Royal Academy of Turku

The Royal Academy of Turku (Latin: Regia Academia Aboensis, Finnish: Turun akatemia, Swedish: Åbo Kungliga Akademi), was the name of the University of Helsinki until 1809, when it was renamed the Imperial Academy of Turku. In 1828 the institution was moved from Turku after the Great Fire to Helsinki, in line with the relocation of Finland's capital.

The academy was founded in 1640 by Queen Christina of Sweden at the proposal of Count Per Brahe on base of Turku Cathedral School (f. 1276). It was the Swedish Empire's third university following Uppsala University, founded in 1477, and the Academia Gustaviana (now the University of Tartu in Estonia), founded in 1632.

The first printing shop in Finland was established at the academy in 1642. The printer was Peder Walde from Sweden.

Turku was the largest city in Finland, while she was under Swedish sovereignty. In 1809 Finland was ceded to Russia and the capital of the new Grand Duchy of Finland was relocated to Helsinki in 1812, as Turku was regarded as being too remote from Saint Petersburg. As a result of the "Great Fire" of 1827, which devastated most of the city, the government offices that had remained were finally moved to the new capital, and so was also the university. It continued in Helsinki, first as the Imperial Alexander University in Finland, and, following Finland's independence in 1917, as the University of Helsinki.

Both the Swedish-speaking Åbo Akademi University (1918) and the Finnish speaking University of Turku (1920) are much newer entities in Turku, although they claim an academic tradition at the location since the 17th century, in spite of a break for almost a century.

See also

• List of universities in Finland (present-day universities)
• History of Finland
• History of Sweden

External links

• The University of Helsinki official history (in English) - retrieved 31 January, 2006
• Pirkko Forsman Svensson: From monolingual to bi- and multilingual instruction at the University of Helsinki