 1,000 square miles is home to less than 40,000 people. For many Estonians and foreigners alike this truly is an enchanted place.

It’s probably not surprising then that the island is also the source of a rich variety of myths and legends stretching back into antiquity. Many places are associated with tales of heroic deeds and epic adventures with hills, lakes and other landforms playing a prominent role. None, however, are perhaps more mysterious than the Kaali Meteor Crater.

It’s a 4-hour coach journey from Tallinn to the island’s capital Kuressaare, a quick ferry crossing the short distance from the mainland. It’s a pretty place – the town boasts the impressive medieval Bishop’s Castle, a fortress that wouldn’t look out of place in a fairy tale – but I’m not here to sightsee. Instead I dump my bag at a local youth hostel and pick up a rented bicycle; this will be my transport for the day.

Kaali is little more than a hamlet, and it takes me just over an hour to pedal the dozen miles or so through a mixture of farmland and meadows. There’s a village store, a small post office and a scattering of houses and farm buildings. And there, incongruously tucked next to a school building, is the Crater.

A perfectly round hole in the ground, it measures over 300 feet (100 meters) in diameter and is over 60 feet (20 metres) deep. In the centre lies a still green lake with barely a ripple disturbing the surface. Surrounded by a steep embankment covered with shrubs and trees, it’s unusual in that it’s fed and maintained almost entirely by rainwater. On a crisp summer morning like today it’s a serenely impressive sight but during times of drought it’s often little more than a puddle.

The force that created such a hole was impressive. It’s believed that the meteor responsible hit the Earth at some 5-10 miles (10-20km) per second, punching its way into the ground with a force equivalent to an atomic bomb. Eight other smaller craters pepper the area – formed as the original meteor broke up into pieces in the Earth’s atmosphere - but it’s the main crater that takes centre stage.

But what makes Kaali particularly special is that at a mere 4,000 years old it’s thought to be one of the few such impact craters in the world to be created in the recent past, and the only one to have taken place in a populated area.

At the time of the impact Saaremaa was entering the Nordic Bronze Age. People were starting to form small settlements and communities, and numerous rock art sites across Scandinavia attest to a period of innovation and expansion. On-going contact between different groups led to an ever-increasing exchange of cultural ideas and new technologies; in particular a rich collection of myths and legends began to develop, with epic tales of heroic battles between the gods featuring both in regional mythology and further afield.

It’s thought that Kaali features prominently in some of these stories. In nearby Finland – there are strong cultural and linguistic links between Finns and Estonians – the Kalevala epic tells the story of Louhi, a mighty witch-queen capable of changing shape and casting powerful spells.

One day Louhi steals the Sun and fire from mankind, plunging the world into total darkness. Ukko, the god of the sky, orders a new Sun to be made from a spark. Ilmatar, the Virgin of the Air, begins to make a new Sun but the spark drops from the sky and hits the ground, creating a new lake in its wake.

“The Sun with a long tail flew with deafening noise over the sky, wood was cut down, trees were set afire and the fortress destroyed. The bright flame of the explosion shook the shores of the Baltic Sea and it was even noticed in faraway countries...

“Then it was as quiet as a grave, pitch-dark and only a shimmer from burning forests could be seen. The Sun had fallen down and perished. We couldn't explain it in the other way. But the next day the Sun was in the sky again…”

But all is not lost. Finnish adventurers witness the ball of fire falling somewhere "behind the Neva river" - the direction of Estonia from Finnish Karelia – and after journeying in that direction they are finally able to gather flames from a forest fire.

Another story has it that Saaremaa is the legendary island of Thule. First mentioned by ancient Greek geographer Pytheas, the theory is that Thule is derived from the Finnic word tule ("of fire") and thus ultimately from the folklore of Kalevala. Similarly, the Ancient Greek myth of Phaëton tells of the son of Helios who lost control of his Chariot of the Sun, scorching the Earth before being struck down by a thunderbolt hurled by Zeus. The meteor strike is also thought to inspire parts of the Edda, a prominent collection of medieval Icelandic peoms. Notably, Kaali was considered the place where "The sun went to rest.

Archaeology certainly seems to back up the claim that Kaali enjoyed some sort of sacred status at the time. Thought to have been surrounded by an Iron Age wall almost 500m in length, a large number of domestic animal bones have been found in or around the lake dating from prehistoric times right until the 17^th century. It’s believed that these sacrifices were offerings to ensure good harvests and that these continued to be made in secret long after the church forbade such Paganesque practices. Silver ornaments dating from the first few centuries AD have also been discovered at the site.

Near the Crater is the Kaali Visitors’ Centre, a smart modern building housing a small museum. The receptionist looks genuinely surprised to see a visitor and jumps into action, racing around the few rooms switching on lights. The displays are mostly dedicated to the geology of the Estonian islands but it also features a section on the history of the Crater, including the moment in 1937 when researchers realised it was created by a meteor and not by volcanic activity. It’s a display that firmly has its scientific hat on; little attention is paid to the myths and legends associated with the Crater. It seems a shame.

As I cycle my way back to Kuressaare I try to imagine the “Falling of heavenly fire, explosion, clouds of dust and smoke, and the landscape changed beyond recognition, (which) must have caused fright and horror and awe among the surviving inhabitants.” It’s not beyond the realms of possibility that such a cataclysmic event must have left a lasting impression upon the people of the island and that stories of the sun falling from the sky spread to other cultures as trade and warfare grew. The most tangible legacy of the Kaali meteor is perhaps not found in the Crater that bears its name but in the stories and legends that find their origins in this most idyllic of places.

(This article also appears in Fortean Times 297 - February 2013)