66

EASTERN EUROPEAN FAMILY HISTORY RESEARCH

Daniel M. Schlyter 3685 Whitewood Court Salt Lake City, UT 84118

Getting Started History Library. Available records are listed in the Family History Library Catalog'" and may be or­ Genealogical research in Eastern Europe is dered at the Family History Library or family actually easier than American research. This is history centers. Not all records are in the perma­ because Europe has a strong tradition of record nent collection at the main library. All newly keeping. Civil and ecclesiastical laws required that acquired films must be ordered which can all births, maniages, and deaths be recorded. Thus sometimes take several weeks. It is best to call Eastern Europe has a far greater pool of resources abead (SOl) 240-2334 to order needed films a few to draw from for research. To successfully do weeks before your visit. When records have not your research you must answer several Key been microfilmed you will need to write for questions. The basic steps of research in Eastern information. The following pages give details Europe are: about microfilming and writing for each country.

~ Who was the emigrant ancestor! Do the Sources for Genealogical Research American part of your research first to learn as much about your heritage as possible, including Europe has many excellent sources for research. who actually came from the old country. Researcbers accustomed to genealogical researcb ~ Where was he from! Because records were kept in the U.S. and Canada often rely heavily on on a local basis you must determine where your census records, land records, wills and probates to ancestor was from. Some of the best sources to do build a pedigree of their families in North this are wbere he settled, including such things as America. This is because there often is nothing marriage records, death records, obituaries, better available. But in Europe the availability of natura1ization, etc. Passenger lists of anivals may vital records greatly improves the research give a birthplace. Many eastern Europeans sailed climate. from Hamburg. The passenger departure records of Hamburg still exist, are indexed and are Church Records and Civil Registration: These available on microfilm through the Family History are records of births, christenings, marriages, Library. . deaths, and burials made by church priests and ~ Where is that! Once you determine wbere your pastors and government officials. They are excell­ ancestor was from you must verify the spelling, ent sources of accurate information on names, determine where it is now (eastern Europe has had dates, and places of births, marriages, and deaths. a lot of border cbanges), and where the records They are the single, most significant source of were kept. Gazetteers are the best way to solve genealogical information in the eastern European these problems along with maps. The Family countries and are essential for genealogical History Library has an excellent collection of research. In most cases civil registration did not eastern European gazetteers. The most significant begin until the late 1800s. gazetteers for eastern Europe are listed lIt the end of this section. The earliest Catholic church records begin in the ~ Where are the records! This can be the late l500s. In general, church records began to be toughest question of all. For some of the eastern kept on a consistent basis in the mid to late 1600s. European natinns it is very difficult to get access By the 1800s laws were enacted in most areas to the records. Others are accessible by writing or requiring the churches to keep church records in a in person. In many cases the records are easily specified format and to make transcripts of the accessible on microfilm through the Family records for the benefit of the civil government. In

Utah Genealogical A"ociatioll 3rd Annual Confereoce 12-13 April 1996 149 certificate and it takes 2 to 3 months. Write to: Records filmed by the Family History Ubrary are not available from these republics until they The Embassy of the Hungarian Republic appear in the Family History Ubrary Catalog. 3910 Shoemaker Street N.W. Look for the specific place for which you need Washington, D.C. 20008 records. In some cases it is possible to do research in person but this is no simple matter and not Slovakia: The Family History Ubrary is presently recommended unless you have considerable microfilming the church records of Slovaida. Most experience and bave clear assurances that you will of eastern Slovakia is already filmed and in the be allowed in the archives. Until such time as Family History Ubrary Catalog. The collection records have been microfilmed the only practical continues to grow, but until records are listed in ways to get information is through one of the the catalog they are not available. The Slovak several genealogical research organizations that archives also provides a research service which is have been formed. The most best known of these especially helpful when the records you need are: haven't yet been filmed. All records of genealogical value in the Slovakia were RAGAS· The Russian American Genealogical natiooalized. Records from before 1900 are kept Archive Service: 'Ibis organization was formerly in stale regional archives [statnl oblosmi archiry]. with the National Archives Volunteer service in These records are accessible by writing or in Washington D.C. It is now an independent self­ person. The Ministry of the Interior and supporting (for profit) organization. They work Environment is responsible for the administration with archivists in Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine. of archives. Their archival administration •department processes genealogical research RAGAS requests. 'Ibis same agency can grant permission -1929 18th Street· NW for you to visit the archives in person. Suite 1112 Washington, DC 20009 If your ancestor was from Slovakia (formerly by Hungary), send your application directly to: PROBAND - This is a new self-supporting organization which assists people in tracing Slovak Ministry of Interior and Environment ancestry in the former USSR (especially Russia, Archivoa Sprava Belarus, Ukraine, and Moldova). For more Kri!kovl17 information contact: 811 04 Bratislava SLOVAKIA PROBAND-GENEALOGICAL BUREAU ul. Bekbtereva 35/2, 128 The archival administration will arrange for 11 55 16 Moscow searches of records (such as birth, marriage, and RUSSIA death registers) before 1900. They will send your request for research to the appropriate archive in FAST - This is a private firm with connections in Slovakia. Qualified archival researchers there will Uthuama, Latvia and Belarus. Contrary to the do the actual research and they will send you a implications of the name this company is not any report of the research done. With rare exceptions, faster than any other research company. All the only records available for genealogical companies that do research in the former Soviet research by mail are parish registers [matriky] of Union are painfully slow because the sources are births, marriages, and deaths. Other records such very difficult to find and use. as land records and census records exist and you can use them for research if you visit the archives FAST Genealogy Service yourself, but they are difficult to access by 85lO Wild Olive Drive writing. Potomac, MD 20854

RepUblics of the Former Soviet Union: The Other genealogical organizations and firms are acquisition of records from these republics varies emerging and many advertize or are referred to on considerably from republic to republic. In most the pages of various Jewish genealogical cases the process is proceeding very slowly. periodicals. One of the leading Jewish

Utah GenealogiL'al A'Sociation 3rd Annual Conference 12-13 April 1996 151 geoea1ogical periodicals is: Moldova: Microfilming recently began in this republic which has close cultural ties with Avotaynu Romania. For records not yet filmed try writing ISS North Washington Avenue directly to the Moldovan State Archives: Bergenfield, NJ 07621 Central State Archives of Moldova Russia: The Russian Republic is vast. 27028 Kishinev Microtilming began several years ago, but it will Georgi Assaki Str. 67B be many years before many areas are represented MOLDOVA in the collection of the Family ffistory Library. There are as yet DO significant Jewish records in Ukraine: The Family ffistory Library is presently the collection. Many genealogical researchers are acquiring microfilms of records from Ukraine but interested in the records of German colonists who the process will take many years. Presently settled in Russia and the Ukraine. No records are filming is ongoing at archives in Kiev, L'viv, and yet available from the Volga. Transcripts of the Chemigov. For records not yet filmed contact records of Protestant communities in the Ukraine RAGAS or write directly to the archives in (Black Sea and Volhynia), Belarus and the vicinity Ukraine. ofSt. Petersburg were stored at the Lutheran Consistory in St. Petersburg; and these records Central State Historical Archive of Ukraine have been microfilmed. Localities and film 252601 Kiev - 110 numbers for this set of records are listed in The Solomyanskaya wI. 24 Lulherans ofRussia; VoL 1 Parish index to the Ukraine churchbooks ofthe Evangelical Lulherans Consistory ofSt. Petersburg compiled by Tom Central State Historical Archive of Ukraine Edlund, published 1995 by the Germanic 290008 L'viv Genealogical Society, P.O. Box 16312 St. Paul, pI. Voiziednannya 3A Minnesota S5116. Not yet microfilmed. UKRAINE

Belarus: The Family History Library is presently acquiring microfilmed records from archives in State Archive of Transcarpathian Oblast Grodno and Minsk. 294008 Beregovo wI. Geroev 4A National Archives of Belarus UKRAINE 22038 Minsk wi. Kozlova, 26 The Family History Library is also acquiring BELARUS records from the former Soviet republics of Armenia and Georgia. Central State Historical Archive of Belarus 23023 Grodno Poland: Many church records and civil transcripts pI. Lenina, 2 of church records from Poland have been BELARUS microfilmed. In many cases however, they are filmed only up through the 1880s. Later records Baltic States: Most records of Estonia have been and records of communities that are not filmed can microfilmed and are available through the Family be obtained by writing. You can often get History Library. Many Latvian protestant records information by writing in Polish directly to the have been filmed. A few Lithuanian records are Catholic parish [parafia Rzymsko-katolicka] in the being microfilmed. For records not yet filmed town where your ancestor lived. For non-Catholics contact FAST or write directly to the Lithuanian or when you receive no response from the church State Archives: you can write to Polish state archives.

Lietuvos Valstybinis Archyvas Naczelna Dyreckja Archiw6w PaJlstowych Gerosios Vilties, 10 Skr. Poczt. 1005 20I5 Vilnius 00-950 Warszawa LITHUANIA POLAND

Utah Genealogical Association 3rd Annual Conference 12-13 April 1996 152 Poland was partitiooed in 1795 between Russia, Former Yugoslavia: Records have been Austria, and Germany. The style of record microfilmed only in the republics of Croatia and k:eeping varies considerably in each of these three Slovenia. The process of filming continues in areas. those republics even now. It is difficult to get genealogical information from former Yugoslav. Romania: Some records of German communities republics by mail. You may be able to get in Romania have been microfilmed in archives in information by writing to the archive of the Germany and Hungary. But no records have been appropriate Yugoslav Republic. filmed in Romanian arohives. There is no specific information on where to write in Romania. The Croatia former government rarely replied to genealogical Arhiv Hrvatsk:e questions, and the new government does not seem ManlIi6ev trg br. 21 much better. HopefuUy, the chances for response 41001 Zagreb will improve. You can try writing to the local CROATIA parish [parohle] or to the local civil records office [Qficiul Stlfril Civile]. The foUowing is the new Serbia address for the state arohives. Arhiv Srbije U1. Kamedfijeva br. 2 Archivelor Statului din RomAnia UOOO Beograd Bucureljti, sect. 5 YUGOSLAVIA Bdul Kogllniceanu no. 29 ROMANIA Slovenia Arbiv Siovenije U1. Levstikovtrg br. 3 61001 Ljubljana SLOVENIA

c 1995 Daniel M. Schlyter

1I111111111ll/lAuIUIo,HiItorIc_ond_boundaries of from 1116_1811

Utah \.rencalogical Al;jsociatioll 3nl Annual Conference 12-13 April 1996 153 Mitior Gazetteers for Eastern Europe

Gazetteer of Austria Gemeinde1exikon der in Reichsrate vertretenen KlJnigreiche und Llinder [Gazetteer of the crown1ands and territories represented in the imperial council]. Vienna: K.K. Statistisches Zentralkommission, 1903-1908. (Family History Library call number: European Collection Ref Q 943.6 ESg; also on microfilm). 1187925 item 2 Vol 1 Niederosterreich 1187926 item 5 Vol 8 Tirol und Vorarlberg 1187925 item 3 Vol 2 Oberosterreich 1187927 item 1 Vol 9 BOhmen 1187925 item 4 Vo13 Salzburg 924736 item 1 Vol 10Mahren 1187926 item 1 Vol 4 Steiermark 1187927 item 2 Vol l1Schlesien 1187926 item 2 Vol 5 Karnten 1187928 item 1 Vol 12Ga1izien 1187926 item 3 Vol 6 Krain 1187928 item 2 Vol l3Bukowina 1187926 item 4 Vol 7 Kiistenland 1187928 item 3 Vol14Dalmatien

Based on the 1900 census. The volume for each province is arranged by district with an index to both German and local place names. If you do not find the town on the page listed in the index check the footnotes. The parish or synagogue location is not listed in the main text but is given in an appendix, located between the main text and the index of each volume. The appendix is arranged alphabetically by district and sub-district. The parish and synagogue are given in the last column: Standort der rom.-kath., gr.-kath. und isr. Matrikelstellen.

Gazetteer of Hungary

Magyarorszag Helysegnevtlira [Gazetteer of Hungary], Janos Dvorz2.k, compo Budapest: "Havi Fiizetek," 1877. (Family History Library call number: European Collection Ref. 943.9 ESd; also on microfllm, Vol. I on Film 599564 and Vol. II on Film 973041).

Volume I includes a 610 page index. It lists all place names in alphabetical order. Entries in the index are followed by the name of the old Hungarian county, and a set of numbers. These numbers refer to the gazetteer entry in Volume II. The first number is the sequential number of the county; the second is the consecutive number of the district; the last is the number of the locality.

Volume II has more details. Volume II is arranged by county and districts. Use the numbers from the index to find the entry for your town. Additional names the locality was known by are listed in parentheses. Population figures are given according to religion. The following abbreviations are used: rk. - R6mai Katholikus - Roman Catholic ref. - Reformatus - Reformed gk. - Gorog Katholikus - Greek Catholic un. - Unitarius - Unitarian kg. - Keleti Gorog - Greek Orthodox izr. - Izraelita - Jewish ago - agostai - Augsburg Evangelical Lutheran

If the village had its own parish church (or synagogue, for Jews), the abbreviation for the religion will be in boldface capital letters. The diocese will follow, also in boldface type. If the people attended church elsewhere, the abbreviation of the religion will be in lower case.

Utah Genealogical Association 3rd Annual Conference 12-13 April 1996 154 The name of the parish location follows the population figure. Ifa dash (22) follows the population figure, it means members of that religion belong to no particular parish.

Gazette~ of the German Empire

Uetreeht, E., compo Meyers Ons- und Verkehrs- Lexikon des Deutschen ReicJlS [Meyer's gazetteer and directory of the German Empire). Leipzig: Bibliographisches Institut, 1912. (Family History Library call number: European Collection Ref. 943 ESmo; also on microfilm, Film 496640 - for places A-K, Film 496641 - for places L-Z; also on Fiche 6,000,001-6,000029».

Towns are listed alphabetically. This gazetteer is written in the old Gothic script. This gazetteer gives the 1871-1918 political jurisdictions and indicates whether the locality had its own parish or synagogue. The following abbreviations are used:

Evangelical parish: EvPfk. Catholic parish: KPfk. Jewish synagogue: Syn.

Gazetteer or Prussia

Gemeindelexikonjar das KlJnigreich Preussen [Gazetteer for the Kingdom of Prussia). Berlin: Verlag des Koniglichen statistischen Landesamts, 1907-1909. (Family History Library call number: European Collection Ref 943 ESkp; also on microfilms listed below). Vol 1 Ostpreussen (Film 1186701 item 3) Vol 4 Pommern (Film 806634 item 4) Vol 2 Westpreussen(Film 1186701 item 4) Vol 5 Posen (Film 806635 item 3) Vol 3 Brandenburg(Film 806635 item 1) Vol 6 Schlesien (Film 806633 item 4)

.Each volume has an index at the end listing in alphabetical order all localities in the province. In the index, there are two numbers given after each place-name. The first number refers to the "Kreis" (district) to which the locality belonged. These numbers can be found at the top of the page in the body of the book. The second number refers to the town. Thus "21 17" refers to the 17th town listed in district 21. The parish is given in the columns marked as "Kirchspiel"; "Evangelisch" (Lutheran) in column 25 and "Katolisch" (Catholic) in column 26. Note: If the town in question is not listed in column two, refer to the footnotes in the gazetteer.

Gazetteer of the Russian Empire

Sulimierski, Filip, ed. Slownik Geograjicmy Kr61estwa Polskiego i Innych Kraj6w Slowiatiskich [Geographical dictionary of the Kingdom of Poland and other Slavic countries]. 15 Vol. Warsaw: Sulimierski i Walewski, 1880-1902. (Family History Library call number: European Collection 943.8 ESc; also on microfilm).

Utah Genealogical Association 3rd Annual Conference 12-13 April 1996 155 Film numbers are as follows:

920,957 vol. 1 Aa-Dereneczna 920,967 vol. 11 Sochaczew-Szlurbowska Wola 920,958 vol. 2 Derenek-Giack 920,968 vol. 12 Szlurpkiszki-Warlynka 920,959 vol. 3 Haag-Kc:py 920,969 vol. 13 Warmbrunn-Worowo 920,960 vol. 4 Kl:S-Kutno 920,970 vol. 14 Worowo-!yZyn 920,961 vol. 5 Kutowa-Malczyce 920,971 vol. 15 Ababi-Januszowo 920,962 vol. 6 Malczyee-Netreba (addendum) 920,963 vol. 7 Netreba-Perepiat 920,972 vol. 15 Januszpol-Sniatyn 920,964 vol. 8 Perepiatycha-Poiajgcie (addendum) 920,965 vol. 9 Potajkie-Rukszenice Arranged alphabetically with text in Polish. 920,966 vol. 10 Rukszeniee-Sochaczew

Poland

BysUZycki, Tadeusz. Skorowidz Miejscowosci Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej [Listing of Localities of the Polish Republic]. Przemy§l: Wydawnictwa ksiaznicy naukowej, 1934. (Family History Library book 943.8 ESsm; also on microfilm, Film 1343868).

Gazetteer of the early repUblic of Poland from 1918 to 1939. Arranged alphabetically with infonnation in columns. Localities are listed alphabetically down the page in the first column. Township, district, province (voivodship), post office, railway station, bus station, local and regional courts, and Christian parish for the locality are listed in successive columns to the right. The nearest synagogue is not listed.

Yugoslavia lmenik mlsta u Jugoslaviji [place names in Yugoslavia]. Beograd: Novinska Ustanova SluZbeni List SFRJ, 1972 (Family History Library call number: 949.7 ESim, also on microfiche, Fiche no. 6053513)

From pages 45 to 452 all Yugoslav localities are listed alphabetically down the page in the first column. District, republic, and post office, are listed in successive columns to the right. Post office towns are listed with postal codes on pages 456-473.

UGA Genealogical Conference 1996

Utah Genealogical Association 3rd Annual Conference 12-13 April 1996 156 LIFE IN THE BALTIC STATES BEFORE THE TWENTIETH CENTURY

Andrejs Plakans

Born in Latvia. Resides in Ames, Iowa. Assistant professor of history, Iowa State University. Ph.D. (history), Harvard University. Author, lecturer.

TIlE RlJSSIAN EMPIRE was the elites--the landowning nobles and the city-dwelling burghers--who were pri­ On a map of eighteenth century Europe our marily German speaking. The Baltic eyes move eastward from England and Germans (Baltendeutsche) had arrived in France across the patchwork quilt that the area during the medieval centuries in was Germany, and eventually encounter an various capacities: as representatives immense and uniformly colored area of the medieval church, which wanted to labeled "The Russian Empire." Normally Christianize the remaining "pagans" of only European Russia would be depicted on the European continent through the so­ such a map, for the Asian territory of called Baltic Crusade in the fourteenth the empire was too vast to be included. century; as military adventurers who went In the eighteenth century the empire was wherever warfare and booty were to be still expanding, and its European acqui­ found; as land-hungry younger sons of sitiona included the pf"vinces of the German nobles who were unable to acquire eastern Baltic littoral. The provinces property in the lands of their birth; and of Livlaiid and Estla.!!d were obtained at as merchants who wanted to include the the beginning of the century, when Peter eastern Baltic littoral in the trading the Great triumphed over Sweden. Later area ~ing built up by the Hanseatic in the century, as part of the territor­ League. Having arrived, most of them ial settlement accompanying the Third stayed to form over the centuries the Partition of Poland, Catherine the Great upper layers of Baltic society, which added the province of KurJ.ang (1795) • were still very much in control by the Thus, by the end of the l790s Russia had time the area joined the Russian Empire. succeeded in establishing itseU as the In due course they were joined by hun­ dominant power in northeastern Europe, dreds of other people migrating north­ replacing Sweden; and the inhabitants of eastward from Central Europe: estate the Baltic Provinces--nobles, burghers, functionaries, artisans, some peasants, and peasants ali1sovereignty of a new ruler. of noble families. In spite of this The historical documents of the area substantial immigration, the German would reflect these changes. The student speakers of the Baltic area remained no of Baltic history would now need to be more than about 5 to 6 percent of the able to read Russian ~\¥1&e sources, in total population, the great bulk of the addition to the Latin, German, Swedish, Baltic inhabitants being the successors Danish, and Polish that are needed to of the original Latvian and Estonian understand Baltic historical events prior populations. The Baltic Germans exer­ to the triumph of Russian hegemony. cised their dominance through the corpor­ ations of the nobility (Ritterschaften), the Lutheran Church after the Protestant TIlE BALTIC GERMANS Reformation, and the guilds in the towns; as well as through the recognition they In spite of the change of sovereign were given as the mainstays of local and rulers, certain things remained unaltered regional government by the succession of in the Baltic region, and one of these monarchs in Warsaw, Stockholm, Ibscow, 533/Plakans 2 and St. Petersburg. Not surprisingly, responsible to the crown's wishes, St. the Baltic Germans eventually came to Petersburg had to rely on the local think of themselves as much "native" to nobilities to govern, to collect taxes, the regions as the original Latvian and and to provide military assistance in Estonian inhabitants of it. To the times of need. There was also the fact extent that they ....re indeed the princi­ that many Baltic nobles became officials pal figures of local and regional admini­ in St. Petersburg and officers in the stration' they kept their records in .the Imperial Army, and thus were well placed language which they themselves spoke. to fight against efforts to diminish The historical records left by the admin­ their authority in the Baltic area. istrators of landed estates, tradesmen Then, too, the mercantile sector of the and merchants in the t01iilllS, and the court Baltic economy was well developed, systan are therefore mostly in the German creating a substantial proportion of the language. trade moving across the borders of the empire. Tranquility in this region would Having consolidated this power locally, ensure its economic prosperity. the Baltic Germans were not willing to surrender it to the distant monarchs who periodically gained ascendancy over the SOCIAL STRUCTURE AND NATIONALITIES Baltic area. In the seventeenth century, when Sweden possessed the region, the The social structure in each of the Vasa dynasty had a hard time exlj'nding Baltic provinces, as in the anpire and in its authority to the local level. The the rest of Europe, was conceived of by relations between the Swedish monarch contemporaries as consisting not of across the Baltic Sea and the nobilities social classes, as we use the term, but in the Baltic had to be carried on of a hierarchy of social orders (or through a series of compromises. When Stllnde) each of which was defined as a Peter the Great defeated Sweden in the separate entity in the law, and indeed Great Northern War, he found that in had laws applicable only to its members. order to secure the loyalty of the Baltic The main orders were the nobles nobles in Livland and Estland, he had to (Adelstand), burghers (Biirgherstand), and guarantee the continuation of their pri­ peasants (Bauernstand). Each resident in vileges to rule the Baltic undisturbed. the Baltic was identified as belonging to When the last of the provinces-Kurland­ one order or another. Usually manbership became part of Russia in 1795 in the was acquired through birth; that is, a partitions of Poland, the Kurlandic person was a member of the order to which nobility d"""",ded similar privileges, and his parents belonged; and throughout an Tsar Paul had to agree to than. Thus, by individual's lifetime, privileges, the end of the eighteenth century, in rights, responsibilities, and generally terms of the distribution of power, the life opportunities were· defined by the Baltic German situation had not changed posit.ion of that order in the hierarchy dramatically: they were, to be sure, now of orders. This society was therefore the loyal subjects of the Russian tsar radically inegalitarian. This does not rather than of the Swedish king, but mean that the population was entirely their loyalty could be counted on only as frozen into place, but it did mean that long as the Russian tsar did not try to movanent upwards in the social orders introduce too many Imperial officials (social mobility) was minimal. There into the Baltic area or try to interfere were individual exceptions to this in the affairs of local administration. general rule, but these tended to be From the Imperial government's viewpoint, statistically insignificant. this was hardly a satisfactory situation, but the Russian government was at this One of the interesting aspects of social point not willing to undertatuz. military life in the Baltic was that the line challenges to regional nobles. In the demarcating the higher orders (nobilities absence of regional officials directly and the burghers) from lower order (the 533/Plakans 3 peasants) coincided also with the princi­ held them to be of major significance. pal nationality division within the Thus, in the eighteenth century member­ population. The upper orders were made ship in a nationality group did not yet up almost entirely of German speakers, entail a national consciousness. If whereas the lowest social order--the there was friction between German peasantry--was made up almost entirely of speakers, on the one hand, and the either Latvian speakers or Est~ian Estonian and Latvian speakers on the speakers, depending on the province. In other, it grew out of the fact that the Kurland, the peasantry was almost en­ former were estate owners, nobles, and tirely Latvian; in Livland, the peasantry merchants, and the latter highly vulner­ was Estonian in the north and Latvian in able peasants, and less out of the cir­ the south; and in Estland, it was en­ cUlllstanceg that each spoke a different tirely Estonian. In all cases, it was language. The life of peasants was the peasantry that made up the vast bulk locally orient.ed and they normally de­ of a provincial population, JOOre than 90 fined their "world" in terms of the percent; also, in all three provinces in landed estate in which they and their the eighteenth century very few Latvian forefathers had lived. The idea that all or E~tonian speaking individuals were residents of the Baltic provinces who living in the cities and towns. It was a spoke Latvian, for instance, should tmnk situation in which the social structure of themselves in terms of a national com­ (as defined through the idea of orders) munity with common interests would not had as its internal boundaries not only enter the Baltic area until the second the different laws that regulated the half of the nineteenth century. At the life of each order, but also the nation­ ssme time, however, the language commun­ ality division which separated the ities were a social fact, and their dis­ peasantries from the rest of the members tribution in the way I have mentioned an of the social hierarchy. By contrast, in important characteristic of the social Russia proper, or, for that matter in structure. Western Europe, where a society based on orders also existed, social structure did not include the problem of nationality SERFDOM divisions; there, the nobilities, burghers, and peasants generally spoke In addition to being peasants, that is, the same language and could think of agriculturalists and farmers, the Latvian themselves as having originated from the and Estonian speakers of the Baltic pro­ ssme earlier population. vinces were also serfs. The institution of serfdom had nearly disappeared in the When we speak of "nationality" in the western parts of Europe, and the peasants eighteenth century, we must be very of England, France, and the western parts careful not to read too much into that of Germany were legally free to move word. At that time, nationality dif­ where they pleased, not being bound to ferences normally did not mean much more any particular piece of land or to a par­ than language differences. The philos­ ticular person. In the same centuries ophy of nationalism was still a matter of when serfdom had disappeared from western the future. Germans--the Georges of Europe, however, it had experienced a re­ Hannover--occupied the throne of England; surgence in the east, and by the end of Catherine the Great of Russia was herself the eighteenth century, the institution a German; and the idea that a particular of serfdom w"f a major social fact of the nationality group, however defined, rural areas. Technically speaking, to should have its own state and should be be classified as a serf (erbuntertan; governed by persons from within its own leibeigener), meant either that one was ranks had not yet taken hold of the bound to live on a particular peasant European mind. The Baltic peoples were holding in a particular estate, or, conscious of linguistic differences, alternately, that one was the serf of a of course, but it is not likely that they particular landowner and therfore bound 533/Plakans 4 to live where that landowner commanded. escape life under a particularly harsh Moreover, serf status had become her­ landowner. ediatry; SO that rural people were not only born into a particular social order (the peasantry), but also into a parti­ FAMILY LIFE OF SERFS cular subgroup of a social order, the enserfed peasantry. There were free Family life of peasants was conducted in peasants even in the Baltic, but they the context of the serf estate, and the were relatively few in number. By the regulations governing the estate end of the eighteenth century, to be a naturally impinged upon family life as peasant in the Baltic provinces meant welL One regulation which appears to that one was also a serf, and as I have have had considerable impact was the mentioned, these peasant-serfs were restriction on movement, which serfs nearly always either Latvian or Estonian could undertake only with the express speakers, depending on the province. permission of the landowner. In practice this restriction could not be enforced Conditions of serfdom varied greatly from quite as stringently as it was conceived province to province and between regions of in the law, since landowners did not within Russia, and there is very little have a large enough police force to keep utility in thinking of all peasant-serfs a tight control over everybody. Moreover as living in the same kind of undifferen­ there was an advantage to allowing fe­ tiated misery. Nonetheless the peasant­ males to marry out, in exchange for some serfs of the Baltic were subject to a kind of payment; and males to marry in, host of restrictions and obligations since in this arrangement the estate. which, in the western part of Europe, gained additional labor. The subject of ""uld have been thought intolerable and local movements under these conditions in England, prob~ly judged to be viola­ has not been studied very well, but the tions of rights. Apart from the l:lmi­ studies that have been done suggest that tation on movement, peasant-serfs were in the Baltic area, as elsewhere in pre­ also obligated to yield up part of their industrial Europe, we should not conceive crop to the estate owner, and part of of the peasant populations as totally their time to ""rlung that section of the iJlInobilized. Even if peasants did not estate's fields which was set aside for move in large numbers in and out of the the landowner himself~ Peasant-serfs estate there was considerable movement also performed other labor duties, from within the estate. In a study of a repairing roads to hauling goods to single estate between the years 1797 and market. In addition, they were subject 1811 it was found that only about 22 to the authority of the landowner sitting percent of the peasants of the first as judge in the manorial court, and to census who were alive by the second were rulings that included corporal punish­ still living in the farmst~ in which ment. In return, the peasant-serf had they had been found in 1797. While it use rights to a particular piece of the was probably true that most peasants died estate (a holding) and certain common within the estate into which they had rights of grazing. lie also depended on been born, it was not necessarily true the landowner to champion him against the that they always lived in the same· outside world, whether against invading farmstead. enemies or usurpations practiced by neighboring landowners. No one would Studies have shown that peasant-serfs argue that this system of rights and tried to ensure that a holding would obligations, as experienced by the remain in the same family over genera­ peasant-serf, ensured a principle of tions. The farmstead, to which a plot of equality; but, at the same time, fear of land was attached, was the smallest condemnation by their peers kept most subunit in the estate economy. The landowners from practicing the worst landowner depended upon the farmstead and abuses. Not infrequently, serfs fled to its inhabitants not only for the upkeep 533/Plakans 5 of the farmstead's lands but also for a appear to have been patrilineal, empha­ supply of labor to work the landowner's sizing the father's line where inheri­ land, the demesne. In the Baltic it tance was concerned, and bilateral, appears that farmsteads were almost recruiting relatives from both si11.s, as permanent institutions, which, once far as co-residence was concerned. built, continued to house generation after generation of peasants with little One interesting aspect of family life was change in the physical premises. MJre­ that in spite of a household structure over, landowners were apparently unwill­ which resembled that of other eastern ing to allow peasants to build additional European areas, the marriage patterns structures, so that new marriages did not were definitely more like those in Sweden necessarily mean the creation of new and other Scandinavian countries than farmsteads. What was more likely was like £2e Russian marriage patterns to the that if he could not find an open farm­ east. The Baltic peasants married at a stead to take over, he remained living later age than did Russian peasants--pro­ with his father, or with his married bably in their early twenties rather than brother who had taken over. This meant in their late teens-and there was a that the proportion of farmsteads on higher proportion of peasants in the which joint families of various kinds Baltic who never married at all. This is could be found was very large, far larger likely to have meant a somewhat lower than could hJ:o found in western European fertility rate in this area, even though rural areas. The different combina­ .that matter has not been thoroughly tions of related married couples who were studied. What accounts for this unusual living in a single farmstead was quite pattern of relatively high ages at first great, and the varieties could include marriage is not very clear. The land­ not only the usual "parent-married owners had every interest in seeing to it offspring" and "married brother" combina­ that the female serfs they owned married tions, but also sons-in-law, and married as early as possible, so that the number sisters co-residing with married of children born on the estate and the brothers. The discussion of family types number likely to survive would be higher. in the Baltic, therefore, involves a In the serf estates for Russia, peasant discussion of the joint family system as fathers could be fined if their daughters a significant fact of family life. had not yet married by age eighteen or nineteen. Yet in the Baltic this kind of Relatively restricted migration across interference was apparently not regular estate boundaries also meant that Baltic if it existed at all. Apparently, peasants were likely to encounter within peasant families were freer to exercise the estate of their residence large choice in the matter, and the statistics numbers of relatives beyond those in­ show very few women or men in the married cluded in their families of birth and state before their twentieth year. One marriage. Census records show that the factor may have been the shortage of relatives who were living with an farmsteads mentioned earlier. If the individual in a farmstead were not the estate had allowed a new farmstead to be only important ones he had in the entire buHt and new holdings to be claimed by community; and consequently, for the each newly married couple, the chances of Baltic area, the old observation that "in a young couple being able to manage on this village all persons are related," its own might have been greater. As it while not entirely true, was also not was, however, very young couples had to entirely erroneous. This does not mean, live with their ·parents, or with married of course, that the entire population older siblings, since, judging by statis­ lived in peace and harmony; but it does tics, there appears to have been a pro­ suggest that there was. a kinship basis hibition against farmstead heads who were for treating incomers and perhaps even younger than twenty. It is therefore the landowner as "outsiders." The kin­ possible that peasant parents did not ship rules in these Baltic communities give their offspring permission to marry 533/Plakans 6 early, knowing full ""U that that would 'There ""re both advantages and disadvan­ mean either new mouths to feed in their tages for the landowner in this situa­ own farmsteads or that the young couple tion. He still had a labor force, it is would have to start their married life as true, but at the same time there had farmhands in the farmsteads of other developed an unhealthy situation of over­ peasants. crowding and possibly also a force of surplus labor. Moreover, the landowner was still responsible in the eyes of CHANGING CONDITIONS regional law, and in the eyes of his peers, for seeing to it that his serfs At the end of the eighteenth century, were not starving and at least had a certain changes in Baltic areas began to place to live. point toward the alteration of these long-standing arrangements and patterns. One very important change was a new ABOLITION OF SERFDOM attitude by landowners toward their land: they had started to think of their One way of changing this situation was to properties less in terms of self-suffi­ abolish serfdom and thus to transform at ciency and more in terms of profit, since one stroke the entire relationship that the grain they grew could be and was existed between landowners and peasants. exported to a wider foreign market. 'This was, of course, a very radical move, Landowners were always short of capital, and few landowners wanted to take so however, since their wealth was fixed dramatic a step, especially since it rather than fluid; consequently, many could not be directly proven that it estates ""re mortgaged and remortgaged would indeed benefit them materially. until the nobility as a whole, in spite Abolition conjured up images of vast of the visible:J-uxuries it enjoyed, was numbers of landless persons wandering in heavy debt. Along this same line, about the countryside, ripe for various efforts ""re made to alter the tradi­ kinds of unrest. On the other hand, now, tional settlement patterns on the land, in the early nineteenth century, with so as to enlarge the arable and to make Tsar Alexander I on the Russian throne, it more efficient for yielding a larger abolition of serfdom was being discussed crop. One way of doing this was for for the empire as a whole, and therefore landowners to reduce the number of it began to seem much less a radical peasant holdings by adding the holding to idea. And, indeed, several decades of the demesne if it feU vacant, by forcing discussion and deliberation eventually the current occupant to leave and becane led to the abolition of serfdan in the a hired hand on another holding, or by Baltic provinces--Kurland, Livland and shifting peasant families to other Estland-in the period fran 1817 to 1820, estates which the landholder owned. 'The forty years earlier l~han in the rest of long-term result of these changes, the Russian Empire. 'The reform was coupled with population growth, was an carried out in a way that most clearly increase in the number of entirely land­ benefited landowners and reduced the less peasant-serfs, and an expansion in possibility of major social dislocation. the number ()f persons living on those First of all, as canpensation for losing farmsteads which continued to exist. 'The a labor force, the nobility's ownership average number of peasants per farmstead of all land was confirmed. 'Thus even by the end of the eighteenth century had after emancipation, the peasants were not risen to about fifteen persons. 'The much more capable of owning agricultural landowner still depended on these serfs real estate than they had been before. for labor, but increasingly peasants were Ownership for peasants was possible in no longer tied to particular holdings and theory in individual instances, but not resided on the estate either in the as a characteristic of the entire peasant direct employ, for wages, of the owner or order. Also, the transformation of serfs in employ of other wealthier peasants. into freemen was carried out for segments 533/Plakans 7 of the entire serf population at a time Latvian and Estonian speakers in various in the expectation that this would avoid urban and rural occupations and positions the excesses of rural dislocation. As a in which such people had never been found consequence of emancipation, it is true, before. These positions were of course the peasants became free subjects of the still low as far as income and prestige Tsar; on the other hand, since for mst were concerned, but their existence of them it was materially impossible to cannot be denied. There also appears to leave the areas in which they had been have taken place a change in attitude born, they occupied their holdings now on among some Baltic Germans toward the pea­ the basis of labor rents. That is, the sant populations over which they still introduction of money rent was very slow had such power and control. This period in caning, since the landowners wanted to saw the founding of learned societies preserve as much of the labor force as which had as their main objective the they had had befor the emancipation. In study of Latvian and Estonian folk cul­ practical terms, this meant that the vast ture, and these were responsible for majority of the Latvian and Estonian establishing the first ne'fgpaper (1821) speaking peasants were still bound by the in the Latvian language. Generally labor obligations of the property they such efforts were still in the old tradi­ now rented, but now this relationship was tion of the Baltic German clergy and men a fixed legal one, rather than being of letters looking after the education of defined by custom, and the landowner the masses, an obligation that had been could be brought into court if he tried taken very seriously, especially among to violate it. The landowners sought to the Protestant clergy for centuries be­ improve their positions in ot\'5 ways in fore this. But at the same time these the emancipation document. Local efforts came to involve an increasingly affairs were now to be run by the peasant larger number (though still small in community itself; whatever funds were absolute terms) of sons of Latvian pea­ needed for setting up poorhouses, sants, as these received education at the orphanages, storehouses for times of community level and became capable of famine and so forth had to be established serving as rural school teachers and and run by the peasant community. The minor journalists. They could not aspire landowner could not be obligated any to much mre than this at the manent, but longer to help peasants in times of even this limited mbiliry carried them hardship, nor to aid if they needed into positions in the provinces which protection. The road system had to be Latvians and Estonians had not occupied paid for by the community; and such taxes before. The end result of this process as were owed to the government were the was that by the 1850s there began to community's responsibility. Thus the appear calls among the Latvians and landowner had extricated himself fran a Estonians for a "national awakening," and host of obligations which had been part for a wholesale restructuring of the of his role before the emancipation relationships between Baltic Germans and decrees. Freedom had been bought for the Latvian and Estonian speaking popu­ quite a heavy price. lations. Nationalism had cane to the Baltic fran the west, and it had touched the imaginations of these first few gen­ CHANGING SOCIAL STRUCTURE AND NATIONALISM erations of pe'l~ant offspring in a dramatic fashion. In spite of the hardships that the new situation created for the peasants, there Above all, the "national awakening" meant is no doubt that the general atmosphere that from this point onward, in the total of the Baltic area had been altered to corpus of written historical records in provide them with new opportunities. It the Baltic, there would be a small but is fran the l830s, by which time the ever increasing segment which was being emancipation process had concluded, that produced by the traditional underc1asses we begin to date the appearance of and would reflect their point of view. 533/Plakans 8

Official records, of course, continued to parts of the Russian Empire. To a great be generated by Baltic German and Russian extent, these attitudes coincide with functionaries, in their capacity of those of a segment of Russian intellect­ administrators of the provinces. But ual opinion-namely, Slavophilism--which belletristic literature was another held that the goverrnnent should not allow matter. Initially, this new literature non-Russian minorities to dominate any was experimental since the languages-­ part of the Empire. Consequently, the Lativan and Estonian-in which it was Latvian, and to a lesser extent, the expressed fell short of being full­ Estonian nationalists received aid from fledged literary Latvian and Estonian journalists and other officials in St. languages. They had to be sharpened as Petersburg and Moscow. On the other Iiterary tools, since they lacked a hand, Baltic German influence in official vocabulary to discuss the Baltic world of circles remained strong as well, so that the nineteenth century and were full of the Baltic nationalists could not really all sorts of Germanisms and Russianisms count on absolutely unqualified support as a result of the fact that the Latvian from these quarters in their struggles and Estonian authors frequently spoke for cultural and econcmic autonomy. The German and Russian at home. crown was, of course, concerned lest Latvian and Estonian nationalism lead to NATIVE LANGUAGE LITERATURE subversion and create in the Baltic area a situation like in Poland, where nation­ The new writing was of two distinct alists attitudes led to the insurrection types. There was, first, the works which in 1863. In such a context, for a period were openly polemical and challenged on a of twenty years or so, the Latvian and broad front the hegenony of the Baltic Estonian nationalists were able to launch Germans over the cultural life of the and institutionalize a nationalistic Baltic, as well as their control of movement which, once begun, showed no political and economic institutions. signs of losing support either in the This literature took the form of news­ masses of the people or among the ever-­ papers, such as Peterburgas avizes, and expanding ranks of the educated in the lengthy examinatio~of the conditio.ns of two nationality groups. the Baltic area. The Latvian and Estonian writers could not be as This institutionalization of nationalism thoroughly critical of the Baltic Germans took the form of the establishment of as they wished to be, since all publica­ societies, such af9 the Riga Latvian tions had to be approved by govermnent Association (1868) , which meant that censors, and any attacks which were too alongside the German language historical harsh would be forbidden as "subversive." records kept by the official provincial Thus political and econcmic commentary institutions there would be other records was always walking a tightrope: it had which reflected the deliberations and to be acceptable to the crown yet at the problems of the La tvian and Estonian same time critical enough of Baltic national communities. In addition to German ways to accomplish its purpose of associations, there were also newspapers raising the consciousness of the Latvian which, after the first run of Peters­ and Estonian masses. It should be noted burgas aVizes, continued to appear with that in these decades Latvian and considerable regularity. Besides these Estonian nationalists were not calling Latvian and Estonian language materials, for total control over Baltic institu­ there also existed a considerable body of tions; instead, they asked for a sharing writings by Latvian and Estonian nation­ of power between themselves and the alists in Russian and German, published Baltic Germans. Moreover, they were not in the periodical presses of these separatists either and continued to languages. The character of this early believe that a greater share in political writing waS hardly scholarly, since control of the Baltic could be obtained neither of the two nationality groups while the provinces stayed as constituent were represented in the scholarly 533/Plakans 9 disciplines in the Baltic area. But it Estonian nationalists faced was how to did represent a new viewpoint and there­ view the oral traditions of the two fore a new type of historical source. peoples. If, as they claimed, a new era of the imagination had begun, what was to Much more numerous were Latvian and be the status of the older creative Estonian belletristic writings, since in traditions? Nationalist theory said that the area of fictional literature censor­ the oral tradition was an outpouring of ship was not as heavy and the Baltic the "national soul" of the people and Germans did not perceive such activities therefore constituted a basis on which as threatening their control over the all written literature had to be built. Baltic. Consequently Latvian and But the nationalists eventually dis­ Estonian writers were relatively free to covered that the oral tradition could not experiment in a wide range of genres, really serve these goals because of its starting with poetry, and extending over relatively restricted forms and the novels, novellas, short stories, and dra­ almost entirely rural basis of its matic literature. The overall guiding content. Nonetheless the oral tradition concern of these writers was to have a was considered to be extremely valuable, "national literature" and this meant, in and therefore a major effort was launched their thinking, that there should be by both Latvians and Estonians to record Latvian and Estonian language materials as IDUch of it as was still alive and available in all literary genres. The being recited. The collection effort principal characteristic of the writings turned out to require far more time than of the 1850s and 1860s was its experi­ was thought, and the final publication of mental nature, since the writers of this the oral tradition did not take place period ""re still feeling their way inza until af 'r the turn of the twentieth this kind of intellectual activity. century.2 By that time, however, Moreover, the total amount of this writ­ belletristic writers. had begun to take ing was still relatively small; no their inspiration from a society that had Latvian and Estonian writer could make a become relatively more complicated. living by writing, and therefore most of them had to write in their spare time as they carried on their regular profes­ LANDOWNERSHIP sions, usually schoolteaching. Nonethe­ less, as in the case of the polemic lit­ erature, the total number of belletristic As the diversity of Baltic literary works continued to grow. The greatest efforts grew the social, economic, and success came in the writing of novels, political context in which it was set which were written in a realistic vein continued to change. The Latvian and and sought to portray the Latvian coun­ Estonian nationalist movements, having tryside in a period of rapid change.• passed through a generation of fiery and Some of this writing continued to have a dedicated founders, became more sober and didactic purpose: it explicitly sought turned increasingly to matters of econom­ to educate its readership not only in the ics. By the 1800s all of the major use of the Latvian language but also in cities of the Baltic provinces had sub­ the thought that the Latvian dimension of stantial communities of Latvians and life was worthy of being written about. Estonians, who now constituted important It was not until the 1890s that Latvian elements in ~ economic life of each of and Estonian belletristic literature lost these cities. HaVing a residential and this didactic content and was written economic base, Latvians and Estonians primarily by reference to aesthetic con­ sought to consolidate their position by siderations• gaining political power as well, but success in this venture was very slow in FOLKLORE coming. Defining politics in a broad sense, it can be said that the Latvians One major question the Latvian and and Estonians, by the 1800s, already 533/Plakans 10

possessed considerable power in rural nationalities, however, made for sharper areas. But in cities and towns success division in the social realm. The was minllDal. In rural areas, changing "national awakening" period was long laws had enabled Latvian and Estonian over, but the Latvian and Estonian peasants to buy land outright, so that by populations were still politically power­ the 1800s there had come into being a less in comparison to the Baltic Germans. substantial segment of peasant land­ The economic wealth of these two subject owners, many of them well-to-do. Yet nationalities had increased, to be sure, even by the turn of the century, half the but this had not been accompanied by any rural land in the two provinces was still relaxation on the part of the Baltic in the hands of Baltic Germans. Thus Germans of their hold over regional there was insufficient rural prope23Y for political institutions. For a time, the all of those who wanted to own it. The Latvians and Estonians thought that this rural population was expanding, and this situation could be reversed if they meant in the long run that rural areas supported the russification efforts of would be overpopulated. Alongside the the Imperial government, which st~5ted in strata of relatively well-to-do Latvian earnest during the later 1880s. The and Estonian landowners, and the small­ belief was that the introduction of holders of these nationalities, there was additional Imperial Bureaucrats and also a growing subpopulation of landless Russian institutions into the provinces peasants, who had the minllDal choice of would weaken Baltic German control and earning their living as hired laborers or allow the Latvians and Estonians at least emigrating. Landlessness remained a a small amount of autonomy. But the serious problem, and emigration was a Russian government, despite grandiose characteristic of the provincial popu­ plans, l!!9nSlled to implement only a few lations well into the twentieth century. russification measures, mostly to the It has been estimated that by the tum of detriment of the Latvian and Estonian the century some 10 percent of both the national aspirations. By the end of the Latvian and Estonian speaking populations century, nationalism among the subject in the Russian Empire were living outside nationalities was as strong as it had of the tlfundaries of the Baltic ever been; and now there was the added provinces. dimension of resentment against the crown of attempting to russify the newly emerging national cultures. Moreover, AT TIlE TURN OF TIlE CENrURY within the nationalities, other divisions had appeared, especially between those By the 1890s life in the Baltic area had who remained willing to work for slow come to resemble that of much of the rest reform and those who had become adherents of Europe. The provinces now had all of of Marxism and looked for a revolution. the same social problems that character­ The earlier unity which Latvians and ized other regions of a continent Estonians had felt as they first struck undergoing the strains of industrializa­ out against Baltic German overlordship tion. The continuing conflict between was not threatening to disappear.

NOTES

lSee Reinhardt Wittram, Baltische Geschichte (Munich, 1954) for the best general introduction to the political history of the Baltic area. 533/P1akans 11

~illiam Urban, The Baltic Crusade (DeKalb: Southern Illinois University Press, 1975).

3J. Vasar, Die grosse livlilndische Giiterreduktion. Acta et commentationes universitatis Tartuensis. Vol. XXII (Tartu, 1931).

4Friedrich Bienemann, Die Staathalterschaftszeit in Liv- und Estland (Leipzig, 1886) • 5 Edgars Dunsdorfs, Latvijas vesture 1710-1800 (Stockholm: Daugava, 1973), pp. 275-314.

6Dunsdorfs, Latvijas vesture 1710-1800, Chapter 4.

7Jerome Blum, "The Rise of Serfdan in Eastern Europe," American Historical Review LXII (1957), pp. 826-33.

8Some of these are described in Garlieb Merkel, Die Letten (Leipzig, 1800). Merkel was one of a handful of Baltic German intellectuals who po1emicized against serfdan, especially in its Baltic form.

9Andrejs Plakans, "Population Turnover in a Serf Estate 1797-1811," paper given at History of the Family Conference, Brigham Young University, March 1978.

lOAndrejs Plakans, "Seigneurial Authority and Peasant Family Life: The Baltic . Area in the Eighteenth Century," Journal of Interdisciplinary History IV (1975), pp. 629-54. 11 Andrejs Plakans, "Identifying Kinfolk Beyond the Household," Journal of Family History II (1977), pp. 3-26.

12Ansley J. Coale, Barbara Anderson and Erna Hlirm, Human Fertility in Russia Since the Nineteenth Century (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1979), Chapter 2.

13Dunsdorfs, Latvijas vesture 1710-1800, pp. 315-85.

14Herbert Creutzburg, Die Entwicklung der kurliindischen AgrarverWtnisse seit Aufhebung der Leibeigenschaft (Konigsberg, 1910).

15Arveds Svabe, Grundriss der Agrargeschichte Lettlands (Riga: B. Lamey, 1928) •

16Andrejs Plakans, "The National Awakening in Latvia 1850-1900," unpublished dissertation, Harvard University, 1969, Chapters 4 and 5.

17Andrejs Plakans, "Peasants, Intellectuals, and Nationalism in the Russian Baltic Provinces, 1820-1890," Journal of Modem History 46 (1974), pp. 445-75.

18For a description of some of the authors of this early literature see Margarete Lindemuth, "Krisjanis Valdemsrs und Atis Kronvalds: Zwei lettische Volkstumskampger," Baltische Hefte XUI (1967), pp. 84-107.

19p1akans , "Peasants, Intellectuals, and Nationalism," pp. 464-65. 533/Plakans 12

20For a general history of Latvian literature see Janis Andrups and Vitauts K.alve, Latvian literature: Essays (Stockholm: Zelta Abele, 1954).

21The first major collection was Krisjanis Barons and Henri Wissendorffs, Latwju dainas (Moscow and St. Petersburg, 1894-1905). 22 Arnolds Spekke, History of Latvia (Stockholm: Zelta Abele, 1957), pp. 316.

23A1freds Bilmanis, Baltic Essays (Washington, D.C.: Latvian Legation), p. 96. 24 Retabulation of populations statistics concerning Latvians and Estonians, as presented in the 1897 Imperial census, can be found in Margeris Skujenieks, "Iecelosana un izcelosana Latvija," Domas X (1913), p. 1156 ff.

25See Edward Thaden, ed., Russification in the Baltic Provinces and Finland 1850-1914, in press, Princeton University Press, January, 1981.

THE PEOPLE OF THE BALTIC: SOURCES THAT TELL THE STORY OF THEIR LIVES

Andrejs Plakans

Born in Latvia. Resides in Ames, Iowa. Assistant professor of history, Iowa State University. Ph.D. (history), Harvard University. Author, lecturer.

THE GOALS OF HISTORICAL DEMOGRAPHY carefully in order to gain the best possible understanding of What the data In recent decades European historical in the sources really mean. It has been demographerr have set for themselves two necessary to decide what camnunities are objectives. First, they have tried to representa~ive of regional populations, gather as much evidence as possible about how missing data can be inferred from the the basic facts of birth, death, marri­ evidence that is available, how to link age, and migration, so as to be able to individuals into larger units such as study long-term patterns and variations families and households, and how to in patterns in the different European obtain evidence about population changes countries. Second, they have also tried over a period of time when ortlysingle­ to cane to grips with the problem of year enumerations are available. The social structure, conceiving structure as time involved in such work has been involving the study of families, house­ reduced considerably by the availability holds, and kin groups, as well as large, of the cooputer to process the data that inelusive social classes. It cannot be can be fed into it. but even the computer said about any of these areas of research has not eliminated the hU:'ldreds of that the quest for basic information is decisions and interpretations that have now over. While we have a good idea to be made in the data preparation stage. about what was going on in the western parts of Europe, much of the rest of the continent remains unexplored in this THE SITUATION IN EASTERN EUROPE sense. The por,trait of the historic populations of Europe is being painted by Research concerning basic population means of very small brush strokes, and it patterns in eastern European history has will be some time before the entire not proceeded as quickly as such work for portrait will be finished. At the same the western are'2s, for several inter­ time, however, it has to be said that we related reasons. Generally speaking, now have a far better idea of what eastern European scholars developed perspective and colors to use in such a interests in demographic research only portrait than did historians three or recently; and even now, far less research four decades ago. time in eastern European academies, institutes, and universities is devoted The work has proceeded slowly because it to demographic topics than in comparable has sought to build generalizations on institutions in the West. There is also the basis of population enumerations and the fact that in researching historical surveys that have the form of lists of quantitative sources, eastern European indiViduals, rather than on the basis of scholars are far more likely to concen­ aggregated statistics. Because the trate on economic matters, in the belief origins, intentions, and procedures of that changes in the ecoUOOlic substructure such surveys are not always known. of past societies has produced demo­ historians have had to proceed very graphic changes. In this conception, 522/Plakans 2 demographic evidence is of secondary 1897, was taken in the Russian language. importance; and population studies that Because of the territorial changes, the are not linked to econanic changes are researcher can never be sure t in considered to have been inadequately addition, that even the locality that researched. Since western scholars are shows up in all three sources included not always guided by such a philosophy, exactly the same area. Conversely, a they have been more free to concentrate local camnunity may appear in one census on population questions as such in the and disappear in another because the expectation that in due course demo­ census takers defined the region graphic and economic research will be differently in each document. The integrated when the basic facts in each discontinuities in language and domain have been established. In any geography, therefore, make long-term case, the work that has been done by studies very difficult, especially on western scholars on eastern European subjects that require consistent data. sources suggests very strongly that the There also exist, in these sources, the potential of such sources for yielding normal problems of all premodern extensive and accurate evidence is very population documents: undercounting; great. What we know now about population imprecise ages; limited number of first changes in eastern Europe falls largely names and,' surnames; and weak linking into the period from 1800 to the present. information, so that, for instance, tw Evidence fran the pre-nineteenth-century brothers living in different households era is still sparse, and most of the cannot be identified as brothers. The basic work still needs to be done. Even list of such problems could be easily so, because of the advances in the west, extended, and few of them are peculiar to it is possible to use the western the east. In any case, there are four experience as a guide to evaluate eastern major types of sources which are European sources. The availability of available for eastern Europe, and I will western evidence also allows substantive discuss their characteristics by findings about the east to be stated in a reference to the concrete examples that comparative fashion. are available from the history of the Russian Baltic provinces.

TIlE MAJOR EASTERN EUROPEAN SOURCES Cadasters

One of the problems facing eastern The land census, or cadaster, was usually European population research in the initiated by a regional or national premodern period is the unstable government that wanted to levy a new tax political history of the region. The and needed information on how much land authorities that collected population was available to be taxed. Within that information changed frequently, and the general concern, a cadaster could be made areas their surveys covered were not to serve other purposes, depending upon likely to have the same boundaries for what additional, more specialized long periods of time. Even in a information the authorities wanted at the relatively limited geographical area, time. They might be interested in how population sources can exist in several much livestock individuals possessed; different languages and employ very what types of crops were being grown; how different techniques of enumeration. In much land was in arable, in pasture, in the Baltic provinces of the Russian waste, or how much was flooded; and, Empire, for example, the best sources for finally, who the people were who the seventeenth century--cadasters--are inhabited the land. I have placed people in German or Swedish; the most detailed as the final concern, for, indeed, in sources for the eighteenth and nineteenth cadasters the counting of human centuries--the soul revisions--were populations was deemed far less important carried out in German; and the first than the measurement of material goods. modern census of the Russian Elnpire, in This means that even though human S22/Plakans 3 populations are dealt with in almost all graph series to generalizations about cadasters that I have seen, we cannot aspects of family life has been worked expect too much precise information about out by the anthropologist Eugene A. them. In the Baltic province of Uvland, Hannnel, who faced similar problems in for example, the Swedish authorities dealing with medieval documents from 4 carried out cadastral surveys from 1601 Serbia. An analysis based on the to 1638, and again in 1688, in the course structure of coresident groups of males of which the Latvian-language peasantry allows us to form a rough estimate about of the area was caught up for the first th~ relative frequency of simple and time in histo'! in a systematic counting canp1ex family groups, when canplexity is of any sort. But in the cadastral defined as growing out of male links • record itself, as shown in figure 1, we Thus we should be able to tell approxi­ find the information about human beings mately how frequently married sons were to be relatively imprecise. The survey still in residence with their fathers, expedition was interested in able-bodied how many farmsteads had married brothers males primarily; and in their ages only living in them, and how many were headed insofar as the male population needed to by simple families. It is understood in be divided between those below and over records of, this kind that certain kinds fifteen years. Moreover, the records of of complexity will remain entirely the expeditions indicate that systematic undetected: widowed elderly mothers inquiry was not carried out in all of the living with married sons, unmarried inhabited parts of the province; and that sisters living with married brothers who the surveyors took information variously had becane heads, and so forth. In the from peasants themselves, from estate absence of anything better, however, even authorities, and sanetimes fran peasants a record of males constitutes a step away reporting about the conditions in the fran ignorance. farmsteads of other peasants. While certain estimates can be made on this If the cadaster contains enough informa­ evidence about the total population of tion on human populations to make an the province, these estimates have to expanded inquiry worthwhile, the obvious remain guesswork. next step is to link demographic data (in this case data about family structure) Nonetheless, even relatively weak surveys with the econanic information available such as the cadasters can be of sane use in the document. As other cadasters, the for investigating human populations. 1638 Livland survey contained a notation Trough we cannot expect to derive from about the size of the peasant I s land, them accurate statistics about birth, which normally was an areal measure death, marriage, and migration, the indirectly. That is, in Livland, peasant enumeration in them of coresident males land was measured in Haken (Latin: uncus; allows for inferences about family struc­ Latvian: arkls), which meant the amount ture. Figure 1, which contains of land that could Sbe worked with one transcribed entries from the 1638 horse and one plow. How much actual cadaster, shows how this is true. We acreage a Haken represented apparently first make note of all of the males varied from place to place and from mentioned in the entry and develop an region to region. Nonetheless, ideograph on the basis of the relation­ premodern surveys often took the Haken ships stated as existing among them. (or sane similar unit) as a basic measure This yields what might be called the core not only for the holding size of of the male population, and the entire peasants, but also as the unit on the series ~ideographs for a particular basis of which the peasant's obligation locality or region will reflect, however to the landowner was determined. In the roughly, the distribution of structures premodern centuries in the Baltic, a based on kin links among males. The "typical" peasant holding was said to specific methodology by means of which have consisted of 1/4 Haken, as is the the analyst can proceed from such ideo- case with many of our examples in figure 522/Plakans 4

1. In addition, the cadaster also stated increasingly necessary, and one result the amO\lllt of different kinds of grain was the creation of account books which, the peasant had sowed and the nlJIDber 0 f in English, have come to be referred to different types of livestock he generically as "manorial rolls." In the possessed. On occasion, in the cadaster, Baltic provinces these doclJIDents were it was also noted what dues in labor, called Wackenbncher, and they figure money, or kind the peasant owed to the prominently in the land records of estate owner, but there were other estate estates until the early nineteent9 documents that described this matter more century, when serfdom was abolished. precisely. The format and content of these sources varied greatly from estate to estate, and Experience with single-year surveys of some estates had none at alL One any kind in other European countries has obstacle to asslJIDing that they reflected revealed the limits of the generaliza­ reality at a given point in time is that tions that can be based on them. Even if they could not be drawn up every year; males-only ideographs are obtained, we and it is frequently impossible, even still know that each ideograph does not from internal evidence, to know precisely exhibit the "structure" which that family when they .were created. Sane Wacken­ had f0l; the entirety of its develoI'J!ental bucher were u~jated continuously, and cycle. The absence of ages for farm­ sane were not; furthermore, in all the stead heads in the 1638 cadaster prevents WackenbUcher that have survived, it is the simulation of develoI'J!ental cycle, true that detailed information on human and consequently statements as to what population was again not the principal the "typical" regional familial patterns concern. Consequently, the utility of a might have been have to be made with particular WacY~nbuch for population great care. Moreover, the mention of history depends very much on the detail very few proper names in the cadaster which was originally introduced in it by makes it impossible for genealogical the agents of the landowner when it was searches to be carried out with any first drawn up. degree of accuracy; for that purpose other doclJIDents might be of greater As can be seen frOlll figures 2a and 2b, assistance. Wackenbucher formats could vary a great deal, sometimes having entirely hand­ Manorial Rolls written formats and sometimes printed ones. The reason for their existence was The expansion of the importance of the to prOVide a record of dues, and thus landed estate as a basic unit in the most of the information in them revolves rural economy of eastern Europe meant around thst central concern. Some that the nature of the peasant labor estates noted dues only (2b), while force on each estate was of grave concern others used additional columns in which to the estate owner. Peasants, who were it was noted whether a particular holding more often than not enserfed, were the had on it a full peasant family, whether only source of agricultural labor, and that family had able-bodied males in it, the farmsteads or village households in whether there were present farmhands who which they lived served as the basis of could do work, and so forth (2a). The calculating the dues (in labor, money, expectation that Wackenbiicher will yield and kind) that were owed to the precise population statistics is again landowner. Oftentimes these dues were a unwarranted, but the best of them do matter of customary, unwritten allow for the creation of family struc­ understanding; but as estate owners ture ideographs based on links between turned more to distant markets for the males, and for the use of the Hammel agricultural yield of their estates, analysis mentioned in connection with the record keeping became a more serious cadasters. As far as aggregated popula­ business. A clear record of what was tion figures are concerned, Wackenbiicher owed by each peasant holding became are even poorer sources than the 522/Plakans 5 cadasters. Cadasters were normally the social statistics they provide. The produced by expeditions of enumerators picture yielded by a cadaster is a static where assigrnnent was to cover an entire picture; it is description of conditions region, while the Wackenbucher were at a point in time. In the cadaster we concerned with the conditions on do not find any evidence that would allow particular estates and owed their us to infer the patterns of the chrono­ existence to the willingness of logical or agricultural year. But in particular landowners to cover the costs Wackenbiicher (e.g., figure 2b) there is a (in man-hours) of drawing them up. time dimension implied in the statistics on labor service. Thus in figure 2b, we A very good Wackenbuch, however, in which note that the family of the peasant at least the male members and the approx­ Skreies Jahnis had to send for work on imate size of the peasant family can be the manor farm one man with a horse for identified, will yield extremely impor­ 1-1/2 days a week during the entire year, tant information about a dimension of one man without a horse 1-1/2 days a week peasant existence which is not recorded from 23 April (St. George's Day) to 29 anywhere else. In a cadaster, we can September (St. Michael's Day); and one obtain data about the actual "wealth" of man for 3/," of a day each week from 29 a peasant family: the amounts of seed September 'to 23 April, that is, during that were sown, the numbers of different the winter months. In addition to these kinds of livestock and working animals normal obligations (Ordinair-Gehorch) , that were present, and the relative additional obligations (Hulf!H?"horch) "size" (in Eaken) of the holding. In the entailed thirty-two days oTamBtr-horse Wackenbuch,--onthe other hand, we have a team, and forty-eight days of a man record of how much of a peasant family's alone, during the StDIDDer months; and a labor time, crop yield, and new animals lesser amount of additional labor during had to be surrendered annually to the the winter period. Assuming that each estate owner. If these records are peasant family met its obligations linked, the possibility exists for cal­ regularly, it is possible (in theory) to culating, however roughly, the material calculate labor movement within the conditions of life of peasant families in estate for the major periods of the cycle relation to their size and membership. of the agricultural year: that is, to Such calculations will always be hased on identify the most important framework of evidence which is less neat then we would the minutiae of peasant existence. No like it to be; for instance, the linked such possibility is offered by a records may not be from the same year. cadaster, nor by the other records we On the other hand, in the Baltic area, shall mention. Thus, in spite of the peasants' holdings and the physical imprecise population figures, the structures on them had unique names, manorial rolls can be used to add an which did not chauge as their inhabitants important element to the portrait of the came and went, thus creating some con­ everyday life of the peasantry. tinuity in the data. The expectation that we will obtain a perfect record for Parish Registers individual peasant families in the premodern period is not likely ever to be In the Baltic, as elsewhere in eastern fulfilled, but, as I suggested in connec­ Europe, the parish clergy tried to keep tion with the cadasters, even poor infor­ continuous records of births, deaths, and mation constitutes a step away from marriages in their congregations, as well ignorance concerning populations which as information on who stood as godparents did not keep, and could not have kept, for baptized children, how much each records of their own. worshiping family tithed, the expenses of the church, who was undergoing training From the historian's viewpoint, the for confirmation, who attended regularly, Wackenbiicher differ from cadasters also and who did not. These continuous in the time dimension that is implied in records have come to be known generically 522/Plakans 6

as "parish registers" in English; in th!l Parish registers ceased to be kept in the Baltic they were termed Kirchenbucher. traditional style in 1832, when a new Certain kinds of evidence from them--such kind of registration was introduced; and as the records of births, deaths, and therefore, in the Baltic, family recon­ marriages--have been used widely in stitution for the peasantry can seldom be historical demographic analysis for carried out for a period longer than a deriving a wide variety of rates and century, that is, perhaps three genera­ measures: fertility and mortality rates, tions. This contrasts sharply with ages at first marriage, marriage rates, possibilities in the west, where the best age differences between husbands and registers (e.g., Colyton) have yielded wives, ages of wives at first childbirth, continuous informati~~ for as long as the spacing of children, illegitimacy three hundred years. In the single rates, and longevity rates. These instance of attempted reconstitution (in measures have been extracted from parish the Estonian-speaking area of the prov­ registers by means of the method of inces) continuous records started in the family reconstitution, which was last l~ecades of the seventeenth cen­ introduced into historical demographi§ tury. research by French and English scholars. Because of the way these records were One major obstacle to successrul long­ kept, with entries about individual term family reconstitution· projects in members of a particular family being made serf areas of eastern Europe, including over a long stretch of historical time, the Baltic, is the highly irregular the entire demographic record of a family naming practices in the premodern period. . has to be reassembled by the analyst; it The reconstitution method is based on the does not appear in anyone place in the linking of names of individuals so that register. Moreover, there are certain the analyst can gather onto a single form kinds of crucial information which parish scattered entries about individuals registers do not yield; for example, belonging to the same family. But in the information on coresidence, or on the Baltic and other serf areas, the use of networks of kinship existing within a surnames to identify individuals was not community at a particular point in time. a Widespread practice. A register Not all of the existing register designation which appears to contain a information has been used systematically; surname may just as likely be the for example, the analysis of godparent­ individual's Christian name together with hood in the European setting remains to the name of the farmstead on which that be accomplished. Nonetheless, the .individual was residing. In the Baltic, application of the family reconstitution the names of farmsteads did not change procedure to parish registers has yielded with changes of their residents; an imnense amount of precise demographic therefore, there is no guarantee that an information about the "common" people of individual can be unequivocally linked to Europe, which has made it possible for any other individual if the linking is their experiences to become a part of the attempted on a name basis only. An total historical record. individual A liVing on farmstead X would have his name listed as A-X in one year, The best parish registers in England and but if he changed residences and started France reach back into the sixteenth to live on farmstead Z in the following century, while in the Baltic, registers year, his name would change to A-Z. do not become u~ilble until the middle of Ancillary sources, though helpful, are the eighteenth. Apparently, precise themselves subject to the same record keeping at the parish level was limitations • not required of clergymen before that time; and, in the localities where parish Though the success of family reconsti­ registers were kept for earlier periods, tution in the Baltic remains in doubt documentary loss has been considerable until more registers are experimented through fires and other accidents. with, the registers can be a source of 522/Plakans 7 other kims of information valuable for Soul Revisions understanding the family lives of enserfed peasants. On occasion, Starting with the early eighteenth clergymen drew up household lists and century and ending in 1859, the Imperial entered these in the church record~3 government of Russia carried out ten apparently for their own reference. major tax censuses, which were supposed Lists of this kind, of course, can be to create a basis for calculating the analyzed for structural information. In amount of hf~d tax owed by localities to scme parishes, energetic clergymen kept th", Crown. Similar capitation tax relatively thorough records on the pre­ censuses were carried out elsewhere in paration of young people for confirma­ eastern Europe, but because the Russian tion, which involved an assessment of census-the soul revision-is prohably their level of literacy. Along this same the best known I will discuss the line, at least One clergyman in the potential of these sources in terms of province of Kurland kept literacy the Russian example, particularly 'doth statistics for his parish for the entire reference to the revisions in the Baltic period of his service, producing tabular area. The Baltic provinces appeared entries in the register about the IlIJIllber relatively" late in the series: Livland of persons in each peasant household who and Estland in the fourth revision, and could read, who coul'\tr'ite, and who had Kurland in the fifth in 1797. The early both of these skills. Sane clergy kept revisions apparently enumerated only continuous aggregated records on church males, but depending on the region, attendance, as well as aggregated annual coverage in time became better. The records on the IlIJIllber of births, deaths, Kurland revision in 1797, for example, and marriages among their parishioners. enumerated all persons regardless of sex Finally, an underutilized type of or age; the next one, in 1811, fell hack evidence pertains to the practice of to the males-only procedure; but the next godparenthood or sponsorship, which can one after 1811, in 1831'7 again used the be interP13ted as an aspect of social more thorough approach. There do not structure. Through sponsors, peasant exist at this time complete inventories parents tried to enlarge the number of describing the contents of particular adults who would have responsibility for revisions in localities for any region of the baptized child if the parents the empire, and the quantitative analyses themselves happened to die, and this very of them carried out by Russian scholars significant practice can suggest the have normally referred only to aggregated degree of importance attached to dif­ figures. Thus we do not yet know whether ferent kims of kinfolk (if kin were microanalysis of families, households, chosen as sponsors) or to unrelated and kin groups is possible for a wide people who must have been linked with selection of localities or whether such bonds of friendship to the parental possibilities exist for only a small couple. All of these different kinds of number of sites. evidence cannot be expected to appear in any regular fashion, since with a change In the final analysis the thoroughness of of the parish clergymen the condition of these enumerations depended very much on the registers could change dramatically. the trouble the local authorities wanted A series of responsible clergymen, to go to. Apparently, only summary however, could produce a continuous statistics were sent to St. Petersburg, record of evidence about the structures and thus scme local enumerators did no of everyday life to which the analyst more than count individuals in order to could not obtain an entry in any other get sunmary figures. Other officials, way. The main imnediate obstacle is the however, used the opportunity to obtain location of the Baltic parish records, detailed information about the localities the bulk of which are in Riga or Tallinn under their jurisdiction, and therefore in the USSR and therefore not accessible left the historian with exceptionally for extended analysis. fine records to analyze. In the Baltic 522/Plakans 8

area, this was true of both the which people actually lived. This means countryside and the city (see figures 3a that each revision can be subjected to and 3b), and the resulting documents the kind of household list analysis that provide evidence for answering a long has been pioneeri~ by Peter Las1ett and series of historical demographic his colleagues. Moreover, since a questions. sequence of revisions exists, it is also possible to do population turnover The format of the revisions was rela­ studies, to obtain statistical measure­ tively simple. The enumerator was ments of the changes 1'9 local population required to list all males of a parti­ for a series of years. Either of these cular inhabited locality, most often a two exercises can be carried out without serf estate, and to subdivide that list reference to the names of particular into groups of people who were not individuals, if one chooses to focus on subject to the head tax, those who were, such matters as age structure and and special groupings such as Jews. household structure and the movement of . These subdivisions varied from province persons in or out of the estate, as in a to province, but the ultimate concern was turnover study. As far as the study of a figure on the basis of which the the life cycle of particular individuals necessary tax calculations could be made. is concerned, the possibilities are Beyond these requirements, the enumerator somewhat weaker , since the interval was free to include as much (or as between revisions does not allow for an little) detail as he wished. It appears easy tracing of people from one revision that in the Baltic area each revision, to the next. Moreover, there is the became the basis for the next one, so problem of names, already mentioned in that the revision after 1797 in Kurland connection with the sources discussed and after 1782 in Livland usually earlier. contained three columns, as in figure 3a. The first of these listed Most of the revisions list persons in the individuals as they appeared in the last context of their residential groups, and revision, the second a notation to what very frequently they give the connection had happened to those persons since the a person had to the head of that group. last revision (whether they had died, or Consequently, these sources permit the moved to another camnunity, or were now analysis of the structure of a family as liVing in another household in the same it existed at the lIlCIIlent of the revision. cOlllllunity), and the final column, if that A few revision documents go beyond this, person was still present, noted his or however, and thus enhance the possibility her name and age as of the year of the of idenz&fying the composition of kin revision being carried out. The groups. In a few revisions the revisions were supposed to be made in enumerator added to the name of each intervals of fifteen years; in practice, listed individual the name of that this usually meant sixteen or seventeen hdividual's father, or sane other senior years. In the Baltic, as a consequence relative, and indicated where that of the early emancipation of serfs in the relative was living if the two were not 1817-1820 period, there were additional coresidents. This added dimension of the revisions just before and during the data allows the analyst to produce, with emancipation so that in these provinces a high degree of accuracy, a -more the sequence of available documents is canplete genealogical record for each of somewhat different than elsewhere. the persons on the list, unless that person is a recent in-migrant. These records constitute, in essence, a series of household censuses, since in If such additional information is not most areas the enumerators produced not available, it is possible to attempt the only lists of undifferentiated names, but linking of a revision and the parish subdivided the lists, within each larger register of a particular locality. In category, into the residential units in this manner the analyst can track down 522/Plakans 9 the connections between people living in cases, peasants were assigned surnames separate households, and can determine rather arbitrarily; for example, they whether persons who are living alone, might be assigned a Latvianized form of that is, without any relatives in the the German name of the estate owner on household, are indeed alone when examined whose land the peasant lived. Sometimes, in the context of the whole canmunity. these surnames were created entirely ad Without such a corrective one might hoc, being based on the peasant's misinterpret the data by assuming that physical appearance or sane other factor. the incidence of, for example, 2fphanhood The consequence of this procedure was was far larger than in reality. In the that the records after the emancipation Baltic it was a characteristic of cannot be matched very easily with· those farmhand families that they put rela­ of the pre-emancipation period, if the tively young children out to work in record linking is conducted on a name other farmsteads. basis only. Genealogical searches frequently have to stop with the In the Baltic area, a sharp break in the emancipation, because there is no way of nature of personal identification came matching names before and after this with the emancipation of serfs. With the period. !' acquisition of personal freedom, and with the possibility of migration within the province as well as beyond it, peasants In terms of the development of documen­ were judged to be in need of surnames so tary sources for the study of Baltic that records about them could be kept populations, the "premodern" period ends more easily. The surnames enter the with the soul revision of 1859. The next parish registers and the revision enumeration, in 1881, was a modern documents during t~ 1820s and in the census. In it, what the analyst loses in revision of 1833. The reason for terms of data for the study of family and characterizing this as a sharp break is household structure, he gains in terms of that the surname a peasant family evidence for exploring the variation in acquired was not necessarily derived from demographic patterns over the entire the name of the farmstead in which they Baltic area. The original forms of the were living or by reference to the name 1881 census may no longer exist, and they may have had before the emancipa­ therefore the 1859 revision is probably tion. The procedures for granting the last of the Baltic surveys in which surnames to peasants differed fran place structural evidence is obtainable. to place. In some cases peasants were Similar shifts in the nature of popula­ asked by enumerators the surname they tion sources occurred in most of the wished to adopt, and it turned out that eastern European countries in the second sane peasant families had already been half of the nineteenth century, or in the using surnames even though these did not decades imnediately preceding World War appear in official documents. In sane 1. The published results of modern cases, there was no match between new censuses require very different proce­ surnames and old ones, or between the new dures of analysis and therefore a ones and the place-names in the locality discussion of th~3may be safely left for in which the peasants lived. In some another occasion.

522/Plakans 15

NOTES

1 A good survey of current developments in historical demography, especially as they pertain to the history of the family, is the special "Family" issue of Daedalus (Spring, 1977); see, in particular, the essay by E. A. Wrigley, pp. 71-86.

2Leszek A. Kosinski, "Sources of Demographic Statistics in East Central Europe," in L. A. Kosinski, ed., Demographic Developments in Eastern Europe (New York, 1977), pp. 64-75; and other essays in this volume.

3Edgars Dunsdorfs, Vidzemes arklu revizijas, 1601-1638 (Riga: University of Latvia, 1938); and by the same author, Der grosse schwedische Kataster in Livland, l681~1710 (Stockholm: Wahlstron and Widstrand, 1950).

4E• A. Hamnel, "The Zadruga as Process," in Peter Laslett and Richard Wall, OOs., Household and Family in Past Time (Cambridge, Engl.: Cambridge University Press, 1972), pp. 335-73. 5 E. Dunsdorfs, "Zum Hakenproblem," Commentationes Baltical I (1953), pp. 1-26. 6 The use of the developnental cycle concept in analysis of European historical materials is discussed in Lutz K. Berkner, "The Stem Family and the Developnental Cycle of the Peasant Household: An Eighteenth-century Austrian Example," American Historical Review LXXXVII (1972), pp. 398-418. 7 A detailed analysis of this type of source can be found in Edgars Dunsdorfs, Uksensernas Vidzemes muizu saimniecibas gramatas, 1624-1654 (Riga, 1935).

8A discussion of record keeping in the Baltic Lutheran Church is to be found in B. Gruner-Salgaln, "Kirchenarchiv und Kirchenchronik," Baltische Monatschrift evIU (1904), pp. 231-47.

9See E. A. Wrigley, "Family Reconstitution," in E. A. Wrigley, ed., An Introduction to English Historical Demography (New York: Basic Books, 1966), pp. 96-159; and M. Fleury and L. Henry, Des registers paroissiaux a l'histoire de la population (Paris: INED, 1956).

lOHermann von Bruiningk, "Die alteren Kirchenbucher .LivIands," Sitzungsbe­ richte der Gesellschaft fur Geschichte und Altertumskunde der Ostseeprovinzen Russlands (1898), pp. 46-67.

llE. A. Wrigley, "Mortality in Pre-industrial England: The Example of Colyton, Devon, aver Three Centuries," Daedalus 97 (1968), pp. 546-80.

12Heldur Palli, "Parish Registers, Revisions of Land and Souls, Family Reconstitution and Household in 17th and 18th Century Estonia," in Sune Akerman, ed., Chance and Change (Odense, 1978), pp. 143-46.

13Examples of the different kinds of information that can be obtained in the Baltic parish registers can be found in the transcribed, edited, and printed excerpts of Livland registers in Lauma Sloka, ed., Vidzemes draudzu kronikas (Riga: Valsts archivs, 1925-27). 522/Plakans 16

14Latmla Sloka, ed., Kurzemes draudzu kronikas (Riga: Valsts archivs, 1930), vol. 9, part 2, pp. 19, 25, 220, 246. 15 See E. A. Hammel, Alternative Social Structures and Ritual Relations in the Balkans (Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall, 1968).

16v. M. Kabuzan, Izmeneniia v razmeshchenii naseleniia Rossii v XVIII - pervoi polovine XIXX v., po materialam revizii (Moscow, 1971). 17 A discussion of the revisions in the Baltic area can be found in Andrejs Plakans, "Peasant Farmsteads and Households in the Baltic Littoral, 1797," Comparative Studies in Society and History XVII (1975), pp. 2-35.

18peter Laslett, "The Study of Society Structure from Listings of Inhabi­ tants," in E. A. Wrigley, ed. An Introduction to English Historical Demography (New York: Basic Books, 1966), pp. 160-208.

19See the chapter on population turnover, "Clayworth and Cogenhoe," in Peter Laslett, Family Life and Illicit Love in Earlier Generations (Cambridge, Eng!.: Cambridge University Press, 1977). 20 Andrejs Plaksns, "Identifying Kinfolk Beyond the Household," Journal of Family History II (1977), pp. 3-27.

21Andrejs Plakans, "Parentless Children in the Soul Revisions," in David Ransel, ed., The Family in Imperial Russia (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1978), pp. 77-102. 22 See Arveds Svabe, Latvijas vesture, 1800-1914 (Uppsala, 1958), pp. 114-62.

23The kinds of systematic evaluation of nineteenth-century censuses that make them useful for the study of social structure and population are discussed in E. A. Wrigley, ed., Nineteenth Century Society (Cambridge, Engl.: Cambridge University Press, 1972). Similar evaluations need to be carried out on all of the eastern European censuses, but very few attempts have been made in that direction. Other Resources Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania

Baltic States Cindy’s List Links http://www.cyndislist.com/baltic.htm

Eastern Europe Resources http://www.lib.umich.edu/area/Slavic/resdirhome.html

Estonian Historical Archives http://www.eha.ee/english/english.htm

State Archives of Latvia http://www.arhivi.lv/index.php?&3

Lithuanian State Archives http://www.archyvai.lt/archyvai/selectLanguage.do?language=en

Lithuanian Global Genealogical Society http://www.lithuaniangenealogy.org/

FamilySearch Wiki https://wiki.familysearch.org/en/Main_Page