Kat­telus in the older days

Kat­telus of Kar­jalo­hja — a short his­tory of the vil­lage and the farm

Kat­telus farm lies in the vil­lage of Kat­telus, today part of the city of Loh­ja in west­ern Uusi­maa. The­re has been some pop­u­la­tion since the Sto­ne Age as indi­cated by numer­ous sep­a­rate archae­o­log­i­cal dis­cov­er­ies. Also some remains from Iron Age set­tle­ment have pre­vailed. Migra­tion from Swe­den in the past few cen­turies has affec­ted local pop­u­la­tion a lot as shown by many place and fam­ily names.

The ear­li­est traces of Kat­telus farm lead to the 14th cen­tury. By the year 1549 the­re were four houses in the vil­lage. First writ­ten ref­er­ences have been found in old court doc­u­ments from 1547. There’s an ent­ry of 9 marks penal­ty to Las­se of Pyö­li for punch­ing three brui­ses at Jacob of Kat­telus. Anot­her penal­ty of 3 marks was sen­tenced to three farm­ers from Kat­telus, Mic­hel, Oleff and Lass for dis­re­gard­ing their duties in road and brid­ge maintenance.

Towards the end of the 16th cen­tury one of the farm­houses beca­me a cav­alry esta­te of the king­dom of Swe­den. Due to tax exemp­tion it even­tu­ally over­took the other houses. Around the mid­dle of the 17th cen­tury the­re was only one house left in the vil­lage. Later the esta­te was divi­ded by inher­i­tance and through­out the 19th cen­tury the own­wer­ship took many turns from one to anot­her. The begin­ning of the 20th cen­tury saw all the houses join­ing into one farm con­sti­tut­ing the who­le of the vil­lage once again. That’s when the ances­tors of the cur­rent own­ers acqui­red the farm. Today the 5th gen­er­a­tion of the fam­ily is in duty. Dur­ing the 20th cen­tury var­i­ous parts of the farm have been sub­di­vided for set­tle­ment, first for relie­ved ten­ant farm­ers and then after the World War II for refu­gees from Karelia.

The vil­lage of Kat­telus has always been a tra­di­tional farm­ing one even though fore­stry and fish­ing have also been impor­tant for liv­ing. At least from the 16th cen­tury onwards the­re has been farm­ing to some extent on the fields of the village.

Source: Mäke­lä, Mat­ti (1998). Kar­jalo­h­jan Kat­telus — kylä ja tila — asu­tushis­to­riaa, omis­ta­jia, vil­jeli­jöitä. Self published.

Kat­telus today

Until around 1990 the Kat­telus farm was essen­tially a typ­i­cal tra­di­tional Fin­nish farm. Dai­ry cat­tle pro­duc­tion was cea­sed in 1983 whi­le pig breed­ing con­tin­ued as far as 1999. Farm­ing has pre­vailed through­out the years regard­less. Fore­stry plays an impor­tant part as always. In ear­ly 1980ies the first few cot­tages were ren­ted for hol­i­day guests. To the mid-​ni­ne­ties even more was inves­ted to this kind of activ­i­ties. Some new cot­tages were built for short-​ti­me rent­ing and also other func­tions kept emerg­ing. Ear­ly in the new mil­len­nium the old sto­ne ware­house and adjoin­ing sta­ble were ren­o­vated to facil­i­tate grand fes­tiv­i­ties, wed­dings, birth­day par­ties etc. In the mid-​ni­ne­ties all farm­ing was switc­hed over to orga­nic. Recent­ly reti­red mas­ter of the farm was keen­ly inter­ested in dig­ging arti­fi­cial ponds and cul­ti­vat­ing cray­fish in them as also in pur­su­ing var­i­ous other mac­hi­ne-​dri­ven exca­va­tion pro­jects as an entrepreneur.

The last gene­ra­tion chan­ge on the Kat­te­lus farm took place on 1.1.2011. The cur­rent owners want to offer their clients a beau­ti­ful rural envi­ron­ment whe­re they can relax from their busy lives and inc­rea­se their well-being. They want the expe­riences they offer to be aut­hen­tic and natu­re-based. It is also impor­tant to be able to put their own values into prac­tice in their busi­ness acti­vi­ties and to deve­lop envi­ron­men­tal res­pon­si­bi­li­ty in par­ticu­lar. It is also impor­tant to have mea­ning­ful acti­vi­ties and the oppor­tu­ni­ty to live and rai­se one’s children on a farm.

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Loca­tion

Tit­le Address Desc­rip­tion
Loca­tion
Kat­te­lus 17, 10360 Mus­tio, FinlandKat­te­lus 17 10360 MUSTIO

Con­tact

Ter­hi Haa­ta­ja: 050 303 3625
Mik­ko Haa­ta­ja: 0400 017 289

info@katteluksentila.fi

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