International Law and Justice Working Papers - IILJ

neighboring Lithuania. This pattern of Estonia's history, as we will see, remained similar during
the subsequent centuries: reformation was followed by counter-reformation, revolution by
counter-revolution, occupation by counter-occupation.
The university of Dorpat was closed when the Russian czar Peter the Great attacked Sweden in
1700. In the ensuing Nordic war (1700-1721) Russia beat Sweden and the provinces of Estonia
and Livonia became part of the Russian Empire. However, the university of Dorpat was
reopened only in 1802, following the orders of the Russian Tsar Alexander I. While the faculty
of law had been one of the four initial faculties since 1632, public international law was included
in the curriculum only in the middle of the 19th century with the rise of August Bulmerincq at
the faculty.
Since Bulmerincq, every succeeding international law professor faced a new political situation.
Identity conflicts are symbolically revealed already in the change of the name of the university
(and town) in the course of history. Since 1802, i.e. while Bulmerincq and Bergbohm were
professors, the university of Dorpat was the only German university in the Russian Empire, the
Kayserliche Universität Dorpat. In the last quarter of the 19th century the Baltic provinces
became subjects to the politics of Russification and in 1889 the Faculty of Law was Russified.
The university council lost its right to elect professors and all lectures had to be held in Russian.
In 1893 the town and university of Dorpat were renamed Iur'ev. The architects of the politics of
Russification in St. Petersburg referred to an ancient Russian chronicle which narrated that in
1030 the Kiyevian Russ prince I'aroslav (I'uri) had made a successful military campaign against
the Estonians, conquered their castle in Tarbatu (Tartu) and created his own stronghold.
Although the Russians had subsequently been expelled from the place, the town's new name,