Baltic Germans
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- German
Baltic Germans, members of an ethnic group (known in German as Deutschbalten or Baltendeutsche) that mostly lived in what are now Estonia and Latvia from the 13th to the 20th centuries. They comprised most of the nobility, as well as the merchant and administrative classes, of these territories during this entire period, irrespective of changes of governance or rule. Twentieth-century events, including the foundation of Estonia and Latvia as independent states, the effects of World War II, and the imposition of Soviet rule, meant that the Baltic Germans have essentially disappeared as a significant community in their own homelands. However, their historical influence was of major importance for the Baltic region and the Russian Empire.
Origins and early history
The German communities in the eastern Baltic region largely arose due to the activity of two very different organizations: the Teutonic Knights and the Hanseatic League, with the former acting as a political and religious force and the latter as a commercial one. In the 13th century the Knights waged the Northern Crusades to impose Christianity on the indigenous Baltic and Finnic tribes of the region, who were some of the last pagans in Europe. They eventually established their own state and instituted a social order that replicated the feudal system common in Europe at the time, with class differences also being manifested in ethno-linguistic terms. The upper classes were either ethnic Germans or persons from varied ethnic backgrounds who assimilated to German language and culture, while the Estonian and Latvian peasants who made up the vast majority of the population were collectively known as Undeutsche (“non-Germans”).
During the same period, many Germans immigrated to the region and settled in the towns, and many of the towns became members of the Hanseatic League—an international trading organization dominated by North Germans. The result was that the major Baltic cities, such as Tallinn (Reval) and Riga, were dominated by their German merchant classes. German law codes were instituted in these towns. In the Middle Ages, the lingua franca of these communities, as of the Hanseatic League as a whole, was Low German (also known as Low Saxon), which reflects their origins in the northern German states. Low German gave way to High German at about the time of the Protestant Reformation, starting in the 16th century.
Changing rulers, unchanging society
A notable aspect of the history of Baltic Germans is that they were able to preserve their privileges and status over the centuries despite major changes in overlordship. Their lands were ruled over variously by Denmark, the Teutonic Knights, Sweden, Poland-Lithuania, and Russia, but under all these powers the social structure remained basically the same: a German nobility ruling over Estonian and Latvian peasantry and German guilds and merchants in control of commerce in the towns.
Swedish and Russian rulers upheld the privileges of the Baltic Germans because they were deemed useful as a class because of their military, administrative, and commercial skills. When Russia acquired the Baltic territories from Sweden, under the 1721 Treaty of Nystad, Tsar Peter I (the Great) allowed the Baltic Germans to retain their institutions of local self-government, as well as their Protestant religion and German language. Over the next two centuries, Baltic Germans played an immense role in the administrative aspects of the Russian Empire, particularly in the military, the government bureaucracy, and academia. Prominent Baltic Germans in Russia included Russia’s first prime minister, Sergey Witte; the explorer and admiral Adam Johann Krusenstern; the scientist Karl Ernst von Baer; and many others.
Communal decline
Changes during the late 19th and early 20th centuries brought a weakening of the Baltic Germans’ position. German lost its status as the official language of the Baltic provinces in 1889, being replaced by Russian. At the same time, rising Estonian and Latvian national movements, and their associated political demands, threatened the power of the Baltic Germans. Growing industrialization meant that the urban areas experienced an influx of people from the countryside, altering the character of towns where Germans had hitherto been dominant.
Never a large group—it is estimated that at no time did they comprise more than 10 percent of the population of their homelands—they suffered further demographic decline in the next century. Casualties of war during World War I and emigration to Germany reduced their numbers. When Estonia and Latvia became independent, they carried out land reforms, breaking up the German estates. A further portion of the Baltic German population emigrated as a result. Between the 1880s and the 1930s their overall numbers declined from 181,000 to 78,000. The final blow was the resettlement of the remainder of the Baltic Germans, which occurred under pressure from Nazi Germany during the early years of World War II. By the end of the war, with the two countries now under Soviet rule, the Baltic Germans had effectively ceased to exist as a community in Estonia and Latvia.
In their former homelands, the Baltic Germans left behind a significant legacy. This is most immediately noticeable in architecture. Manor houses and castles from past centuries dot the countryside. Tallinn and Riga, as well as other towns, contain many medieval and modern buildings that reflect the North German architectural styles, such as Brick Gothic. Estonia and Latvia have been heavily influenced by Protestantism since the Reformation, another legacy of the German influence. Furthermore, the German language has left many loanwords in the local languages.
