| Chapter 1: | A Brief Account of Formative Historical Events That Shaped Social and Agrarian Relations Until the Mid-Eighteenth Century in Livonia |
|
|
This is a limited free preview of this book. Please buy full access.
The competing views of Germans as Kulturträger—or, alternatively, opportunistic oppressor—were issues very much at the heart of the historical investigation of the agrarian and social reform discourse in Livonia in the late eighteenth century. Up until this period, the categorization of the indigenous populations as Undeutsche was enduring and stigmatizing. It was a classification that served and maintained an ideological agenda, which was reinforced through an undeniable sense of German cultural, social, military, and technological superiority that, over the course of time, increasingly justified the right to rule. Such early ethnic categorizations formed the basis for social division within the Livonian Ständegesellschaft. The vanquished were relegated to the lowest social echelon and, over time, gradually were denied opportunities for upward social progression; social status and position were determined by language and ethnicity. In the view of Gert von Pistohlkors,57 the crusades and colonization of the Baltic region were, however, processes that brought many undeniable benefits and improvements to the material condition of the indigenous populations—principally through the transfer of technologies. The Latvian peasantry benefited from the introduction of wind- and watermills and from the implementation of the three-field agricultural system. Masonry skills and the development of trade were also introduced into the Baltic region (comprising current-day Latvia and Estonia).58The basis of many misunderstandings and differences, however, had their origins in language and culture. Due to the reported rebellious nature and unsteady Christian faith of the new Baltic converts, the Livonian crusading enterprise remained—out of necessity—military in nature.
There were disagreements between the German military crusading order and the newly established ecclesiastical authorities in Livonia—especially the bishops of Riga that focused predominantly on the question of reward for military service. In time, German knights were rewarded for military service with land and associated feudal obligations. It was the beginning of the long-enduring Ständegesellschaft that would be an issue central to Aufklärung in the second half of eighteenth-century Livonia, especially in relation to the agrarian and social reform discourse.59