Esimese öö õiguse stereotüübi leviku eellugu. Mõisnike ja talutüdrukute suhetest regilaulus ning valgustusajastu saksa kirjameeste teostes
The prologue of the ius primae noctis stereotype in Estonia. The relations between landlords and peasant girls as reflected in runo songs and in the works of German authors of the Enlightenment

Summary/Abstract: The article was inspired by interest in how the stereotype of the right of the first night (ius primae noctis) arrived in Estonia. The first publication introducing the meaning of ius primae noctis to the Estonian reader is a translator’s footnote in the Estonian translation of the first part of “Ehstland und die Ehsten” by Johann Christoph Petri (1901). The translator was Adam Peterson, who had cut a figure in the Estonian society in the 1860s. It was certainly arbitrary of him to attach his commentary on ius primae noctis to a text on the Estonian condition written by a German enlightener. However, numerous bits and pieces of information on sexual relations between landlords and peasant girls can indeed be found in other works on Estonia by Petri and other enlighteners, which anticipate later discussions on the subject. The article is focused on sexual relations between people of unequal social ranks as depicted in the works of Christian Hieronymus Justus Schlegel, August Wilhelm Hupel, J. Chr. Petri and Garlieb Helwig Merkel. The prime aim of Schlegel and Hupel was to introduce the reader to Estonian topography and the ethnic and social customs of the inhabitants of the territory, whereas Petri and Merkel described the life of the peasant folk mainly in order to criticise the estate society. Hence the difference between the depictions of morganatic relationships by the two pairs of authors. Petri and Merkel put a relatively strong emphasis on such relationships, including several attempted rapes thwarted by the girl’s courageous defense of her honour. The agency of a girl and her readiness to act by herself in similar situations can also be noticed in old runo songs. The considerable independence and presence of mind of peasant girls, as well as the Estonians’ contempt for sexual relations with representatives of other estates are subjects also reflected in Hupel’s writings. Thus, on the one hand, the depiction of an Estonian girl or woman as a noble Amazon defending her virtue was a motif undermining the predestination ordained by the estate society and discrediting the ruling nobility. On the other hand, the fact that the subject keeps popping up in most different sources suggests that the motif must have had a solid basis in real life, associated with the historically strong position of the Estonian woman in the community.

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