Crossroads

The Baltic state of Estonia has long been a commercial, ethnic and religious crossroads. Eastern Orthodoxy was brought to the region by Russian missionaries in the middle ages and, despite the Lutheranism of its Scandinavian neighbours and Hanseatic traders, it stuck. Even today it’s the highest denomination in an increasingly secular state. The magnificent Alexander Nevsky Cathedral in Tallinn, pictured here on a grey day in February, is the icon of the fiercely independent Estonian Orthodox Church.