Part Seven. On the Peasantry [Village Farmers]
First Section. On the Peasantry in General.
Who Is a Peasant:
1. Members of the peasant class [“estate”] are all inhabitants of the open countryside who are directly engaged in cultivation of the soil and other agriculture, insofar as they are not excluded from this class through noble birth, office-holding, or special rights.
2. Whoever belongs to the peasant class may not, without the state’s permission, ply a bourgeois [urban] occupation, or commit his children to such occupations. [ . . . ]
3. Such types of handicrafts or industry, apart from cultivation of the soil and other agriculture, as may be pursued in the countryside without special permission are specified in the following section. [These included milling, blacksmithing, small-scale tailoring and linen-weaving, and limited tavern- and innkeeping.] [ . . . ]
General Rights and Duties of the Peasantry.
8. Every rural dweller is obliged to efficiently cultivate his landholding and help meet the needs of the communal livelihood. [ . . . ]
14. The number of peasant landholdings in the countryside may not be diminished, either through enclosure of their farmsteads and lands [into noble or state demesne land] or their amalgamation into larger units. [ . . . ]