The Estonian and Latvian land reforms as reflected in Baltic German documents

• In Event: Land Reform and Historical Memory in the Baltics

Abstract

The Estonian and Latvian land reforms (Estonia 1919 / Latvia 2020) following the wars of independence had far-reaching consequences for the respective populations: the majority population of Estonians and Latvians had the opportunity to acquire land, but the expropriated large landowners, who mainly belonged to the German-Baltic nobility that had been protected by privileges for centuries, found that the reforms meant that their remaining estates were often no longer profitable. In addition to their political power, they now also lost their economic one. The document collection of the Herder Institute for Historical Research on East Central Europe in Marburg contains numerous testimonies that primarily show the German-Baltic perspective on the events in the early years of the Baltic republics. The lecture aims to draw attention to this corpus of sources. Some of the sources originate from the period itself, others still show decades later how deep the bitterness of the former landowners ran.

Author

• Elke Bauer, Herder Institute (Marburg)