As we celebrate Women's History Month, it's important to remember that only a few countries granted women the right to vote before World War I. Although female taxpayers were allowed to vote in local elections in the Kingdom of Croatia-Slavonia beginning in 1881 this right was rescinded in 1895. In the 1906 elections to the Hungarian Parliament, the Slovak National Party was pushing universal suffrage as a part of its program. However, this "universal" suffrage was only about men’s rights (not to mention the requirements of literacy or property ownership). 

It was only beginning in 1917 that the process to introduce women's right to vote picked up momentum worldwide resulting in women's suffrage becoming a reality in an increasing amount of states, including Slavic and East European countries. Before that happened there was a long process of raising awareness and appreciation of women's accomplishments and contributions to society at large. Below are some books which were published with this goal in mind (all have been digitized and are available remotely).

Jan Sowiński, O uczony Polkach (Warszawa: W Xięgarniach N. Glücksberga, 1821) (.... pp.).

Jan Sowiński was inspired by the 1811 work De l'influence des femmes sur la littérature française by Stéphanie-Félicité de Genlis (1746-1830), a writer and educator who pointed at the limited opportunities for female writers. Sowiński wrote fifty biographies of accomplished Polish women, mostly writers. The list was later expanded by Karol Józef Teofil Estreicher (1827-1908), a Polish bibliographer and librarian. His manuscript included 500 biographies, many of which appeared in a periodical Niewiasta (1860-1862). 

The New York Public Library's copy of this book was acquired in 1924 and was once in the private collection of Wiktor Teofil Gomulicki (1848 -1919), a Polish writer, translator, and editor who was a major advocate of Positivism.

Daniil Lukich Mordovtsev, Russkiia istoricheskiia zhenshchiny: populiarnye razskazy iz russkoi istorii: zhenshchiny do-petrovskoi Rusi(Sanktpeterburg : K.N. Plotnikov, 1874).

Daniil Lukich Mordovtsev, Russkiia zhenshchiny novago vremeni : biograficheskie ocherki iz russkoi istorii, 3 vols. (S. Peterburg : A. Cherkesov, 1874-1902.) 

Daniil Lukich Mordovtsev (1830-1905) was a Ukrainian and Russian poet, writer, and historian educated at St. Petersburg University. He served as an official in Saratov where he also was the editor of the Saratovskie gubernskie vedomosti and contributed to several popular journals exhibiting a democratic leaning. His historical works were also received favorably. In the first work, he presented biographies of Russian women from the pre-Petrine times, and in the three-volume set from the 18th and 19th centuries.

Teréza Nováková, Slavín žen českých. Podává . Díl I. Od nejstarších dob do znovuzrození národa českého (V Praze, Nákl. "Libuše," Matice zábavy a vědění, 1894) (510 pp.).

Teréza Nováková, née Lanhausová (1853-1912) was a Czech writer and a representative of realism and so-called rural prose. She was an active member of the women's emancipation movement. The first part of her Celebration of Czech Women is devoted to the period from the earliest times to the rebirth of the Czech nation in the 19th century. No other parts were published.

 NYPL's print copy.

For further reading on early feminism and women's emancipation see the following studies (print resources):

• Bilym po bilomu: zhinky v hromadsʹkomu zhytti Ukraïny, 1884-1939 / Marta Bohachevsʹka-Khomiak (Lʹviv: Ukraïnsʹkyĭ katolytsʹkyi universytet, 2018).
• Comrades and Sisters: Feminism, Socialism, and Pacifism in Europe, 1870-1945 / Richard J. Evans (Brighton, Sussex: Wheatsheaf Books; New York: St. Martin's Press, 1987).
• Drogi wolności : Ruch emancypacyjny kobiet w monarchii habsburskiej na podstawie publicystyki i twórczości literackiej w latach 1867-1918 / Urszula Górska (Warszawa: Instytut Badań Literackich PAN Wydawnictwo, 2016).
• Działaczki społeczne, feministki, obywatelki-- : samoorganizowanie się kobiet na ziemiach polskich do 1918 roku (na tle porównawczym) / redakcja Agnieszka Janiak-Jasińska, Katarzyna Sierakowska, Andrzej Szwarc (Warszawa: Wydawn. Neriton, 2008).
• Equality & Revolution: Women's Rights in the Russian Empire, 1905-1917 / Rochelle Goldberg Ruthchild (Pittsburgh, Pa.: University of Pittsburgh Press, c2010).
• Feminism in Russia, 1900-17 / Linda Harriet Edmondson (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 1984).
• Granitsi na grazhdanstvoto: evropeiskite zheni mezhdu traditsiiata i modernostta / sustavitelstvo Krasimira Daskalova, Raina Gavrilova (Sofiia: Bulgarska grupa za izsledvaniia po istoriia na zhenite i pola, 2001).
• Ideolohiia ta suspilʹna praktyka zhinochoho rukhu na zakhidnoukraïnsʹkykh zemliakh XIX--pershoï tretyny XX st. : typolohiia ta ievropeisʹkyĭ kulʹturno-istorychnyĭ kontekst / Oksana Malanchuk-Rybak (Chernivtsi: Knyhy - XXI, 2006).
• Lietuvių moterų judėjimas XIX amžiaus pabaigoje, XX amžiaus pirmoje pusėje : monografija / Virginija Jurėnienė. (Vilnius: Vilniaus Universiteto leidykla, 2006).
• Miscarea pentru emanciparea femeii în România, 1848-1948 / Paraschiva Câncea (Bucuresti: Editura Politică, 1976).
• Ot siankata na istoriiata: zhenite v bŭlgarskoto obshtestvo i kultura, 1840-1940 / [Krasimira Daskalova, sŭstavitelstvo] (Sofiia: Bŭlgarska grupa za izsledvaniia po istoriia na zhenite i pola, 1998).
• Sestre Srpkinje: pojava pokreta za emancipaciju žena i feminizma u Kraljevini Srbiji / Ana Stolić (Beograd: Evoluta, 2015).
• Shifting Voices: Feminist Thought and Women's Writing in fin-de-siècle Austria and Hungary / Agatha Schwartz (Montreal: McGill-Queen's University Press, c2008).
• The Struggle for Female Suffrage in Europe: Voting to Become Citizens / edited by Blanca Rodriguez-Ruiz, Ruth Rubio-Marin  (Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2012).
• Women's Emancipation Movements in the Nineteenth Century: a European Perspective / edited by Sylvia Paletschek and Bianka Pietrow-Ennker (Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2004).
• The Women's Liberation Movement in Russia: Feminism, Nihilism, and Bolshevism, 1860-1930 / Richard Stites (Princeton, N.J. : Princeton University Press, c1978).
• Ženska obrobja: vpis žensk v zgodovino Slovencev / Marta Verginella (Ljubljana: Delta, 2006).
• Zhenskoe dvizhenie v Rossii : vtoraia polovona XIX-nachalo XX veka / O.A. Khasbulatova, N.B. Gafizova (Ivanovo: Izd-vo "Ivanovo", 2003).