Tallinn Museum of Orders of Knighthood — Attraction in Tallinn

There are hundreds of artifacts - medals, sashes - from dozens of national, religious, chivalric and knight orders. You will learn some interesting trivia. For example, did you know that the Holy See issues membership in the Order of St. Gregory and Sylvester to non-Catholics, and the beknighted enjoy the right to parade through St. Peter's Basilica on a horse?

Despite learning much about the various orders associated with the nations and organizations of the world I did not feel very satisfied with my trip to this museum. First, I did not get a sufficient overview of the significance of being knighted or otherwise invited to wear a medal. Why is it a big deal to belong to an order? I extrapolated some things - that the medals must be attached to honors and privileges and they are given out to promote group identity (as when powerful people create orders and then give out membership - The idea is to create a followship of allies) or promote socially desirable behaviour (like when the Queen knighted Benedict Cumberpatch the actor who plays Sherlock Holmes and donates to charity). But, it would have been really nice to have learned more about the sociology of orders and their associated medals from the tour.

To continue on this line of critique, one wonders whether orders were a successful way to promote desirable behaviour, and if so, would a revival of orders and medalsgiving be a way to promote virtue today? Should I start my own order and give out medals to promote an alliance around my family? I didn't feel like this museum equipped me to begin answering these questions. I had to give it three stars though because it provoked me to have thoughts about orders and medals of the kind you now read here, and if a place provokes thought then it must be overall a good...

This museum is truly awesome! We haven't expected it when we came, but their collection has so many interesting objects that we couldn't fit in the time slot that we planned for visiting, and we are returning again) The museum is well organized, audio guide is interesting, and you don't want to skip anything)) The collection contains valuable originals of orders from different countries and centuries. The first part of the exhibition is organized by the type of the order, for example, Order of the Golden Fleece or Order of the Garter, others are organized by countries or regions. We highly recommend to visit it next time you are un the...

One of the best and most unexpected experiences I had in Tallinn.

We thought based on the images that it would be a tiny cellar with some medals. We were wrong.

It was three large rooms with medals and accessories from all over the world, with information plaques next to each display case explaining the history of the pieces.

Me and my two friends are into history and we got a guided tour and loads of backstory from the guy running the place. He was very knowledgeable and enthusiastic, and his enthusiasm was infectious, we had a great time.

We stayed longer than we had planned for and really enjoyed ourselves. I would highly recommend...