Österkullabäckenin kylä- ja viljelymaisema (Österkullabäckens by- och odlingslandskap)

English translation (from the Finnish)

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Description

The central elements of the village and field landscape spreading at the head of a sheltered bay and clearly bounded by the shores of the former bay, namely the village sites, the open slope fields and the course of the Suuri Rantatie, are medieval. The whole forms a landscape that arose near the coast and is representative and typical in terms of settlement, building and transport history.

The village and cultivated landscape of Österkullabäcken includes the villages of Österkulla, Dalin, Sonasund and Innanbäck, and the course of the Suuri Rantatie. The small villages, which lie close to one another, have survived on their old village sites. With the exception of Österkulla, they are located on hilly areas on the edges of the fragmented and undulating cultivated plain. Österkulla village forms the landscape's focal point in the middle of the cultivated plain. The building stock of the villages on the cultivated plain consists mainly of farmhouses and virkatalo farmsteads from the 19th century and the early 20th century.

On the Österkulla village hill, the former building groups of the Östergård virkatalo and the Västergård nimismiehentalo have survived, whose main buildings date from the 18th and 19th centuries. Stone fences, planted deciduous trees and stone cellars are also characteristic of the hill. The school in Sonasund was completed in 1922, and the former paritupa section and luhti of the military virkatalo date from the late 18th century. The main building of Mellangård in Dalin village was built in the 18th century; its present appearance dates from the 1930s. The main building of Kalars was completed in the 1920s. The old village centre of Innanbäck has survived as an inhabited area. East of the village sites there are Iron Age burial mounds.

History

The villages of the Österkullabäcken village and cultivated landscape were settled in the Middle Ages. The bottom of the former bay, the clay flats of Gördviken, was well suited to cultivation on the upper slopes. Because cultivation was limited, the villages were small and close to one another. In the early modern period, in the 1560s, Dalin village had four farms, Österkulla two, Sonasund one and Innanbäck four farms. The highway crossing the cultivated plain was part of the Suuri Rantatie linking Turku and Viipuri, which was the most important road in Finland in the Middle Ages.

Österkullan Östergård was formed in the late 17th century as a virkatalo for the muster clerk of the Uudenmaan ja Hämeen rakuunarykmentti. The present double-house type main building and the luhti were built in the 1740s. The farm was mainly farmed by tenants until the 1930s. Sonasund, an isolated farm, was turned into a virkatalo in the 1680s, first for a corporal of the Uudenmaan ja Hämeen ratsuväkirykmentti and later for a sergeant major (vääpeli) of the Uudenmaan rakuunat. The present main building was completed in the late 18th century and has later been extended with gable rooms and a cross-centre. The vaulted cellar beneath the residential building is older than the present building. The present handsome Empire-style main building of Österkullan Västergård was built in 1825 by nimismies Carl Johan Lemström. The yard also includes wing buildings, the more easterly of which was apparently completed in 1814.

The Suuri Rantatie and the central role of the coast in transport and communications are linked to Telegrafberget, located in Innanbäck village along the road. Finland's first optical telegraph was completed on the coast in the 1850s. At that time telegraph towers were built at regular intervals on the hilltops of the coast. Most of these structures have disappeared, but the name referring to the telegraph has survived in many places.