Kurista is one of the oldest manors in the area: it already existed in the 1300s as a manor of the Viljandi commander. From 1632 it belonged to the Taubes, and from 1820 until 1919 to the Samson-Himmelstjernas. The house was a fairly short, tall two-story building with attic rooms on a third level. The ground floor was stone and the upper floor timber. It was probably built in several stages: the older stone part in the late 1700s and the rest in the 1800s. The manor had a large park and many outbuildings.
After the fire a new building was raised using the surviving walls and later lengthened; for many years it housed the Jõgeva forestry enterprise. A number of altered outbuildings survive, including a granary with Late Baroque details at the edge of the former carriage circle.
Owners
Taube1632–1820
von Samson-Himmelstjerna1820–1919
Good to know
Under the Samson-Himmelstjernas, Kaave and Kaavere were run as Kurista’s secondary manors.
Of the family cemetery four kilometers southwest, the ruins of a Gothic Revival chapel remain.
