Tammsaare was born in Järvamaa, in the municipality of Albu, village of Vetepere, the son of a farmer. He came from a poor background, but managed to collect enough money for his education. More so his family was quite enlightened for the time, with his father for instance ordering newspapers, which most Estonian farmers didn't. He studied in Väike-Maarja and Tartu in Hugo Treffner's Gymnasium, and afterwards at the University of Tartu, where he studied law. Tammsaare's studies were interrupted by tuberculosis in 1911. He spent over a year in a sanatorium in Sochi — where his memorial house is open to the public — and the following six years in his brother's farm in Koitjärve, Estonia (now part of Põhja-Kõrvemaa Nature Reserve), reading works of Cervantes, Shakespeare and Homer. His younger sister, Maria Hansen, was the mother of Tammaare's nephew, actor Arno Suurorg.