Landmark Europe
Kõpu Lighthouse
Kõpu Lighthouse is a huge white tower on an island in Estonia. It is about 500 years old, and its light shines far out over the sea!
Kõpu Lighthouse stands on the island of Hiiumaa in Estonia. Built in the 1500s as a daymark for ships, it is 36 meters tall and stands on the island's highest point, so its light shines 102.6 meters above the sea. Visit Estonia calls it the oldest lighthouse on the Baltic Sea.
Kõpu Lighthouse, on the Kõpu peninsula of Hiiumaa, was raised in the first half of the 16th century as a daymark demanded by the Hanseatic League. Visit Estonia calls it the oldest lighthouse in Estonia, the Baltic States and on the Baltic Sea: a 36 m tower on a 67 m hilltop whose light shines at 102.6 m above sea level.
Photo: Abrget47j, CC BY-SA 3.0 EE, via Wikimedia Commons
Discover Kõpu Lighthouse
Kõpu Lighthouse is on Hiiumaa, an island in Estonia.
It stands on a hill among pine trees, and it is very wide at the bottom.
Kõpu Lighthouse stands on a wooded hill in the middle of the Kõpu peninsula on the island of Hiiumaa. The tower is 36 meters tall and sits on the island's highest point, 67 meters above the sea.
So its light shines 102.6 meters above the sea. Visit Estonia says no other lighthouse by the Baltic Sea is as high.
Visit Estonia says the lighthouse was built 67 m above sea level at the highest point of Hiiumaa; the tower stands 36 m above the ground, so its light shines at 102.6 m, higher than any other lighthouse by the Baltic Sea.
The Estonian Lighthouse Society calls it the symbol of Hiiumaa, standing on a promontory in the middle of the Kõpu peninsula.
- Where
- Kõpu peninsula, Hiiumaa, Estonia
- Tower height
- 36 m
- Light above the sea
- 102.6 m
- Built
- First half of the 1500s (1504–1540 or 1514–1538)
A landmark for traders
Long ago, trading ships sailed past this island.
Some ships were lost at sea, so people built a tall tower to warn them about the shallow water.
About 500 years ago, the most important east-west trade route in northern Europe passed Hiiumaa, and merchants complained that ships were being lost. The Hanseatic League asked for a landmark.
The tower was built in the first half of the 1500s to warn ships of the shallow waters off the island. For more than a hundred years it had no light at all: sailors used it as a daymark.
The Estonian Lighthouse Society says the Hanseatic League's demands for a navigation mark date from the 1490s and that Tallinn's town council started the work; its page gives the building years both as 1504-1540 and as 1514-1538. Visit Estonia links it to the main east-west trade route and to ships lost on the shallows.
For over a century the tower was an unlit daymark about 20 meters high, the first landmark sailors from the west had to spot.
From wood fires to lamps
In 1649 people began lighting a big wood fire on top of the tower.
Later, lamps and a glass lantern room took the fire's place.
In 1649 a wood fire began to be burned on the top platform. It needed more than 1,000 loads of wood a year, brought by local farmers, and six men kept it burning.
In the early 1800s the state took over the tower. Stairs were cut inside it, two rooms were made in the upper part, and a glass lantern room with oil lamps was built on top.
From 1649 wood was burned on the platform, needing more than 1,000 loads a year delivered by local peasants, with six men employed to tend the fire. The Lighthouse Society dates the state takeover to 1805 in one passage and to 1810 in another.
A staircase was then cut into the tower, two rooms were carved into its upper part, and a glazed lantern room with 25 oil lamps and brass reflectors was built. The top of the tower was rebuilt in 1845, and the lighthouse has largely kept that appearance.
A light seen far away
In 1902 the lighthouse got a new light from Paris.
It turned round and round and could be seen far out at sea!
In 1860 the lighthouse got a rotating glass lens. In 1902 a new rotating light bought at the Paris World's Fair was installed; it turned in a bath of mercury and could be seen 21 nautical miles away.
By 1990, a strong shell of reinforced concrete had been built around the old tower to prevent it from collapsing.
A rotating dioptric apparatus came in 1860. In 1902 a new one bought at the Paris World's Fair was installed; the heavy optics, turned by a clock mechanism, rotated in a mercury bath and showed the light 21 nautical miles away.
After falls of the outer coating, caused by the building's age and its weak mortar, a reinforced concrete shell was poured around the tower in 1988-1990 (the Society's English summary says 1989-90). The whole lighthouse complex is a protected cultural monument and is on IALA's list of 100 lighthouse architectural monuments.
- Wood fire on top
- From 1649
- Light from Paris
- 1902
- Seen from (1902 light)
- 21 nautical miles
- Concrete shell
- 1988–1990 (also given as 1989–90)
Among the pines
This photo shows the bright white tower on a sunny day.
Its sides slope out wide at the bottom, and pine trees grow all around.
This photo was taken on 13 August 2012. It shows the bright white tower with a red lantern on top, small red-framed windows, and thick sloping supports that make the bottom very wide. A small building with a red roof sits at its foot, between tall pine trees.
The photo (Abrget47j, 13 August 2012, Wiki Loves Monuments) shows the white square tower with its red-trimmed lantern and gallery, small window openings, and the massive sloping buttresses that widen its base, a small red-roofed entrance building, pines on both sides and a grassy hilltop.
Amazing facts
-
For more than 100 years, this lighthouse had no light at all!
For over a century the tower was only a daymark, a tall shape sailors could see in daylight.
For over a hundred years the beacon was an unlit structure about 20 m high, visible far out to sea.
-
Its old fire needed more than 1,000 loads of wood every year!
The wood fire lit in 1649 needed more than 1,000 loads of wood a year and six men to keep it going.
From 1649 the fire required over 1,000 loads of wood a year, delivered by local peasants, and six men were employed to keep it burning.
-
No lighthouse by the Baltic Sea shines from higher up!
Visit Estonia says no other lighthouse by the Baltic Sea has its light as high as Kõpu's 102.6 meters.
With the tower's 36 m on a 67 m hill, the light is 102.6 m above sea level; Visit Estonia says no other Baltic Sea lighthouse is as high.
Words to know
- lighthouse
- a tower with a bright light that guides ships and warns them of danger
- daymark
- a tall shape on land that sailors can see and steer by in daylight
- Hanseatic League
- a group of trading towns around the Baltic and North Seas in the Middle Ages
- buttress
- a thick wall that leans against a building to hold it up
- lens
- a curved piece of glass that bends light
- shoal
- a place where the sea is shallow and dangerous for ships
Discovery challenge
-
On which island is Kõpu Lighthouse?
On which Estonian island does Kõpu Lighthouse stand?
Kõpu Lighthouse stands on the highest point of which island?
- Hiiumaa
- Sicily
- Iceland
Show the answer
Hiiumaa
Hiiumaa!
Hiiumaa, in Estonia.
Hiiumaa.
-
Which traders asked for the tower to be built?
Which group of trading towns demanded a landmark on Kõpu?
Whose demands from the 1490s led to the Kõpu daymark?
- The Hanseatic League
- The Silk Road caravans
- The Vikings
Show the answer
The Hanseatic League
The Hanseatic League!
The Hanseatic League.
The Hanseatic League.
-
How high above the sea does the light shine?
How high above sea level is Kõpu's light?
With a 36 m tower on a 67 m hilltop, at what height above sea level is the light?
- 102.6 meters
- 10.2 meters
- 1,026 meters
Show the answer
102.6 meters
102.6 meters!
102.6 meters.
102.6 m.
-
What was burned on top of the tower starting in 1649?
What fuel was burned on the tower's platform from 1649?
From 1649, what fuel needed more than 1,000 loads a year?
- Wood
- Gasoline
- Ice
Show the answer
Wood
Wood!
Wood.
Wood, delivered by local peasants.
-
Where did the 1902 light come from?
At which world's fair was the 1902 light bought?
The rotating apparatus installed in 1902 was purchased at which world's fair?
- Paris
- Tokyo
- Cairo
Show the answer
Paris
From Paris!
The Paris World's Fair.
The Paris World's Fair.
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For parents & teachers
What children will learn
- Explain the difference between a daymark and a lighthouse.
- Describe how lighthouse lights changed over 500 years.
- Explain why a light placed higher can be seen farther away.
Recommended ages: 4 to 17 · About 15 minutes
Talk about it
- Why would sailors need a landmark even in daylight?
- What would it be like to keep a wood fire burning on a tower every night?
- Why might builders wrap an old tower in a concrete shell?
Try at home or in class
- Shine a flashlight across a dark room from the floor and then from a chair, and compare how far the light reaches.
- Find Estonia, Hiiumaa and the Baltic Sea on a map and draw a trading ship's route past the island.
Key vocabulary: lighthouse, daymark, Hanseatic League, buttress, lens, shoal
Where these facts come from
- Wikidata , Wikimedia Foundation (CC0 1.0)
- Kõpu lighthouse , Visit Estonia
- Kõpu lighthouse , Eesti Tuletornide Selts (Estonian Lighthouse Society)
- File:Kõpu tuletorn Hiiumaal.jpg , Wikimedia Commons
- Wikimedia Commons , Wikimedia Foundation (Per file (public domain, CC0, CC BY or CC BY-SA); see each media record)
Checked, not yet human-reviewed. Last updated November 1, 2026. Spotted a mistake? Tell us.