Age and family structures among the Jews of Mitau, Kurland, 1833–1834

Bibliographic Data

ID12446754
AuthorsAndrejs Plakans (Iowa State University, corresponding author)
Year2003
Volume8
Issue4
Pages545-561
Publication date2003-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueThe History of the Family (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1081-602X • E-ISSN: 1873-5398
PublisherTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1016/j.hisfam.2002.07.001
OpenAlexW2034941150
LanguageEN
Citations received1
References cited8

The article analyzes an 1834 listing of the Jewish inhabitants in the city of Mitau in the province of Kurland, one of the Baltic provinces (the other two were Estland and Livland) of the Russian Empire. From Catherine the Great's reign onward, the Jewish population of the Baltic provinces rose steadily throughout the 19th century, but microstudies of Jewish communities in the region are virtually nonexistent, especially for the first half of the century. The Mitau list shows that the Jewish population there was very young, with about 45% being in the age group 0–14. Age at first marriage for males was about 24 years, and for females 21. From about age 35, 93% of males and 97% of females were married. The mean size of the family group was 5.8 persons, and about a third of all families were either extended (containing unmarried relatives beyond the nuclear family) or multiple (more than one kin-linked conjugal family unit). Judging by kinship terms in the source, the kin system tilted toward patrilineality, as would be expected. These characteristics need to be compared to other Jewish communities before and after 1834—in the Baltic area and surrounding regions—but the paucity of local studies suggests that some time will pass before the Mitau findings can be placed in an adequate comparative framework. Keywords: JewsFamily structureBaltic provinces Notes 1 An exception in English is CitationHundert (1984), a work which could well serve as a model for other studies of Jewish communities of the area (see also CitationHundert, 1986). CitationBuchholtz (1899) dealt only with Riga and did not treat demographic questions. Some local studies of the post-1850 period inexplicably have ignored the Jewish population completely. Thus, CitationJefremova (1982) examined only Latvian, Russian and Belorussian families, although in Table 1 she showed that in 1897, for instance, Jews (Evrei) comprised about 20% of the population of the district of Daugavpils (Dvinsk in Russian). 2 The list is part of the collection of microfilms entitled Kurländische Seelenlisten: Städte at the Johann Gottfried Herder Institute, Marburg a.d. Lahn, Germany: see Film Nr. C 93, Nr. 75, Mitau, pp. 1–622. 3 About the formation of the Pale and its history during this period, see CitationKlier (1986). Most secondary sources locate Kurland province just north of the Pale of Settlement, but one prominent source Citation(Pale of Settlement, 1905, p. 468) makes the doubtful observation that Kurland was added to the Pale in 1799. If this is true, it was later excluded. Rowland's map of the Pale Citation(Rowland, 1986, p. 208) located Kurland directly north of the Pale's northern boundary, which in 1918 became the northern boundary of the modern state of Lithuania. 4 The sources for these figures are CitationAsaris (1934, p. 224), CitationSvabe (1950–1951, I, p. 878), CitationMitau (1904, p. 622), and CitationDribins (2002, pp. 42–43). 5 The Mitau Database is an Excel file consisting of 5493 names from the 1834 list. Each name (case) is accompanied by 26 variables. Most are drawn from the source list (age, sex, relationship to head of group, marital status, etc.), but some are various kinds of "family numbers" with which the enumerator linked the 1834 list to earlier listings and revisions. 6 The 1833 revision is also part of the Kurländische Seelenlisten collection at the Johann Gottfried Herder Institute, Marburg a.d. Lahn, Germany: see Film Nr. C 93, Nr. 70, Mitau. 7 Many of the revisions and documents emanating from them used printed forms in which the column headings were in Russian but the entries themselves were in German. The Kurlandic nobility that administered the province had obtained permission from St. Petersburg to use German in most administrative documents. In Mitau, the 1833 revision was carried out entirely in German, but the 1834 list was prepared on printed forms with Russian-language headings and entries in German. Hundert , G.D. 1984 . " The Jews in a Polish private town. The case of Opatów in the eighteenth century " . Baltimore : Johns Hopkins University Press . Google Scholar Hundert , G.D. 1986 . " Approaches to the history of the Jewish family in early modern Poland–Lithuania " . In The Jewish family: Myths and reality , Edited by: Cohen , S.N. and Myman , P.E. 17 – 28 . New York : Holmes and Meier . Google Scholar Buchholtz , A. 1899 . " Geschichte der Juden in Riga bis zur Begrundung der Rigischen Hebraergemeinde im J. 1842 " . Riga, Latvia : N. Kymmel . Google Scholar Jefremova , L.S. 1982 . " Latyshskaya krestyanskaya semya v Latgale 1860–1939 " . Riga, Latvia : Zinatne . Google Scholar Klier , J.D. 1986 . " Russia gathers her Jews: The origins of the Jewish question in Russia, 1772–1825 " . Dekalb, IL : Northern Illinois University Press . Google Scholar Pale of Settlement . 1905 . " Pale of settlement " . In The Jewish Encyclopedia , Edited by: Singer , I. vol. 9 , 468 – 470 . New York : Funk and Wagnall . Google Scholar Rowland , R.H. 1986 . Geographical patterns of the Jewish population in the Pale of Settlement of late nineteenth-century Russia . Jewish Social Studies , 48 : 207 – 234 . Web of Science ®Google Scholar Asaris , H. , ed. 1934 . Latvijas pilsetas , Riga, Latvia : Latvijas Pilsetu Savieniba . Google Scholar Svabe , A. , ed. 1950–1951 . Latvju enciklopedija , Stockholm, Sweden : Tris Zvaigznes . Google Scholar Mitau . 1904 . " Mitau " . In The Jewish Encyclopedia , Edited by: Singer , I. vol. 8 , 621 – 622 . New York : Funk and Wagnall . Google Scholar Dribins , L. 2002 . " Ebreji Latvija " . Riga, Latvia : Elpa . (Jews in Latvia) Google Scholar

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