Ehmja Manor

Ehmja appears in records in 1529, when it belonged to Johann Varnsbeke, a canon of Haapsalu cathedral. Around 1600 it was held by the powerful De la Gardie counts, and in 1869 it went to Alexander von Hoyningen-Huene, an ornithologist who also owned Maalse. The two-storey late-baroque house was probably built at the end of the 18th century, and its heavy-walled cellars are thought to be medieval. After the 1919 nationalisation the house slowly fell apart and became a ruin in the 1960s and 70s. The only building that survives, rebuilt in part, is the distillery from the later 19th century.