Since the beginning of 1990’s the teaching of history was developed in TPU (Tallinn Pedagogical University) in close cooperation with Estonian Institute of Humanities (EIH) where history was taught since the Institute was established in 1989, and with the Institute of History. The researchers of the Institute of History participated in the teaching process and some of the teaching was conducted on the Institute premises.

The ever more increasing collaboration between TPU Department of History, EIH Chair of History and Institute of History made further steps towards merger the only possible solution. For TPU and EIH this was the only option how to combine teaching closely with research and solve the problems of well-qualified teaching staff. For the Institute of History the merger was an option to start training new researchers to replace, eventually, their aging research personnel and bring new talented researchers into research and grant projects. Merger was recommended by experts when the Institute of History’s research was evaluated.

Since January 2003 TPU, Institute of History and EIH have joint curricula on BA level (120 CP), MA level (80 CP) PhD level (160 CP). The first joint admittance on these programmes took place in 2003 (BA and MA); the first PhD students were admitted in 2004.

Since January 2004 the structure of the Department of History consists of 3 chairs: the Chair of General History, the Chair of Estonian History and the Chair of Archaeology.

The three institutions TPU, Institute of History, and EIH prepared themselves for the merger for several years. The merger happened gradually and on 15^th of May 2005 Tallinn University was established. On 29^th of July 2005 the Institute of History became a member of Tallinn University. On 26^th of September 2005 the former Department of History was transferred to the Institute of History. The history students and staff from EIH were also transferred to the Institute of History. As part of the reorganization, the former Department of History and Estonian Cultural Studies in EIH was closed. All the history curricula from both institutions became the curricula of Tallinn University Institute of History.

The Institute of History became the uniting structure for the faculties, chairs, laboratories and other structural units of the aforementioned three institutions, to which structure also the 3 chairs of the former Department of History now belong.