301. 



COURLAND. 



Cflur'aid. it forms the criminal court of judicature for the nobles, 

 w "V"""' to which an appeal lies from the inferior courts of justice, 

 and which finally determines concerning all but capital 

 offences. In cases of minority, of the absence or sick- 

 ness of the duke, or on a vacancy of the ducal throne, 

 the same four high counsellors are invested with the re- 

 gency. 



The prevailing religion of Courland is the Lutheran. 

 All other religions, however, are tolerated : and by the 

 acts of subjection already alluded to, it is provided that 

 Roman Catholics may hold any military or civil office 

 within the duclry, with the exception only of that of chan- 

 cellor, and a few others. 



The language of the native inhabitants of Courland is 

 a dialect of the Livonian or Lettish; the same language, 

 with little variation, that is spoken by the natives of 

 Livonia and Esthonia, and which probably is derived 

 from the Finnish. The nobles and gentry who are de- 

 scended from German settlers, speak the German lan- 

 guage, and it is that language which is used always in 

 the debates of the diet. 



The duchy of Courland belonged anciently to the 

 Teutonic order, as did also Livonia. Gothard Ketler, 

 grand master of this order, being unable to resist the 

 Russians, who attacked and laid waste Livonia, put him- 

 self under the protection of Poland, and ceded Livonia 

 to King Sigismund Augustus, on condition that he and 

 his successors should retain Courland and Semigallia as 



CD 



a hereditary fief to be held of the crown of Poland. At 

 Wilna, accordingly, where this treaty was concluded in 

 156l, the master and the principal knights having quitted 

 the habits and ensigns of the order, the investiture of 

 the new dukedom was conferred upon Ketler, who did 

 homage for the same. <, In 1 589, it was enacted by the 

 diet of Poland, that if this-fief should be vacated by the 

 extinction of the heirs male of the line of Ketler, the 

 territory held by them should be united to Poland. The 

 republic of Poland was not, however, sufficiently power- 

 ful when that event took place to enforce its edict. Cour- 

 land itself being too small a state to act independently of 

 the great neighbouring kingdoms, the nomination of its 

 dukes, as well as generally the direction of its more im- 

 portant affairs, ; has been regulated by the will of that 

 power, which at each successive period has had most pre- 

 ponderance in the north. So long as Poland was the 

 great ruling power, Courland was subservient to that re- 

 public. When Sweden, under Gustavus Adolphus and 

 his immediate successors, had gained a superiority over 

 Poland, Courland was over-run by the Swedes, and its 

 sovereign led into captivity. The fortune of the house 

 of Vasa having afterwards declined, and the ascendancy 

 having come into the possession of Russia, Courland be- 

 came almost a province of that power; its dukes were 

 elected and deposed, its councils guided by the influence 

 of the court of St Petersburgh, and its dependence on 

 Poland was no longer any thing more than a mere 

 empty name. As the influence of Russia in Poland be- 

 gan afterwards to be diminished, the duke of Courland 

 proceeded to effect the emancipation of himself and his 

 estate from their absolute dependance on that court. 

 After a succession of vicissitudes, during the progress of 

 which the sovereignty of the duchy was sometimes vest- 

 ed alternately in one or another of different contending 

 competitors; sometimes was altogether without a regular 

 head, while party strove against party within the state, 



and the desire of regulating its affairs embroiled with it Cour'ar.d. 

 or with each other several of the greater neighbouring >—•->,•-«■■>' 

 powers, the rule of succession was at length established, 

 that the appointment of the dukes should rest with the 

 diet of Courland, but subject to the approbation of the 

 king and republic of Poland. After the conquest and 

 final division of Poland, its feudal dependance on that 

 republic was no longer recognised, and the country was 

 annexed to the empire of Russia. Since that period, 

 (A. D. 1795,) the so much greater affairs which have 

 agitated and engaged all the powers of Europe, and of 

 which the consequence has been an entire change in 

 many parts as to all the existing establishments and re- 

 lations, though Courland may not have been without its 

 share in the results to which those mighty operations 

 have led, must yet necessarily cause that the interests 

 and the fate of it, as of any other such petty state, can 

 have little in them comparatively to occupy attention. 

 It will remain for the future geographer and historian to 

 collect, as they best may, the meagre details which con- 

 cern this spot, from amidst the eventful records of the 

 great transactions that had been passing around it, and to 

 fix the limits within which, it may be, it will only be a 

 matter of tradition or of history that it was once con- 

 tained. 



It is to be observed, that the troubles and commotions 

 in which Courland has been so long involved, and by 

 which it has been wasted and destroyed, have been, in a 

 great measure, the consequence of the enormous privileges 

 of its nobles. The internal history of the country is, in- 

 deed, little else than a continued series of disputes be- 

 tween them and its dukes; and its boasted liberty has 

 been no other than an aristocratical licentiousness, free 

 itself to commit all kinds of enormities, but holding the 

 rest of the community in a state of the most galling op- 

 pression. Here, consequently, as in other countries si- 

 milarly circumstanced, a declining state of agriculture has 

 been the result of the state of degradation and wretched- 

 ness, which lias been the unmerited lot of the peasantry. 

 Commerce has languished, because the merchants have 

 been despised ; and literature has suffered through the 

 neglect of men of learning. The nobles and gentry were 

 the only landholders, and with this distinction they cen- 

 tered in themselves the whole powers and emoluments of 

 government, and, indeed, enjoyed exclusively the com- 

 mon advantages which are the natural birthright of man- 

 es o 



kind, and are equally necessary to the happiness of the 

 individual and of society'. Such odious slavery is now, 

 however, and has for a considerable period past, been 

 fast losing ground ; men are become much more enlight- 

 ened than they once were; and the time is, perhaps, not 

 far distant, when the citizen, the merchant, the manu- 

 facturer, and the peasant, will universally gain that 

 esteem and consequence to which their usefulness and 

 importance in society most justly entitle them. 



The population of the duchy of Courland has been 

 estimated to exceed a million and a half. 



See Peuchet's Diction. Univers. de la Geog?: commer- 

 canle ; Coxe's Travels into Poland, Russia, Sweden, and 

 Denmark, vol. ii. ; Description de la Livonie, des ditches 

 de Courlande, de Semigalle, &c. traduiie de V allemand, 

 Utrecht, 1705; Tooke's View of the Russian empire, 

 vol. i. ; and Mirabcau, Hist, secrete de la Coitrlande, Ber- 

 lin, vol. i. (k) 



COURSING. See Hunting. 



