page_title: Baltic Germans
section_title: Russia's Baltic governorates (1710–1917)
hierarchical_section_title: Baltic Germans / Russia's Baltic governorates (1710–1917)
context_page_description: The Baltic Germans and остзейцы ostzeitsy 'Balters' in Russian are ethnic German inhabitants of the eastern shores of the Baltic Sea, in what today are Estonia and Latvia. Since their resettlement in 1939, Baltic Germans have markedly declined as a geographically determined ethnic group. The largest groups of present-day descendants of the Baltic Germans live in Germany and Canada. It is estimated that several thousand still reside in Latvia and Estonia.
  For centuries Baltic Germans and the Baltic nobility constituted a ruling class over non-German serfs. The emerging Baltic-German middle class was mostly urban and professional.
  In the 12th and 13th centuries Catholic Germans, both traders and crusaders, began settling in the eastern Baltic territories. After the 13th-century Livonian Crusade, they assumed control of government, politics, economics, education and culture of these lands, ruling for more than 700 years until 1918 — usually in alliance with Polish, Swedish or Russian overlords. With the decline of Latin, German became the language of all official documents, commerce, education and government.
context_section_description: Between 1710 and 1795, following Russia's success in the Great Northern War and the three Partitions of Poland, the areas inhabited by Baltic Germans eventually became Baltic governorates of Russian Empire - Courland Governorate, Governorate of Livonia and Governorate of Estonia.
caption: Russian Baltic governorates
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