Language: Lithuanian
Currency: Lithuanian litas
Calling
Code: 370
Lithuania is the southernmost of the three Baltic states. It
borders the Baltic Sea to the west and has common borders with
Latvia, Belarus, Poland and Russia (exclave of Kaliningrad Oblast).
Lithuania is the largest country in the Baltics in terms of both
area and population.
From around 1253 to 1795, Lithuania was
a grand duchy, and from 1569 it was part of a real union as
Poland-Lithuania. With the third partition of Poland in 1795, its
territory passed to Russia and Prussia, which lost its share to
Russia in 1807, until Lithuania became a sovereign republic in 1918
with the act of Lithuania's declaration of independence. After the
Soviet occupation (1940), interrupted by the German occupation
(1941–1944), it regained independence in 1990. As part of the EU
expansion in 2004, Lithuania became a member of the European Union
and a member of NATO. Since January 1, 2015, Lithuania has been the
19th member of the Eurozone.
Lithuania has almost three
million inhabitants (as of 2022). The capital and largest city of
Lithuania is Vilnius (588,412 inhabitants). Other major cities are
Kaunas (315,000), Klaipėda (166,861) and Šiauliai (111,967).
Panevėžys is the fifth largest city with 92,944 inhabitants.
Aukštaitija
Upper Lithuania, the largest region in terms of area
in the northeast up to the capital Vilnius.
Jonava · Kaunas ·
Panevėžys · Vilnius
Žemaitija
Lower Lithuania (Samogitia)
Šiauliai · Telšiai
Suvalkija
The southwest.
Dzūkija
The southeast.
Mažoji Lietuva
Lithuania Minor, the former
Memel region, which was counted as part of Žemaitija during Soviet times
and sometimes still is today. In contrast, the other four regions are
collectively referred to as Didžoji Lietuva (literally Greater
Lithuania).
Klaipėda · Nida
Vilnius (German Wilna) - the
capital
Kaunas (German Kauen, Polish Kowno) - the second
largest city in the country
Klaipeda (formerly Memel) - the only port in
Lithuania on the Baltic coast
Šiauliai
(German Schaulen) - the fourth largest city in Lithuania in the north of
the country
Panevėžys (German: Ponewiesch) is
a large city in the north of Lithuania - around 130 kilometers away from
the two state capitals Riga (Latvia) and Vilnius (Lithuania).
Nida
(German Nidden) - a small town on the Curonian Spit
Telšiai
(žemaitic Telšē) is a small town with a lake and a two-story church.
Jonava (German Janau) - a small town on the
Neris
The most famous landscape is the Curonian Spit, which belongs partly to Lithuania and partly to the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad. Another attractive landscape is the Aukštaitija National Park in the north-east of the country.
Aukštaitija
Aukštaitija
National Park
Biržai Castle
Samogitia
Hill
of Crosses
Panemune Castle
Žemaitija
National Park
Dzūkija (Dainava)
Purnuškės
Trakai
Dzūkija National Park
Kernave
Sūduva (Suvalkija)
Lithuania Minor
Entry requirements
Citizens of the European Union only need an
identity card. Lithuania has been a member of the Schengen Agreement
since December 21, 2007. This means that there are no border controls
with EU member states.
Airplane
There are direct flights to
Vilnius Airport (IATA: VNO) from many European cities.
Ryanair
and Wizz Air fly from Kaunas Airport (IATA: KUN).
There are only
a few connections from some European cities to the very small Palanga
Airport (IATA: PLQ), which mainly serves the seaside resort of Palanga.
Train
Poland
Since June 2016 there have been direct train
connections to Lithuania again. Direct ICE daily from Krakow (just after
4 a.m.) ↔ Białystok ↔ Suwałki ↔ Marijampole ↔ Kaunas ↔ Vilnius, travel
time 12¼ hours. The previously necessary change in Šeštokai is no longer
necessary as the route has been converted to standard gauge. For
travelers from northern Germany, the night train from Świnoujście with a
morning change in Warsaw-Gdańska would be a good option. The travel time
here is 19-20 hours. The Lithuanian railway charges 16€ to Suwałki and
30€ to Krakow. (As of August 2023)
Russia
Several corridor
trains between Russia and the Kaliningrad exclave run daily via Vilnius.
Latvia
There is a daily connection from Vilnius to Riga via
Daugavpils, but it is very slow.
Bus
Long-distance buses are a
mainstay of Lithuania's transport infrastructure. International
companies such as Lux-Express or Ecolines offer various daily bus
connections from all neighboring countries and Western Europe to
Lithuania. Important national providers include Kautra or Busturas.
Together with numerous smaller providers and microbuses, they ensure
that the country's towns are easily accessible.
By road
Arrival by car via the Polish-Lithuanian border crossings
Ogrodniki-Lazdijai, Szypliszki-Kalvarija and Grzybina-Varteliai is
possible without any problems. Since both countries belong to the
Schengen area, there are no border controls. Entry via the Kaliningrad
region is generally less sensible, as citizens of most European
countries require a transit visa for this.
Belarus
There are
six land border crossings. The largest is Medininkai-Kamenny Log on the
main road between Vilnius and Minsk.
As of August 15, 2023, the
border posts at Tveriačius (Видзы (Vidzy)) and Šumskas (ПРТО "Лоша")
were closed.
The following are open (as of August 26, 2023):
Medininkai
Lavoriškės-Kotlovka (ПРТО Котловка)
Raigardas Privalka
Šalčininkai-Benyakoni (Пункт пропуска Бенякони)
Russia
In
2022, the following border crossings were closed for political reasons:
Ramoniškiai – Pograničnyj, Nida-Morskoje, Nida-Rybačij,
Jurbarkas-Sovetskas, Rusnė-Sovetskas.
Ship
Ferrylines.com or
DFDS.com offer extensive sources of information about all ferry lines
and detailed descriptions of the ships to Lithuania as well as booking
options and tips on how to travel by ship. Both are portals for ferries
to Lithuania. From Germany, connections are offered from Kiel to the
Klaipėda ferry port. There is also the option of traveling to Klaipėda
as a passenger on cargo ships.
Sports sailors must complete the
formalities at the customs pier in the port of Klaipėda before they can
continue to the yacht club. Entry into the port is difficult when the
wind reaches force 6.
Public transport
The most important public transport is the bus.
There is a dense network both in the cities and across the country. A
helpful portal for finding and booking suitable bus connections between
cities within Lithuania and also some of the neighboring countries is
Autobusubilietai.lt.
There are only a few train lines, and they
are often in poor condition. However, the Vilnius-Kaunas railway line is
very well developed and it only takes around an hour to cover the route.
You can easily search for train connections and buy tickets on the
Lithuanian Railways website (not in German, but in English, among other
languages). There are no rail transport options within the city (apart
from the airport shuttle in Vilnius), but there are trolleybuses.
Be careful with the line numbers in city transport: the same number
can be used up to three times: for a trolleybus line, a normal bus line
and a minibus line. The minibuses (Maršrutinis taksi) run a fixed route,
but do not have fixed stops. You wave them over to get on and tell them
to get off. You pay in cash. Other city buses have tickets that you put
in a ticket validator. You buy them at a kiosk or (more expensive, but
still cheap for Western Europeans) from the driver. For intercity buses
you usually pay the driver, but at the large bus stations you have to
buy a ticket at the counter for some lines beforehand. The timetables at
the intermediate stops in the country are only guidelines, the bus can
also leave earlier.
On the road
In terms of population
density, Lithuania has a high accident rate compared to the EU. Due to
the low population / vehicle density, the probability of actually being
involved in an accident is rather low. A fire extinguisher and a safety
vest in the car are mandatory.
Drinking and driving
You have
to expect (alcohol) checks by the police at any time of day or night.
The blood alcohol limit is 0.4 (driving license holder for less than two
years 0.2; drivers of motorcycles, trucks, buses (more than 9 seats):
0.0).
Driving licenses and regulations for novice drivers
Drivers (including foreign drivers) who have held their driving license
for less than 2 years must mark their vehicle with a sticker in the
shape of a maple leaf on the rear; for this group of people, in contrast
to the table above, the maximum speed on motorways and expressways is 90
km/h and on country roads 70 km/h.
Vignette requirement for
commercial vehicles
Commercial vehicles (vehicle classes N1-N3) and
buses (M2-M3) require an electronic vignette on motorways, which is
available online and at sales outlets in Lithuania for various periods
of validity. Passenger cars and mobile homes are not required to have a
vignette. (Fee overview)
Road conditions
Smaller and remote
places can usually only be reached via gravel roads. The road surface
also changes between asphalt and gravel more frequently. Gravel roads
become bumpy roads, especially in dry sections, which put a lot of
strain on the chassis. You can generally get around there well by car,
but not as quickly, and they are not really suitable for cyclists. Road
maps published in Lithuania show the unpaved sections.
Winter
tires required
Regardless of the actual weather conditions, winter
tires are required for all vehicles from November 10th to April 1st. Be
careful: Branches lying on the road can indicate that a manhole cover is
missing!
Helmets required for motorcycles and bicycles
Motorcyclists are required to wear helmets. Important note for cyclists:
It is compulsory to use high-visibility vests! Children and young people
under 18 are required to wear bicycle helmets.
Cycling in
Lithuania
The roads along the coast and the larger national roads are
in acceptable to very good condition.
The routes should therefore
be well planned: a route of just 20 kilometers can take several hours if
it includes gravel sections.
You cannot assume that regional
(country) roads are in better condition than roads to small towns!
The gravel roads are extremely demanding for the bike: if you are
not riding with full suspension, you should lower the tire pressure a
little so that the bumps do not reach the frame without being dampened.
Usually the road gets better again at some point - and you pump it up
again; the fun of the trip is limited.
When there is little
traffic, driving is not a problem: the vehicles often travel very
quickly, but keep their distance. When there is oncoming traffic,
attention is paid to cyclists. However, where there is no space, the
bike is divided into three - there is no longer a safe distance. When
there is oncoming traffic from trucks, you should leave the road onto
the hard shoulder if possible.
Despite modernized streets and
paths, there are serious pitfalls in the cities: holes caused by
washed-out roads, deep potholes, all kinds of broken paving slabs and
manhole covers - missing, rusting along the direction of travel or
raised too high. Dogs in the country doze peacefully on the street and
can sometimes be a nuisance: when they have expanded their territory
onto the road, you have to be a dog expert to be able to assess their
behavior. An animal repellent spray helps.
Lithuanian is a Baltic language that is only closely related to
Latvian. In some places there is a significant Russian minority; in the
places of interest to tourists, especially in Vilnius and Klaipėda. In
Vilnius and the region south of it there is also a Polish minority.
With the younger generation and in hotels, etc., you can usually
communicate in English. Among the middle and older generation (born
before 1970), knowledge of English is much rarer. As a rule, these
people speak Russian more or less well. It is helpful to ask the
question about knowledge of Russian in Lithuanian (Ar Jūs kàlbate
rùsiškai?) in order to overcome the aversion to the former occupier's
language.
Knowledge of German, on the other hand, is much less
common, but there are certainly people who speak German. This does not
apply to the Curonian Spit and Klaipėda (German: Memel). Since this area
used to belong to Germany, it is geared towards German tourists.
Lithuania has been part of the Eurozone since January 1, 2015. ATMs
are easy to get. Many shops, even in smaller towns, also accept credit
cards.
Alcoholic beverages
In 2018, the minimum age for
purchasing alcohol was raised to 20, and from 18 you can buy drinks with
a maximum of 15% alcohol. Sales times are limited to 10:00 a.m. to 8:00
p.m. every day of the week. Since 2020, drinking is no longer allowed on
beaches or at sporting events.
The Lithuanian national dish is cepelinai, dumplings in the shape of zeppelins and filled with meat. You can find restaurants serving traditional food (which naturally has similarities to neighboring countries) as well as international offerings such as fast food chains.
There are numerous bars, pubs and discos in the larger cities. It
should be noted that discos only fill up from midnight onwards. However,
there is no curfew and so nightclubs are often open until 5 a.m. or even
later. Entry prices are usually between 0 and 5 euros. In the large
cities, such as Vilnius and Kaunas, you will find clubs with different
styles of music (electronic, pop/mainstream, Latin, ...). In discos,
spirits and long drinks are more common than beer and cocktails. In bars
and pubs, on the other hand, beer is often the first choice. Snacks and
simple meals are usually served here too.
The practice and use of
prostitution, as well as sexual assault, are punishable. If minors are
involved in these crimes, this has an aggravating effect on the
sentence; police actions and checks must therefore be expected at any
time.
Palanga is probably the most popular Baltic Sea destination
in Lithuania during the summer months. Many young Lithuanians go here to
party wildly. The pubs often have live music, ranging from traditional
songs to pop music.
March: Kaziuko mugė around the name day of St. Casimir, this festival
of folk arts and crafts is held in both Kaunas and Vilnius
May: New
Baltic Dance Festival, modern dance in various theatres in Kaunas and
Vilnius
June: Medieval Festival in Trakai
June 21: Summer
Solstice, everywhere
June, last weekend: Folk music in Nida
July:
Galapagai Rock Music Festival on Zaras Island near Ignalina
July-August: St. Christopher Cultural Festival in Vilnius
August,
last weekend: “Pagan Music” in Zarasai
Mid Sept.-Wed. Oct: Sirenos
Theatre Days in Vilnius
Mid Nov: European Film Forum Scanorama
simultaneously in Vilnius, Kaunas, Klaipėda and Šiauliai
The emergency number is 112.
Corruption in the legal system
and the police remains a problem that can affect tourists in the early
2020s. The special department Specialiųjų tyrimų tarnyba (STT) is there
specifically for such cases.
As a solo traveller, e.g. by bike,
you are safe in the countryside: your luggage will not be touched, even
if the visit to the shop takes longer.
Even at campsites, which
often have more of a 'bivouac character' with or without minimal
infrastructure, your property is not in danger if you go swimming, for
example.
Intoxicated people who - let's assume - do not speak
nicely to passers-by can be annoying in the towns. However, locals are
also affected by this.
In the border area with Belarus, you
should be more careful, especially as an individual tourist, and try to
get close to locals: the area is heavily monitored, but you can still
expect people who don't care much about other people's property in an
emergency situation.
Treatment by health insurance (dental) doctors is available upon
presentation of the European Health Insurance Card. Specialists and
hospitals may only be visited directly (without referral or admission)
in an emergency.
For prescription drugs, you have to pay 20%
(max. €4.71) per pack. For some drugs, you also have to pay half the
price.
At the dentist, you have to pay 100% of the material
yourself.
Lithuanians are very western-oriented and therefore treat western tourists very openly and respectfully.
The post office Lietuvos paštas was taken over by DHL and focuses on
parcel delivery.
The Lithuanian mobile phone network (telephone
and internet) is very well developed, even in rural areas and in the
forest there are rarely any dead spots. Thanks to EU roaming, you only
need a Lithuanian SIM card if you use a lot of data. Prepaid mobile
phone plans can be purchased in post offices, supermarkets, petrol
stations and telephone shops. Network operators are Telia (brands: Ežys
and Extra, the latter only without EU data roaming), Bitė (prepaid:
Labas; Mezon took over) and Tele 2 (prepaid: Pildyk).
Lithuanian
comparison site English prepaid overview.
Domestic long-distance calls: The phone number must be preceded by an
8 (not 0!), which is often not written. The switch to 0 is planned for
2025.
Lithuanian mobile phone numbers all start with 6.
Abroad: The country code must be preceded by 00. In the mobile phone
area, the internationally common area code, e.g. for Germany +49, can be
used.
The traditional toilet symbols are quite idiosyncratically stylized, especially when it comes to the men's toilets. Nowadays you often find the symbols as in this country, but new signs such as in the recently renovated Kaunas train station sometimes use the traditional representation.
The origin of the name Lithuania is not precisely known. Since many Baltic ethnonyms are derived from the names of rivers, the name Lithuania is associated with the name of the stream Lietava. Since it is a small stream, this assumption raises objections that such a small stream could not have given a name to a large land and tribe. Historian Artūras Dubonis derives the name of the state from the word leičiai, which in 14th–15th century sources referred to the layer of ducal servants. These were warrior colonists who consolidated power in the lands annexed to the grand ducal possessions.
The history of Lithuania covers the developments in the territory of
the Republic of Lithuania and the historical Lithuanian kingdoms from
prehistory to the present day. It is closely linked to that of the
Kievan Rus, the history of Russia, the history of Germany and especially
the history of Poland and the history of Belarus. The first mention of
Lithuania in Western sources dates back to 1009. Lithuania emerged as a
unified state in the 13th century at the latest.
Western powers
viewed the Baltic Lithuanians as the last stronghold of European
"paganism", a potential mission area for the church and an area of
expansion for the Livonian and Prussian knightly nobility. Members of
the Mindaugas dynasty exploited the weakness of the Kievan Rus after the
Mongol invasion of 1240 and subjugated parts of the Rus on the upper
Daugava between 1240 and 1250. After a period of internal discord
following the death of Mindaugas, the Grand Dukes Vytenis, Gediminas and
Algirdas united and expanded the Lithuanian Empire from 1293 to 1377 to
include the southwestern and eastern parts of Kievan Rus up to the gates
of Moscow and the Black Sea, which had previously been in the Golden
Horde's sphere of influence. In the north and west, the Lithuanians were
able to successfully defend themselves against the advance of the
Teutonic Order in Livonia and Prussia.
From 1385, the great power
entered into a personal union with the Kingdom of Poland, under the
leadership of the Lithuanian Jagiellonians, who Christianized the pagan
heartland of Lithuania. In the Battle of Tannenberg in 1410, the union
defeated the Grand Master's army. The connection with Poland was
consolidated in the Real Union of Lublin in 1569. From then on, the
Aristocratic Republic of Poland-Lithuania existed. From 1648 onwards
there was a sustained internal and external decline, after which, after
the three partitions of Poland from 1772 onwards, the two states finally
disappeared from the political map of Europe in 1795.
Lithuania
remained part of the Russian Empire until 1917 and gained independence
in 1918. On June 15, 1940, the Red Army entered Lithuania. The
Lithuanian SSR was officially founded on July 21, 1940 and joined the
Soviet Union shortly thereafter. From 1941 to 1944, Lithuania was
occupied by the Wehrmacht and belonged to the Reichskommissariat
Ostland. From 1945 to 1990, the Lithuanian SSR existed again as part of
the Soviet Union (USSR). In the course of perestroika, the declaration
of independence was adopted after free elections on March 11, 1990,
which was seen in Lithuania as a restoration of the independence gained
in 1918 and lost through the Hitler-Stalin Pact. Lithuania became a
member of the EU and NATO in 2004.
Lithuania became ice-free relatively late. The last glaciers
retreated around 16,000 years ago and left behind a large postglacial
lake, from which individual bodies of water gradually emerged. Human
settlement is documented from the Alleröd period (late glacial period,
from 12,700 BC). The reindeer herds, which the corresponding groups of
hunters followed, had migrated northwards. The most important source of
food for the remaining population was the resident game, primarily the
elk. During the Younger Tundra Period, it became colder again. People
hunted the reindeer that had migrated back and lived in tents.
With the end of the Paleolithic period, various cultures spread in
Lithuania. Camps of hunters of the Ahrensburg culture were found in the
area around Vilnius, partly in connection with finds that are similar to
those of the Bromme culture (also Lyngby culture). The Upper
Paleolithic, so-called "Baltic Magdalenian" can be associated with this
culture of the western Baltic Sea. This is mainly widespread in the
western Baltic, for example with around 40 sites mainly on the banks of
the Memel, the Neris and the Merkys. They are located on the high river
terraces and contain, in addition to short scratches made of flint, the
characteristic large stem tips.
The Swiderian, which is
widespread east of the Oder, is also found on the Vistula, the Bug and
the Memel. It differs from the "Baltic Magdalenian" primarily in the
long, narrow arrowheads, which often have flat retouches on the back.
The sites are also located on the river terraces of the Memel and the
Merkys. Around 60 settlements of the culture have been discovered in
Lithuania.
The largest in terms of numbers is the so-called
hybrid culture, in which features of the "Swiderian" and the "Baltic
Magdalenian" can be found in one complex of finds, although the
proportion can vary greatly at the individual sites. The hybrid culture
was widespread in a strip between the Oder and the Memel from Lithuania
to central Poland.
In search of good quality flint, the
Paleolithic hunters and gatherers traveled distances of up to 100 km.
Valuable sites were visited repeatedly. In the flint pit of Ezerynai
(southern Lithuania), 24 flint striking sites were identified. The
majority of the finds are residues such as shapeless flakes and damaged
core stones and flint blades. At the work sites there were also mining
tools that resembled flint axes and are not found anywhere else.
With the end of the Younger Tundra Period (Dryas) around 9600 BC,
temperatures rose sharply up to the Atlantic, but were repeatedly
interrupted by cold snaps. The water level of rivers and lakes
fluctuated greatly, which caused settlements to change in altitude. The
flora also changed. At the beginning of the Mesolithic, birch trees
predominated, then pine, hazelnut and other deciduous trees began to
spread. The reindeer moved north again, and the animal world became more
diverse.
In the Mesolithic period, there were four cultures in
Lithuania. During the older Mesolithic period, there were the Maglemose,
Memel and, in the north, the Kunda cultures. Typical of the Kunda
culture is the extensive inventory of bone and antler artifacts such as
fishing hooks, ice picks, hoes, harpoons, tools for knotting nets and
socket axes. In comparison to the Memel culture, the flint inventory in
the settlements of the Narva culture, especially its western variant, is
very sparse. Among the stone tools are ground axes, grinding and
whetstones and sinking stones for fishing nets. It differed from the
Memel culture in the different composition of the tool inventories.
Scrapers were used to work on animal hides, while burins and hollow
scrapers were used for harder materials. Oval core axes and disc axes
made from large flakes were part of the tool inventory of the
settlements. Bone and antler artifacts supplemented the inventories.
Serrated and notched harpoons were found. Lance tips with round and
triangular cross-sections and those with flint blade inserts. For the
oval axes, frames were made from antler and shafts from wood. Nets were
knotted from linden bast for fishing. As the water level of the Baltic
Sea dropped, the rich flint reserves on the lower river terraces were
accessible to the people of the Middle Stone Age.
Most of the
Middle Stone Age sites are relatively small and were only inhabited for
a short time. Their areas were 200 to 500 m². In places where people
probably returned more often, the finds are scattered over larger areas.
In 1985 and 1986, three Mesolithic graves were discovered on
Spiginas Island in Lake Birzulis in western Lithuania. The dead had been
laid out and buried sprinkled with ochre. Next to the skeletons were
flint arrowheads and pierced teeth of deer, elk and beavers, which were
worn as pendants.
The Neolithic period in Lithuania can be divided into two periods,
the early and middle phase (4th millennium BC) and the late phase (3rd
millennium to the beginning of the 2nd millennium BC). At the beginning
of the Neolithic period, the climate, although already cooler than in
the Atlantic, was still more favourable than today, winters were milder
and the growing season lasted longer than today. In the Late Neolithic
period, it became cooler. The population of pine, birch and alder
increased, while oak, linden and elm flourished less.
In the
Early Neolithic period, two related cultures developed in Lithuania and
in the north of East Prussia: the Narva culture from the Mesolithic
Kunda culture and the Memel culture. Both retained the Mesolithic
hunter-gatherer culture, but had ceramics. The adherence to the old way
of life can be explained by the spread of seal hunting on the coast.
The most common type of pottery from this phase are pointed-bottomed
vessels with wide mouths and sparse decorations. Often only the edges
are decorated with triangular impressions (so-called pitted pottery). In
the Middle Neolithic, the vessels became shorter and wider. Flat bottoms
only appear later.
The Late Neolithic from around 2700 BC is
characterized by a local development of corded ware with the subgroup of
the Haffküsten culture belonging to the boat axe culture. The
settlements of the Haffküsten culture are found in Lithuania,
particularly on the Baltic coast. Around 20 sites are known in the area
of the city of Palanga and on the Curonian Spit, of which only Nida
has been researched. Flat-bottomed vessels and polished boat axes are
typical of the Haffküsten culture. There are only mineral admixtures in
the clay mass of the pottery. Sand or ground granite was added when
making artistic, ornamented pots. Large pots intended for everyday use
had coarse granite chips and finely crushed vessel shards added as
filler. The pottery can be divided into amphorae, beakers, round bowls,
smaller oblong bowls, wide-mouthed pots and small cups. The pots were
decorated with herringbone patterns, cord, bundle of lines, tooth stick
decorations and bead rings. The upper part was most often decorated.
In the late Neolithic period, fortified settlements emerged in
Lithuania. They had an enclosure made of two or three parallel rows of
driven-in posts that surrounded the settlement in an irregular arc. The
residential buildings were square post structures or oval shelters sunk
slightly into the ground. The fireplaces were built in small depressions
and had no stone settings.
Hunting continued to be very
important. This is evidenced by arrowheads and spearheads, which are
found in all settlements, as well as tools made of wood (bows and
spears), stone and animal bones. From the bones we can conclude that in
the early Neolithic period mainly elk and wild boar were hunted, in the
middle Neolithic period deer, roe deer, wild boar and bison and in the
latest phase hares, horses and bison. In all periods fur-bearing
animals, birds and seals were hunted. Fishing was particularly developed
in the Neolithic period. Pike and zander were caught mainly in rivers
and lakes, but also bream, tench and catfish, and cod, flounder and tuna
on the coast. Simple fishing equipment inherited from the Mesolithic
period was used, such as harpoons, wooden fish piercers, lances and
wooden mallets. The fishermen also used nets and traps. The nets were
made of linden bast. The upper part of the net was held in place by
floats made of birch or pine bark. The lower part of the net was
weighted down with countersunk stones. Fishing is hard to imagine
without dugout canoes, which were made from a hollowed-out tree trunk.
Gathering hazelnuts and water nuts was also an important source of
food. Charred wild apples were found in the settlement of Nida. They
were probably dried as a reserve. Tubers and other plant foods were dug
up with spades made of antler and wood.
The beginning of
comparatively rudimentary agriculture can be proven in Lithuania in the
middle and later Neolithic period. Important evidence is furrowing
sticks made of ash wood. They were suitable for drawing furrows, but not
for ploughing up fallow land. Stone pickaxes were used for this. In
Neolithic settlements, bones of cattle, sheep, goats and pigs were found
alongside dog bones, which allow conclusions to be drawn about livestock
farming. Compared to the bones of hunting animals, these only make up a
small proportion. Wooden tools such as spoons, ladles, mortar clubs and
bowls were used in the household. Baskets were woven from birch bark.
Fibres were obtained from linden and willow bast, and from the middle of
the Neolithic period also from hemp. Fragments of mats and their
impressions were found on the bottoms of vessels. Wooden distaffs and
spindle whorls were used for spinning. Fabric impressions were found on
the walls of vessels; in the Šventoji 2B settlement even a scrap of
fabric.
Amber jewellery was popular especially on the coast. It
mostly consists of oval, square and trapezoidal pendants, some of which
are decorated with rows of dots. The most common jewellery items are
lens-shaped buttons with V-holes and tubular beads. The most realistic
art products include ritual sticks with moose heads, which refer to a
tradition independent of the Corded Ware. The artist who made the
carefully polished stick from Šventoji 2B knew the anatomy of the animal
very well.
Depictions of people, which are much more schematic
than those of animals, are also common. They are small amulets or
stylised shapes carved into the walls of vessels or larger wooden
sculptures. One of the most impressive is a two-metre-high sculpture
from the Šventoji 2B settlement. It was made from a black alder post.
The bark is only missing from the elongated face and neck area of the
sculpture. The curvature of the post can still be seen on the forehead.
The eye sockets are deepened from the eyebrows to the chin and form the
narrow nose. Instead of the mouth, a chin curvature can be seen.
In the early and middle Neolithic period, the dead were buried in the
settlements or in the immediate vicinity. The deceased were buried in a
stretched-out position in different orientations. In four graves of the
Narva culture there was a lancet-shaped arrowhead made of flint,
polished bone chisels, a bone dagger and the pointed tusks of a wild
boar. Two skeletons were sprinkled with ochre. In the Late Neolithic
period, burials were also carried out in a squatting position.
Although the Bronze Age began early in Central Europe, knowledge of
metals reached the Baltic States very late. There were no metal deposits
in the Baltic region and no significant barter trade with the
metallurgical centers existed. Although amber was already a sought-after
raw material in the late Neolithic period, significant exports began in
the 16th century BC. However, only the area with the most abundant amber
deposits on the coasts of East Prussia benefited from this. Amber was so
sought-after that bronze axes, bracelets, daggers, pins and even gold
jewelry were imported here.
The Baltic States were culturally
divided into two zones that continued into the Middle Ages. East Prussia
and the Lithuanian-Latvian coast became the economic catchment area of
Central Europe thanks to amber and received cultural impulses from
there.
Today's Lithuania and Latvia were less exposed to these
influences and remained stuck in archaic ways of life. These ways of
life survived in a remarkably pure form in some areas until the 19th
century, an example of which is Lithuanian, a very primitive
Indo-European language. The eastern Baltic region, the circle of the
"castle hill cultures", has hardly any bronze implements. It includes
various nameless groups in the area of distribution of Baltic water
names. These groups settled in smaller or larger fortified settlements
or on the more heavily fortified so-called castle hills. The population
built post buildings (instead of huts dug into the ground) and lived
mainly from livestock farming and hunting. Cultural differences are only
noticeable in pottery. The ceramics are plain and only decorated in
lines on the upper part, which is why in the 1st millennium BC people
speak of "line pottery culture". Its distribution extends from the
Beresina in the east, a tributary of the Dnieper, to Courland in the
west. In Lithuania there are hundreds of fortified settlements of the
line pottery culture that were continuously inhabited for centuries or a
millennium. They are preferably located on steep banks above lakes or
river banks and are of varying sizes with areas between 100 and 5000 m².
Older hilltop settlements were fenced in with palisades. The Iron Age
hillforts were fortified with ditches and ramparts made of stone, earth
and wood, some of which have been remarkably well preserved. But even if
they are now quite destroyed, they are the most important source of life
and economic activity for Lithuanians, because the settlements on the
plains have now been almost completely destroyed by agriculture and
graves from the hillfort culture are almost unknown.
Livestock
farming continued to be of greatest importance for nutrition. The
proportion of domestic animals in the bone material is 78% in Norkǔnai,
87% in Sokiškiai and even 93% in Nevieriške. Pigs (around 50%) and
cattle (just under 30%) were mainly kept, with small livestock and
horses being less common. Bear, beaver, elk, deer and wild boar were
hunted, and these also provided hides, antlers, leather and furs. Fish
was also part of the menu, as evidenced by fishing hooks, bone harpoons
and clay net sinkers. Since metals were still an unattainable luxury,
bone and stone tools were used even in the 1st millennium BC.
The
Nevieriške hillfort, which was inhabited from the end of the 2nd
millennium BC to the 1st century AD, can be considered typical. Around
250 stone tools have been found there, including 92 hatchets and 40
shaft-hole axes (including unfinished examples that prove that they were
made on site), but only one millstone. The inventory on other hillforts
is similar. The rare millstones indicate that little grain was grown
during this period. Plant food was obviously obtained by gathering at
this stage, as in the millennia before.
The majority of the finds
consist of ornamental objects, bones, weapons and tools. Axes, daggers,
chisels, awls, arrowheads and lanceheads were made from familiar
materials. Jewellery is mainly represented by decorative pins, some of
which are based on bronze examples. Bronze pins or fragments thereof
were also found on the castle hills. Between 1500 and 1000 BC, metal
tools and jewellery were still rare. During the early Iron Age, bronze
axes, pendants, arm and neck rings, lanceheads, needles and sickles
became more common. These were originally imports, but fragments of
casting moulds and small melting pots prove the presence of bronzesmiths
who knew how to process scrap metal on the castle hill finds. As the
metal analysis confirmed, the Baltic material is similar to the bronze
used in Central Europe. Iron objects (knives, awls, occasionally
brooches) and iron slag are only sparsely found in the most recent
cultural layers of the castle hills.
It is assumed that the
ancestors of the Balts reached the present-day Baltic regions around
3000–2500 BC and assimilated the residents. Where they came from is
disputed, as is the question of the original homeland of the
Indo-Europeans from whom they descended. The territory in which the
Balts settled covered around 800,000 km²: from the Baltic Sea to the
upper Volga and the Dnieper. Estimates assume a population of around
500,000 people. A differentiation of the Balts into East Balts and West
Balts can be assumed from the turn of the millennium. This is based on
purely linguistic aspects and is disputed.
The first mention of
the Western Balts comes from the Roman historian Tacitus, who mentioned
the Aestii (gentes Aestiorum) in his ethnographic work Germania at the
end of the first century and located their settlement area on the Baltic
coast north of the Slavs.
It was only after the turn of the first
millennium AD that the Baltic tribes known today were formed: Prussians,
Shemites, Jotvingians, Nadraus, Skalwen, Cours, Semigallians, Selones,
Galinds, Latgallians, Latvians and Lithuanians. The latter lived in the
area between the upper reaches of the Memel and the Neris.
Between about 850 AD and 1230, Lithuania was part of the Kievan Rus'
and was ruled by the Rurikids. Until then, the Lithuanian tribes lived
under small princes. They had a strict caste division into priests,
princes (Prussian Reiks or Rekis, Lithuanian kunigas, Latvian kungs),
warriors, landowners, free people and serfs.
There were no
written laws or legal collections at that time. The supreme power was in
the hands of the first priest Kriwe-Kriweito (Lithuanian Krivis
Krivaitis). Murder and theft were punished very severely. The main
occupation was agriculture and trade with the Swedes and Slavs.
The name Lithuania (as Litua) appears in written sources for the first
time in 1009 in the Quedlinburg Annals in connection with the monk Bruno
of Querfurt, who wanted to convert the local people to Christianity:
"Sanctus Bruno, qui cognominatur Bonifacius, archiepiscopus et
monachus, XI. suae conversionis anno in confinio Rusciae et Lituae a
paganis capite plexus, cum suis XVIII, VII. Id. Martii petitiit coelos"
"Saint Bruno, who was nicknamed Bonifacius, archbishop and monk, was
beheaded by pagans in the border region of Russia and Lithuania with
eighteen of his followers on March 9th in the eleventh year of his
conversion and ascended to heaven."
- Quedlinburg Annals
In
the 13th century, significantly later than among the neighboring Slavic
peoples and favored by the loss of power of the Kievan Rus, the
formation of states by the Lithuanian tribes began. A first important
step towards unification was the mutual assistance agreement between 20
Lithuanian princes and Galicia-Volhynia in 1219. The name of Mindaugas
is already mentioned in this document as one of the powerful princes. He
became the first important ruler of the Lithuanians and was able to
expand Lithuania's rule eastwards. In the area of present-day
Lithuania, however, he was in competition with the Prince of Samogitia,
Vykintas. He therefore briefly made a pact with the Teutonic Order,
which had been Lithuania's neighbour in the north (Livonia) and in the
southwest (Prussia) since the end of the Order of the Brothers of the
Sword in 1236. He was baptised in 1251 and crowned King of Lithuania in
1253. In doing so, he deprived the Teutonic Order of its legitimacy to
take military action against Lithuania under the pretext of missionary
work. He also ceded his territories in Samogitia and Shalauen to the
Order and promised it his entire empire in the event of his death. He
reversed this after the Samogitians under Treniota, who had previously
been his enemies, inflicted a heavy defeat on the Teutonic Order in 1260
in the Battle of the Durbe in Courland. He probably renounced the
Christian faith and, together with Treniota and with the support of
revolts by the Semigallians in Latvia and the pagan Prussians who
settled in the south of Lithuania, was able to secure the Lithuanian
territory against the Teutonic Order. Further successes were prevented
by internal power struggles in Lithuania, which began with the murder of
Mindaugas by Treniota and only ended with the appointment of Traidenis
as Lithuanian Grand Duke in 1270.
In the 14th century, especially under Grand Duke Gediminas and his
sons Algirdas and Kęstutis, Lithuania rose to become a major European
power. In 1323, Gediminas founded the capital Vilnius. After the Tatars
invaded Eastern Europe and the destruction of Kievan Rus, many East
Slavic princes joined the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, while others became
tributaries to Lithuania. Belarus, parts of Ukraine and Western Russia
were now under Lithuanian rule. Therefore, over time, the East Slavic
language and culture played a role in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.
Since a written language already existed here, it was used as the
official written language of the Grand Duchy, the so-called Chancellery
Slavonic. On the western border, Gediminas and his son Kęstutis were
able to parry the constant advances of the Teutonic Knights (see:
Lithuanian Wars of the Teutonic Order), who repeatedly made "journeys"
from Prussia deep into Lithuanian territory, but were never able to
decisively weaken the Lithuanians.
After the death of the Polish
King Casimir III the Great (Kazimierz III Wielki) in 1385/86, Jogaila,
the son of Algirdas, had the opportunity to convert to Christianity and
acquire the Polish royal crown by marrying Casimir's granddaughter
Jadwiga Andegaweńska (Hedwig of Anjou). Jogaila was baptized, married
Poland's queen in the Union of Krewo and ascended the Polish throne as
King Władysław II Jagiełło. In doing so, he founded the ruling house of
the Jagiellonians and a feudal relationship between the Polish and
Lithuanian rulers in personal union. 1387 is therefore considered the
year of the final "baptism" of Lithuania, although for parts of Lower
Lithuania, 1413 is not considered the date of Christianization. The
personal union of Krewo led to a series of further, increasingly stable
unions (1401, 1413, 1432, 1499, 1501) between the two countries.
Jogaila's attempts to unite the two kingdoms during his reign were
successfully thwarted by his co-regent Vytautas. After years of
quarrelling with his cousin Vytautas over power in the Lithuanian Grand
Duchy, in which Jogaila was unable to prevail militarily against
Vytautas, who had made a pact with the Teutonic Order, the two cousins
agreed in 1401 to share power: Jogaila (Władysław II Jagiełło) was
responsible for the west (the Polish territories) as Polish king and
Vytautas as Lithuanian Grand Duke for the east.
The personal
union had drastic consequences for the Orthodox population. Although the
status quo was maintained, the Orthodox were subsequently worse off than
the Catholic Poles and now also Lithuanians. At first, Christianization
was limited to the princes and the pagan population in the Lithuanian
territories, leaving the population in the territories of the former
Rus' unmolested. However, as part of the Western Church mission and
expansion of influence, Lithuania was instrumentalized by Rome and the
Kingdom of Poland. This caused a series of conflicts with the Grand
Duchy of Moscow, which was able to position itself as a defender of the
interests of the Orthodox population. The Grand Duchy of Lithuania saw
itself as the rightful heir of the Rus (magnus dux Littwanie, Samathie
et Rusie) and became a competitor of the Grand Duchy of Moscow in the
collection of Russian lands. Vytautas in particular pursued ambitious
plans to conquer the Rus in order to escape the supremacy of the union
with Poland that had existed since 1386. However, Lithuania's eastward
expansion ended in 1399 after the defeat against the Tatars in the
Battle of Vorskla. Vytautas gave up the plan to gain control over the
whole of the Rus. This was followed by a reorientation of foreign policy
towards the west. With combined forces (they also received support from
Hungary), Vytautas and Jogaila subsequently took action against the
Teutonic Order. They succeeded in pacifying the western border. The
foundation for the military success was the Battle of Tannenberg on July
15, 1410 (Lithuanian: Žalgiris), in which the forces of the Teutonic
Order in Prussia were defeated. The army of the Livonian branch of the
Order did not take part in this battle due to a separate ceasefire.
After that, Vytautas, who ruled until his death in 1430, was able to
orient himself towards the south and east and expand the territory of
Lithuania to the shores of the Black Sea.
Due to the weakness of
the Rus' successor principalities and the victories against the Order,
the personal union of Poland and Lithuania formed the most powerful
political entity in Eastern Europe in the 15th and 16th centuries,
although the advances of the Moscow Grand Duke Ivan III meant that the
Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was weakened. Lithuania had been in
retreat since 1494 and had to move its eastern border back to the
Dnieper and the Sos after the conquest of Smolensk by the Muscovites in
1514.
After Vytautas died childless, Jogaila (d. 1434) was able to place
his son Casimir as Lithuanian Grand Duke. In the following 100 years,
Polish influence increased more and more due to this close connection
(the later Polish king ruled the Grand Duchy of Lithuania). At the same
time, the Grand Duchy of Moscow rose to become a new threatening power
on the eastern border. The Grand Duchy of Lithuania was significantly
weakened by Moscow's attacks (including the Livonian War of
1558–1582/83). In the Real Union of Lublin of 1569, which took place
under the pressure of Moscow's westward expansion, Lithuania became part
of Poland under the royal crown.
This real union also marked a
clear turning point in the history of (then Lithuanian) Ukraine. The
Ukrainian lands, the three voivodeships of Volhynia, Kiev and Podlasie
fell to the Polish part of the empire. Both countries received a common
ruler, Senate and Reichstag. The monarch was elected in Poland and
crowned in Kraków. Every third Reichstag had to take place on Lithuanian
soil. Foreign policy and coinage were union affairs. Law, justice,
administration, finance and military affairs continued to be regulated
independently by Poland and Lithuania. As a result, the Lithuanian
statute of 1566 remained in place. In the country's administration, the
Lithuanian nobility retained the right to fill offices and collect
taxes. The military units also continued to be organized on the basis of
the Lithuanian noble flag. The privileges that remained did not prevent
the Polonization of the Lithuanian nobility. Already in the Lithuanian
statute of 1566, Polish was given equal status alongside Lithuanian and
Latin. The text of the Act of Union of Lublin was written exclusively in
Polish. In 1696, Polish became the language of chancery in the
Lithuanian part of the empire and the lingua franca of the Lithuanian
nobility and clergy. This marked the end of Polonization. The conversion
of the Schemeite nobility to the union with Sweden in 1655 or the
election of the Lithuanian magnate Michael Korybut Wisniowiecki as King
of Poland and Lithuania (1669–1673) no longer had a nationally unifying
effect on the Lithuanian nobility.
Due to the formation of the
union with Poland and Polonization, the history of Lithuania between the
16th and 18th centuries largely coincided with the history of the Polish
aristocratic republic. This was characterized by constant conflicts with
Russia, Sweden and the Ottoman Empire. While the aristocratic republic
was initially successful in the Livonian War and the Polish-Russian War
from 1609 to 1618, it repeatedly suffered defeats at the hands of
Sweden. In the Second Northern War from 1655 to 1660, the aristocratic
republic was on the verge of destruction. In the Peace of Oliva,
Poland-Lithuania had to finally renounce Estonia and Livonia in favor of
Sweden. All claims of the Polish Vasa to the Swedish crown had to be
dropped and the Duchy of Prussia ceded to Brandenburg. In the Treaty of
Andrussovo with Russia in 1667, Poland-Lithuania lost Smolensk,
Severija, Czernichow and the left-bank Ukraine with Kiev to Russia.
After the Great Northern War (1700–1721), Poland-Lithuania became
dependent on the Russian Empire in terms of foreign policy.
Lithuania was one of the centers of Jewish culture in Eastern Europe
with its own schools, a large library and numerous Bible schools. The
prosperity and relative legal security of the Jews was shaken after
1648, when they suffered severe pogroms during the Cossack uprisings
(the so-called Khmelnytskyi Uprising). This was followed by the
exclusion of Jews, which created an image of a special Jewish existence
that had never existed before and led to ever new persecutions.
In the first partition of Poland in 1772, the aristocratic republic lost
a third of its territory and population. Russia gained Lithuanian
territories up to the Daugava and the Dnieper with a predominantly
Belarusian peasant population and an urban population dominated by Jews,
as well as a small aristocratic class. In the second partition, the
Russian Empire received, among other things, the rest of the remaining
Lithuania. The government in St. Petersburg behaved differently towards
the newly acquired population. In principle, religious tolerance
prevailed. The Polish official and judicial language and the Lithuanian
statute of 1566 were retained. However, Polish institutions such as the
Sejm were abolished. The Polish-Lithuanian nobility could be transferred
to the Russian nobility under certain conditions. The Lithuanian
nobility also occupied most administrative posts. The Russian government
worked closely with the higher clergy on religious issues. The
bourgeoisie was also confirmed in its traditional rights. The losers
included the Jews and the peasants, who were even more bound to serfdom
and lost their (already few) documented rights from the aristocratic
republic.
With the third and final partition of Poland in 1795, Lithuania came
under Russian rule. After Lithuania became a province of the Russian
Empire, the Lithuanian nobility initially kept the idea of keeping the
Grand Duchy within Russia. However, this was never put into practice. On
the contrary, the country suffered Russian repression for supporting
Napoleon in 1812. In 1832, in response to the November Uprising of
1830/1831, Vilnius University was closed.
In 1863, the Tsarist
army crushed the significant January Uprising in Poland and Lithuania.
From then on, Russia pursued a policy of complete Russification.
Firstly, the printing of Lithuanian texts in Latin script was banned.
From now on, these had to be written in Cyrillic. Secondly, Lithuanian
primary schools had to close and only Russian teachers were allowed to
teach in Russian. Furthermore, more and more Russian farmers were
resettled in Lithuania, where they enjoyed privileges. The estates and
manors of the Lithuanian nobles who had participated in the uprisings of
1831 and 1863 were confiscated and given to Russian lords. The
authorities closed many Catholic churches or converted them into
Orthodox churches.
In the 19th century, as everywhere else in
Europe, national movements intensified in Lithuania and more books were
published in Lithuanian. Kristijonas Donelaitis (1713–1780), who wrote
his epic poem “Seasons” (Metai in Lithuanian) between 1765 and 1775, is
considered the father of Lithuanian literature. He lived and worked in
Lithuania Minor (Mažoji Lietuva, northern East Prussia), where the
Lithuanian majority of the population had retained their culture and
language to a certain extent. The new generation of intellectuals was
particularly committed to the political and historical education of the
Lithuanian nation from the 1880s onwards. Jonas Basanavičius, who had
lived abroad for a long time, played a leading role in this. He founded
the first Lithuanian-language newspaper Aušra (The Dawn), which was
published between 1883 and 1886. Another activist, Vincas Kudirka,
published the newspaper Varpas (The Bell) from 1885 to 1905. During the
period when printing in Latin letters was banned, these and other works
were printed in neighbouring East Prussia and smuggled into the country
by the so-called knygnešiai (book carriers).
In 1904, the ban on
printing in Latin script was lifted, but censorship remained. The first
legal newspaper, Lietuvių laikraštis ("The Lithuanians' Newspaper"),
appeared in Saint Petersburg on November 24, 1904, followed by Vilniaus
žinios ("Vilnius News") on December 10, 1904. On December 4 and 5, 1905,
Didysis Vilniaus Seimas (the Great Vilna Diet) assembled and declared
the autonomy of the Lithuanian state within the Russian Empire.
Consequently, the Lithuanian language was reintroduced in schools.
During World War I, Germany occupied the Lithuanian territories in
1915 and combined them into an administrative unit called Ober Ost under
the leadership of General Erich Ludendorff. Towards the end of the World
War, Lithuania sought formal independence, but in practice as a
satellite of the German Empire, as a kingdom under Mindaugas II. Germany
only wanted to recognize Lithuania as a sovereign state if it entered
into an economic and military union with the Reich. On December 11,
1917, the Taryba declared the restoration of the "independent" state of
Lithuania with its capital in Vilnius and ties to the German Reich.
Since Germany delayed recognition, the Taryba again proclaimed
Lithuania's independence on February 16, 1918, without any ties to the
other states. This day is a national holiday.
The end of the First World War brought the founding of the First
Lithuanian Republic, the act of which was signed in Vilnius in what is
now the Lithuanian House of Signatories Museum on February 16, 1918. An
attack by Soviet Russia was repelled in conjunction with German
volunteers. The attempt by Soviet Russia to establish a Bolshevik
Lithuanian-Belarusian Soviet Socialist Republic ("Lit-Bel") failed in
1919. However, the young republic could not defend itself against
Poland's territorial claims to the predominantly Polish-populated areas
of Lithuania around Vilnius, which had been occupied by troops of the
Polish Marshal Józef Piłsudski in 1920 during the Polish-Lithuanian War.
The Polish occupation of eastern Lithuania (and proclamation of
Litwa Środkowa) was de facto recognized by the League of Nations. Kaunas
thus became the "temporary capital" of Lithuania. For its part, on
January 10, 1923, Lithuania annexed the Memelland, the part of East
Prussia north of the Memel River, including the port city of Memel (now
Klaipėda). It had been administered by the League of Nations since the
end of the First World War. On May 8, 1924, this annexation was
recognized by the previous protecting powers in the Memel Convention.
During the period of the first republic, there was a great upswing
in Lithuanian culture and education, the center of which was the
capital, Kaunas. On December 17, 1926, Antanas Smetona came to power in
a coup and dissolved parliament in order to rule the country in an
authoritarian manner. He appointed Augustinas Voldemaras as prime
minister. On May 15, 1928, a new constitution was passed, bypassing
parliament, which gave the president greater powers. At the beginning of
1929, the international press reported on mass arrests in Lithuania,
which were mainly directed against social democrats. In 1929, Smetona
deposed Voldemaras and took over the leadership of the country alone. He
was re-elected in 1931 and 1938 and remained in office until June 15,
1940.
In March 1939, Lithuania was forced to cede the Memel region to
Germany following a German ultimatum. Germany and Lithuania subsequently
signed a non-aggression pact. In the Hitler-Stalin Pact, Lithuania was
initially assigned to the German sphere of influence. After the outbreak
of World War II, however, this treaty was revised by the German-Soviet
Border and Friendship Treaty, which changed the spheres of influence.
Germany received parts of eastern Poland. Lithuania was awarded to the
Soviet Union. The Soviet Union immediately put pressure on the small
country and issued an ultimatum to Lithuania to allow Red Army military
bases in the country.
Following the Soviet ultimatum, the Soviet
Union imposed a sham treaty on Lithuania on October 10, 1939, which
meant the end of Lithuania's sovereignty. Lithuania was granted the area
of Vilnius, including the city of Vilnius, which had previously been
occupied by Poland and from September 1939 by the Soviets, and the
Soviet Union was able to station its first troops in Lithuania and set
up eight airfields to supposedly protect Lithuania.
On June 15,
1940, the Red Army marched into Lithuania and annexed it. After the
aggression, the Lithuanian government was replaced by people loyal to
Moscow such as Antanas Sniečkus, the Lithuanian Socialist Republic was
declared and “requested” admission to the Soviet Union. On August 3,
1940, the “Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic” joined the Soviet
Union.
During the twelve months leading up to Germany's attack on
the Soviet Union (June 1941), Lithuania was subjected to the same
measures as the other Soviet-occupied territories: anyone suspected of
counter-revolutionary, anti-Soviet sentiments or economic sabotage,
especially members of the military, political or cultural elite, was
imprisoned, deported to the Soviet Gulag and in many cases murdered. In
the face of the terror, many Lithuanians declared themselves, contrary
to their self-identification, to be members of the German minority,
which was resettled "back to the Reich".
On June 22, 1941,
Germany began the German-Soviet War; the attacking troops made rapid
progress in many places. At the same time, an uprising by the LAF
(Lietuvos Aktyvistu Frontas), controlled from Berlin, started against
the retreating Red Army. Independence was proclaimed on June 23. At the
same time, in Kaunas and elsewhere, pogroms by the LAF against the
Jewish population and against communists took place (see also the next
section).
When the Germans were advancing and there was no time
left to deport all those still interned in the country to the Soviet
Union, Beria (head of the NKVD since November 1938) ordered in a secret
telegram on June 24, 1941 that the prisoners on remand who could not be
deported and those who had already been convicted should be shot.
With the German Blitzkrieg in the east – Lithuania was completely
occupied within a week – the Jewish population became the target of the
new rulers. In the first months of the German invasion of the Soviet
Union, up to November 1941, around 175,000 people were murdered
nationwide in violent excesses led by the "Rollkommando Hamann" under SS
Obersturmbannführer Joachim Hamann, supported by a battalion of
Lithuanian auxiliary police (Pagalbinės Policijos Tarnybos Batalionas).
Mass arrests of critics and minorities, abductions and deportations of
forced laborers began, and the country experienced a rapid economic and
cultural decline. By autumn 1941, Jews who were unable to work were shot
in their thousands; estimates suggest that around 80,000 Jews were
killed in these four months alone. The Wehrmacht and civil
administration endeavored to slow down the extermination of the Jews
because workers were urgently needed. The remaining approximately 45,000
Jews in Lithuania lived mainly in the ghettos of Kaunas, Vilnius and
Šiauliai and a few smaller ghettos as so-called 'working Jews' (see
Jäger report). As the Red Army began to advance, the ghettos of Kaunas
and Šiauliai were converted into concentration camps, all other ghettos
were dissolved and the Jews deported to extermination camps. When the
German troops retreated, the remaining Jews of Kaunas and Šiauliai were
also murdered. In total, the Second World War cost the lives of around
200,000 Lithuanian Jews.
During the German occupation, Lithuania
was under the newly established civil administration of the
Reichskommissariat Ostland, based in Riga. The country formed the
General District of Lithuania, based in Kauen, the German name for
Kaunas at the time.
In Lithuania, attempts were made to implement
the so-called bowling alley project, i.e. the targeted settlement of
certain conquered eastern territories with German emigrants.
In the autumn of 1944, the Red Army recaptured Lithuania; a communist
government was installed again and the Lithuanian Soviet Socialist
Republic of 1940 was restored. Some Lithuanians fled west with the
Germans and later emigrated to Australia, South and North America, where
Chicago became a center of Lithuanian emigration. The country again
experienced a wave of purges with executions, internments and
deportations. From 1947 to 1949, Stalin had 220,000 Lithuanian farmers
deported to Siberia as part of the collectivization of farms.
Many thousands joined the resistance and fought (until around 1953) as
partisans known as the Forest Brothers (Lithuanian: miško broliai)
against Soviet rule and Russification. Over 30,000 other Lithuanians
died in the partisan struggle against the Soviets.
The Soviet era
brought a large influx of people of various nationalities from other
parts of the Soviet Union, especially to the virtually deserted port
city of Klaipėda and the capital Vilnius. This was followed by a strong
industrialization of Lithuania, which was still predominantly rural
until the Second World War. The aim of the Soviet rulers was to settle
as many Russians as possible and to Russify the region. Despite Moscow's
dominance, Lithuania was able to maintain some independence; Lithuanian
remained the official language and was present in schools, universities
and on television.
With glasnost and perestroika under Mikhail Gorbachev, the mood in
Lithuania also changed. The independence movement "Sąjūdis" was founded
in 1988.
In February 1990, free elections were held for the first
time, which Sajudis won by a clear margin. On March 11, the newly
elected Supreme Soviet declared Lithuania independent as the first union
republic of the USSR and reinstated the pre-war constitution. This
marked the beginning of the end of the Soviet Union (singing
revolution). Gorbachev recognized the explosive nature of the decision
(for example for the federal state he wanted). He angrily demanded the
withdrawal of the "illegal acts", which Vytautas Landsbergis, who played
a central role in the non-violent liberation struggle as chairman of
Sajudis and speaker of parliament, refused. The Kremlin then imposed an
economic blockade that brought Lithuania to the brink of collapse - not
least because help from the West failed to arrive. Gorbachev gave the
Lithuanians an ultimatum.
On January 13, 1991 (January events in
Lithuania 1991), forces loyal to Moscow attempted to seize power with
the support of Soviet military personnel. A total of 14 unarmed
civilians defending the parliament and television tower in Vilnius died
and over 1,000 were injured. The coup failed. In response to the bloody
events, a referendum was held on February 9, 1991. With a turnout of
85%, 90.5% of voters voted for an independent Lithuania. The Icelandic
parliament was the first in the world to decide to recognize Lithuania
as an independent republic.
Gorbachev declared the referendum
invalid; the television building remained occupied until further notice.
OMON troops raided a Lithuanian border post and killed seven border
guards.
After the failed coup in Moscow on August 20, 1991 by
communist hardliners, Lithuania's independence was recognized by over 90
states within a very short time. On September 6, three days after the
USA, the Soviet Union recognized the sovereignty of the three Baltic
states (Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia).
After an initial economic
crisis and political instability, reform policy gained increasing
momentum, especially after overcoming the "Russia crisis" of 1998. In
1999, Lithuania and Latvia were granted official EU accession candidate
status by the EU in the "succession procedure".
In 2003, an
affair involving Lithuanian President Rolandas Paksas caused a stir, in
which he was accused of involvement with organized crime. On February
19, 2004, the Lithuanian parliament finally voted 62 to 11 to initiate
impeachment proceedings. On April 6, 2004, President Paksas was deposed.
On June 13, 2004, the new president and, for the first time, the
delegates to the European Parliament were elected at the same time.
Former President Valdas Adamkus ran again and won with 51.89% of the
vote against former Prime Minister Kasimira Danutė Prunskienė (46.66%).
Voter turnout was low at 52.46%.
Lithuania became a member of
NATO on March 29, 2004 and of the European Union on May 1, 2004.
Lithuania has been part of the Schengen area since December 21, 2007.
The planned entry into the Eurozone on January 1, 2007 was postponed
indefinitely due to high inflation. The euro has been Lithuania's
currency since January 1, 2015.
On April 4, 2015, the OECD
Council of Ministers decided to invite Lithuania to join the OECD based
on the 2016 OECD Economic Report on Lithuania, which assessed its
economic development over the past 25 years as successful. Lithuania has
been a member of the OECD since July 5, 2018. The accession agreement
was signed on May 30, 2018 and ratified a few days later.
Lithuania is located in the south of the Baltic States. The
classification of the entire region is controversial and is influenced
by geographical factors as well as historical-cultural and political
aspects. The Baltic States are classified as Northern Europe, Central
Europe (East Central Europe), Eastern Europe and Northeast Europe.
Lithuania borders Latvia to the north and Belarus to the east and
southeast. The border with Poland in the south is only about 100
kilometers long. It is considered the most important connection to
Central and Western Europe and is of great strategic importance as the
so-called Suwałki Gap. To the southwest is the Russian Kaliningrad
Oblast as an exclave, the border is partly formed by the Memel. To the
west lies the Baltic Sea, to which Lithuania has access via the port of
Klaipėda.
In 1989, geographers from the Institut Géographique
National, the national geography institute of France, calculated the
geographical center of Europe and identified a location in the village
of Purnuškės, just north of Vilnius.
Lithuania lies within the Eastern European Platform and has therefore
been relatively quiet geologically for a long time. The surface was
significantly shaped by the repeated advances of the inland ice during
the Ice Age. As a result, only very few older rocks are found on the
earth's surface. In terms of landscape, almost all of Lithuania belongs
to the young moraine land, which was covered by the ice of the last, the
Weichselian glaciation. 20,000 years ago, at the height of the
Weichselian glaciation, only a small strip in the extreme southeast
remained ice-free.
In the west, the country borders the Baltic
Sea with sandy beaches. The Lower Lithuanian Ridge in the western part
of Lithuania is part of the Baltic Ridge. The hilly country in the
southeast is part of the Belarusian Ridge. Here are the highest
elevations in Lithuania (Aukštasis kalnas and Juozapinės kalnas) at 294
m. The largest rivers are the Neman and Neris, both of which originate
in Belarus. In the northeast is the Lake District of Upper Lithuania.
There are also numerous lakes in the south. In total, lakes take up
about 1.5% of the country's area. Part of the Curonian Lagoon and the
Curonian Spit also belong to Lithuania.
Most of the country's
area is taken up by agricultural land. Just over 30% of the area is
covered by forests and over 3% by moors and swamps. Lithuania's area
consists of 62,680 km² of land and 2,620 km² of water.
The climate in Lithuania is temperate continental. The westerly wind
that prevails on the coast carries warm and humid air from the Baltic
Sea inland.
The warmest month is July with an average of 17 °C,
and the coldest month is January with an average of −5.1 °C. The average
annual temperature is 6.2 °C. The average annual rainfall is 661 mm,
significantly higher in the southwest and lower in the north.
There are over 200 nature reserves of various purposes and levels in Lithuania. These include five national parks, seven protected areas under the Ramsar Convention, four total reserves and thirty regional parks. Over 14% of the country's area is taken up by nature reserves, such as the Praviršulio tyrelis area. A well-known raised bog among peatland experts is the Aukštumala bog between Sovetsk and Klaipėda, as it was the first bog in the world to be the subject of a special monograph (C. A. Weber, 1902). While the western part is still very well preserved, a subsidiary of the German company Klasmann-Deilmann is engaged in large-scale peat mining in the eastern part. The raised bog is part of the Neman Delta Regional Park. Upper Lithuania (Aukštaitija) is partly very hilly and has many lakes, and the Aukštaitija National Park is located in the center of this area.
Lithuania is shaped by many different cultural influences. On the one
hand, there is the long independence and maintenance of a non-Christian
state religion, the long shared history with Poland, relations with the
Hanseatic League and in the Baltic region, membership of the Russian
Tsarist Empire. This is where the Orthodox churches that cannot be
overlooked in the big cities come from. In the west of the country,
Hanseatic-Northern European tradition with strong German, Danish and
Swedish influences is visible, e.g. (brick Gothic, half-timbered
houses). In the east, especially in Vilnius, Polish cultural elements
are present in many ways.
The baroque old town of Vilnius is a
UNESCO World Heritage Site, as are the dunes on the Curonian Spit
(Neringa) peninsula and the Kernavė archaeological site.
The first Lithuanian films were made in 1909 by Lithuanians who had
emigrated to America. In the early 1940s, the Lietuvos kino studija was
founded, which was under state control during the Soviet era and became
the sole headquarters for the Lithuanian film industry. Around three to
four feature films and thirty to forty documentaries were produced
annually.
After independence in 1990, the number of Lithuanian
films declined sharply and private companies took over the film
industry. Filmmakers such as Arūnas Matelis and Šarūnas Bartas received
attention at international film festivals and Algimantas Puipa was
commercially successful, especially in Lithuania.
There are numerous museums and galleries in Lithuania. Not only in
the larger cities, but also in some remote farmsteads where famous
Lithuanian personalities have lived.
National Museum: The
National Museum is located in Vilnius next to the cathedral. Other
branches are spread across the city. The exhibition is rich in
archaeological and ethnographic exhibits.
Devil Museum in Kaunas:
The devil plays an important role in Lithuanian mythology and as a
symbol in everyday life. In contrast to Central European ideas, he is
not seen as the embodiment of absolute evil, but rather as a kind of
trickster who also helps people. That is why there are relatively many
devil statues and images in public.
The Amber Museum in the spa town
of Palanga on the Baltic Sea, in the castle of Count Tiškevičius, offers
unique collections of amber. There is also a smaller amber museum in
Nida.
KGB Museum: In the heart of Vilnius is the former KGB prison,
which serves as a museum. Various cells and execution chambers are open
to visitors.
The national coat of arms shows a horseman riding westwards (lit.
vytis, from vyti; German "hunt, pursue"). The Lithuanian coat of arms
has been documented since 1366.
The patron saint of Lithuania is
Saint Casimir. The Casimir Fair takes place every year on the weekend
before March 3rd in the old town of Vilnius. Traditional and handicraft
products are offered and old arts and crafts are shown.
A sculpture
of the Man of Sorrows (lit. Rūpintojėlis; engl. "the caring one") is
often found. This shows Jesus Christ in a sitting position, his chin
resting on his hand in a pensive pose. It is non-canonical, which is why
it is considered to have origins in pre-Christian religion. Small
sculptures can be bought as souvenirs in many Lithuanian galleries.
Amber is also a typical, frequently offered souvenir for travelers to
the Baltics, although most of the stones come from the Kaliningrad
Oblast.
The Hill of Crosses (lit. Kryžių Kalnas) is located near the
city of Šiauliai (engl. Schaulen). It also symbolizes the fight against
Soviet power and occupation.
Rue, although not native to Lithuania,
is considered the national flower. It was (and is) indispensable in
wedding customs, in particular. It can still be found in village gardens
and cemeteries.
Since Lithuania's independence in 1991, which was supported by broad
sections of the population, support for democracy has been high.
Accordingly, relatively stable institutions have developed. Socially
anchored interest groups have also increasingly emerged in Lithuania,
although the role of trade unions is rather insignificant. In general,
there is skepticism towards state institutions and the decisions of
parliament.
The influence of the church in Lithuania has
increased significantly since the country's independence in 1991.
Homosexuality was legalized in 1993, but it is still largely taboo.
The Lithuanian public media group, Lietuvos nacionalinis radijas ir
televizija, operates three television channels, three radio stations and
a media portal. The most watched private television channels include TV3
and Laisvas ir nepriklausomas kanalas (LNK).
Lithuania has
several national daily newspapers, including Lietuvos rytas and the
German-language Baltische Rundschau.
Basketball is the national sport in Lithuania. The Lithuanian
basketball team is one of the best teams in Europe and has won the
European championship three times. Lithuania won the European
championship in this sport in 1937 and 1939. This tradition continued in
the Soviet era when Lithuanian players were repeatedly part of the
Soviet national teams. Well-known names include Kazys Petkevičius,
Modestas Paulauskas, Sergejus Jovaiša, Arvydas Sabonis, Rimas
Kurtinaitis and Šarūnas Marčiulionis. Marčiulionis and Sabonis belong to
the golden generation of Lithuanian basketball players who enjoyed
numerous successes from the early 1980s, first for the Soviet Union and
then for the newly independent Lithuania from 1991. Both were inducted
into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame (Sabonis in August
2011, Marčiulionis in 2014).
At the first Olympic Games after
regaining independence, the Lithuanian men's basketball team
surprisingly won bronze in Barcelona in 1992, a success that was
repeated in 1996 and 2000. After silver in 1995, the new generation
around Šarūnas Jasikevičius and Arvydas Macijauskas became European
champions in 2003.
Among the basketball teams, “Žalgiris Kaunas”
and “Lietuvos rytas Vilnius” have long been among the top addresses in
Europe.
Other team sports, in contrast, lead a shadowy existence.
The country's largest football stadium in Kaunas holds just 20,000
spectators.
In Olympic sports, Lithuania has a tradition of good
throwers (Romas Ubartas and Virgilijus Alekna) as well as cyclists and
rowers.
The Lithuanian tennis player Ričardas Berankis reached
number one in the junior world rankings in 2007 and in November 2010
became the first Lithuanian to enter the top 100 in the world rankings.
Laurynas Grigelis is another tennis player from Lithuania who is
currently in the top 300.
In the summer of 2011, the European
Basketball Championship took place in Lithuania.
Special Olympics
Lithuania was founded in 1989 and has taken part in the Special Olympics
World Games several times.
Lithuania had 2.9 million inhabitants in 2023. The annual population
growth was + 1.4%. Despite a death surplus (birth rate: 7.8 per 1000
inhabitants vs. death rate: 15.1 per 1000 inhabitants), the population
grew due to migration. The number of births per woman in 2022 was
statistically 1.3, that of the European Union was 1.5. The life
expectancy of Lithuanian residents from birth in 2022 was 75.8 years.
The median age of the population in 2021 was 43.7 years. In 2023, 15.4
percent of the population was under 15 years old, while the proportion
of people over 64 was 21.2 percent of the population.
In 2023, 69
percent of Lithuanian residents lived in cities. Since the end of World
War II, Lithuania has experienced a rapid transformation into an urban
society. In 1959, three fifths (60%) of the population lived in rural
areas, in 1970 the ratio was balanced, and in 1990 the ratio of two
thirds urban population to one third rural population was reached.
About 15,100 Lithuanians emigrated to another country between January
and August 2012. The majority of them are young adults. They see greater
opportunities on the labor market abroad than in Lithuania. The target
countries are European countries such as the United Kingdom, Ireland,
Norway, Sweden and Denmark. In 2017, 4.3% of the population in Lithuania
itself was born abroad. The trend has changed and since 2018 more people
have immigrated to Lithuania than emigrated, also thanks to the
record-breaking improvement in the economic situation.
It is
estimated that around 200,000 Lithuanians live or work in western
countries without the Lithuanian registration authorities having
official knowledge of this. According to statistics, over 218,000 people
have officially left the country since 2005; with an immigration rate of
just over 60,000, this represents a loss of almost 158,000 people, which
corresponds to more than 3% of the population. The Lithuanian
Statistical Office states that the unofficial emigration rate for 2001
to 2007 was around 112,000 people. Since then, Lithuanians have always
made up 85% of emigrants; in 2001, less than half were Lithuanian
nationals. Conversely, since 2005, Lithuanians have made up around 70%
of immigrants, compared to just 15% in 2001. As a result of the positive
economic development in Lithuania, (official) immigration from
neighboring Belarus has increased, but is still well below 1,000 people
per year, with a net figure of less than 500 people. There was a marked
difference between 2009 and 2010: in 2009, only 22,000 people left the
country, while in 2010, 84,000 people did so. In 2011, there was a
decline: 54,000 people left the country, while 16,000 immigrated. In
2013, 39,000 people emigrated, the next year 36,600, and in 2015, 44,500
people emigrated. In 2016, 51,000 Lithuanians emigrated, and in 2017,
57,200.
The total number of inhabitants fell from 3.7 to 2.8
million between 1990 and 2017 due to emigration (in 2017 there were 1.4%
fewer permanent residents and in 2018 0.5% fewer).
In 2018,
12,300 people immigrated, of which 5,700 were from Ukraine, 26% from
Belarus and 6% from Russia. Even after Brexit, the United Kingdom
remains the most popular emigration destination for Lithuanians. Ukraine
comes in second place and Belarus in third. After the Russian invasion
of Ukraine in February 2022, numerous Ukrainians sought refuge in
Lithuania. On August 26, 2022, the Lithuanian Migration Service
announced that the country had taken in 60,000 Ukrainian refugees by
then. Accordingly, 2.5% of Lithuania's population were already war
refugees from Ukraine at that time.
By far the largest part of the population consists of Lithuanians.
However, there are also national minorities in the country,
predominantly Slavs. The Polish minority in Lithuania, which lives
mainly in the Vilnius district, has been resident in some cases for over
a hundred years.
The remaining, numerically decreasing German
minority in Lithuania ("Lithuanian Germans"), unlike the Baltic Germans,
has remained without any major historical, political, cultural or
economic significance throughout its long history. The extensive
resettlement of the Lithuanian Germans to Germany in the spring of 1941
was a consequence of the Hitler-Stalin Pact.
Russians mostly came
to Lithuania during and after the Second World War, when the country was
part of the Soviet Union. The Russian-speaking population in Lithuania,
which is the second largest minority after the Poles, is concentrated in
the capital Vilnius (especially the Naujoji Vilnia district), the port
city of Klaipėda, the Mažoji Lietuva region (Lithuania Minor) and in
industrial locations such as Elektrėnai and Visaginas.
Around 2,694,000 people speak Lithuanian as their mother tongue
(including speakers of Shemaitic). Lithuanian is one of the Baltic
languages, which also includes Latvian. It is considered particularly
archaic in some respects and is therefore considered to be particularly
close to the reconstructed Indo-European original language.
Around 358,000 people speak Polish, around 344,000 people speak Russian,
around 63,000 people speak Belarusian, around 45,000 people speak
Ukrainian, around 5,100 people speak Tatar, around 5,000 people speak
Latvian, around 300 people speak Karaim.
In Klaipėda (Memel) and
on the Curonian Spit there are still a few Lithuanians who speak German.
Polish is common in the eastern part, especially in the rural areas
around Vilnius and in the area around the town of Dieveniškės, where a
large Polish minority remains despite the expulsions after World War II.
Due to the long presence of Russian in Lithuania, the Polish spoken by
Poles has partly mixed with Russian words and expressions, which are now
spoken as Lithuanian Polish.
While Russian is still the lingua
franca among older Lithuanians (over 40 years old), English is now
taking over this role among younger people.
The majority of Lithuanians (2011: 77%) are Roman Catholic and belong
to the Catholic Church in Lithuania, about 4.1% are Russian Orthodox.
About 1.9% belong to the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Lithuania and
0.2% (7,000 members) belong to the Evangelical Reformed Church in
Lithuania. According to a survey from October 2008, a good two thirds of
the Catholics surveyed described themselves as practicing the faith. 10%
of all respondents considered themselves non-believers. The vast
majority (75–80%, depending on the question) reject the involvement of
the (Catholic) Church in legislation or in speaking out on current
issues or voting recommendations.
Vilnius is the seat of an
Apostolic Nuncio, who is the Pope's diplomatic representative for
Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. There are around 21,000 (0.6%) Muslims
living in Lithuania, as well as around 3,000 Jehovah's Witnesses. Around
4,000 Lithuanians are members of the neo-pagan Romuva movement, which is
officially recognized as a religious community.
The proportion of
the Jewish population in Lithuania was around 9% before the Second World
War. During the German occupation of Lithuania from 1941 to 1944, over
90% of the Jewish population was murdered.
A representative
survey commissioned by the European Commission as part of the
Eurobarometer in 2020 found that 37 percent of people in Lithuania
consider religion important, 31 percent consider it neither important
nor unimportant, and 32 percent consider it unimportant.
The country's health expenditure in 2022 amounted to 7.5% of gross domestic product. In 2019, there were 44.8 doctors per 10,000 inhabitants practicing in Lithuania. The mortality rate among children under 5 was 3.5 per 1,000 live births in 2022. The life expectancy of Lithuanian residents from birth in 2022 was 75.8 years (women: 80.3, men: 71.5). Life expectancy increased by 5% from 72 years in 2000 to 2022.
Lithuania is a semi-presidential republic. The capital and seat of government of Lithuania is Vilnius. According to the constitution, Lithuania is a democratic and constitutional republic with a separation of powers.
The head of state is the president, who, unlike the German Federal President, does not only perform representative duties. Rather, the President of the Republic of Lithuania is responsible for the country's foreign policy, even before the Foreign Minister. In addition, he has extensive veto powers that enable him to block laws previously passed by the Seimas. In terms of protocol, he is followed by the Chairman of the Seimas and the Prime Minister, who, according to the constitution, can lead the Republic of Lithuania (domestic) in the absence of the President or represent it to foreign state guests. The incumbent President since July 12, 2019 has been Gitanas Nausėda (* 1964).
The Lithuanian Parliament is called the Seimas. The name comes from
the Polish term Sejm and refers to the long shared Lithuanian-Polish
history. The unicameral parliament consists of 141 parliamentarians who
are elected for four years. The last parliamentary elections took place
in October 2020. The chairman of the Seimo is the non-party Saulius
Skvernelis (* 1970).
The parliament has the power to amend the
constitution with a two-thirds majority.
The head of government of Lithuania is the prime minister. He has the
authority to set guidelines for the government's policies. Gintautas
Paluckas has been head of government since December 2024.
The
administration of Lithuania is led by the relevant ministers, who head
the ministry and other subordinate authorities.
The temporary constitution of November 1918 granted all Lithuanians
the right to vote and stand for election in parliamentary elections,
regardless of wealth. On November 20, 1919, the electoral law was passed
by the constituent parliament. This meant that Lithuanian women could
vote and be elected under the same conditions as men from 1919 onwards.
This right was then applied for the first time in the first constituent
parliamentary election in 1920. Even under Soviet administration,
women's active and passive right to vote remained legally protected.
This right was implicitly confirmed in Lithuania's declaration of
independence and explicitly institutionalized in the constitution.
The country attracted international attention in 2009 when a
"morality law" was passed that promoted discrimination against
homosexuality. Although the then head of state Dalia Grybauskaitė also
rejected the law, she felt constitutionally compelled to sign it.
The Lithuanian party landscape is fragmented. Due to frequent
government crises and changing majorities in parliament, smaller parties
have a considerable influence on parliamentary decision-making.
Apart from the Conservatives (Tėvynės Sąjunga) and Social Democrats
(Lietuvos socialdemokratų partija), most parties do not have a distinct
party hierarchy. In determining their practical positions, they are more
dependent on their political leaders and their personal interests than
on party programs or fixed ideological views.
Several parties
were founded for the purpose of offering individuals a party platform:
for example, the New Union for Artūras Paulauskas in 1998, Order and
Justice (Liberal Democrats) for Rolandas Paksas in 2002, the Labour
Party for Viktoras Uspaskichas in 2003, and the Liberal Movement for
Petras Auštrevičius in 2006. The party leaders mentioned above were
previously unable to assert themselves in their main party and simply
founded a new party to give their interests more weight. The most recent
successful founding of the People's Resurrection Party (since April
2008) is also determined more by its popular chairman Arūnas Valinskas
than by its programmatic statements.
Almost all parties pursue a
market economy concept, most openly the liberals of the Liberal and
Centre Union and the Liberal Movement as well as the conservatives -
with some reservations also the Social Democrats, the Labour Party and
the Liberal Democrats. The conservatives and the liberals tend to find
their voters among the educated and "winners" of the last ten years,
while the Social Democrats, the Labour Party and the Liberal Democrats
use populist promises to win support from the ordinary population, who
have benefited little from the economic upturn in recent years.
Geographically, the liberal parties are represented almost exclusively
in the cities, while the Peasants' Party and the Christian Democrats
rely on the rural population.
After the scandal surrounding
former President Rolandas Paksas, part of his electorate defected to the
newly founded Labour Party. Paksas had won over many of the less
well-off voters by promising to defend their interests, the interests of
the runkeliai ("turnips"), against the country's power-political elites.
With the decline of the Labour Party, the Liberal Democrats have been
able to consolidate their position. They are equally represented in town
and country alongside the Social Democrats and Conservatives.
After the fragmentation of the party landscape after the 1996 elections,
a certain periodic consolidation has been observed in recent years
before the upcoming elections in order to improve the electoral
prospects in a coalition, such as the coalition of the Liberal Union,
the Centre Union and the Modern Christian Democrats to form the Liberal
and Centre Union in 2003. In view of disastrous election forecasts, the
Social Democrats formed an electoral alliance with the Social Liberals
in 2004, the A. Brazausko ir A. Paulausko koalicija "Už darbą Lietuvai"
(A. Brazauskas and A. Paulauskas' coalition "Work for Lithuania"), but
this time only for the election on the basis of two independent parties.
Most recently, the Christian Democrats merged with the Fatherland Union.
Interest groups do not play as important a role in the political system as in other countries. Trade unions have very little significance in political and social life. The parties are not separated from each other and are hardly hindered by ideological barriers. Personal acquaintances, on the other hand, play a major role and are therefore asserted at the various levels of political decision-making.
Lithuania is a member of many international organizations. The most
important guidelines of Lithuanian foreign policy are Western ties,
transatlantic and European integration, and regional stability in
Europe. A central aspect of security policy and an expression of Western
ties is membership in NATO, which Lithuania joined on March 29, 2004.
During the conflict over the presidential elections in Ukraine in
November/December 2004, Lithuanian President Valdas Adamkus, together
with Polish President Aleksander Kwaśniewski, acted as mediators between
the conflicting parties. The media in both countries supported Viktor
Yushchenko.
Lithuania has been a member of the EU since May 1,
2004. The introduction of the euro, which was planned for January 1,
2007, was postponed. It took place on January 1, 2015.
With the
expansion of the Schengen area in 2007, Lithuania also joined it. Border
controls on the border with EU countries, i.e. Latvia and Poland, were
abolished on December 21, 2007.
Relations between Lithuania and
Russia are tense. Among other things, the Russian government banned the
import of dairy products from Lithuania in 2013. In return, the
Lithuanian government removed a Russian television station from its
program, and at the beginning of 2018, in November 2017, entry bans were
imposed on 49 Russian officials due to alleged human rights violations,
money laundering and corruption.
After 1990, Lithuanian-Polish
relations were temporarily overshadowed by disputes over the status of
Poles in Lithuania. However, both countries are close military and
security allies against Russia. Since the Euromaidan, relations between
the two countries have been further strengthened and a
Lithuanian-Polish-Ukrainian brigade was set up in 2017.
On July
5, 2018, the country joined the OECD.
In August 2021, the
People's Republic of China withdrew its ambassador from Lithuania and
asked the Lithuanian ambassador to the People's Republic to leave the
country. The reason was that the Republic of China had opened a foreign
mission in the Lithuanian capital Vilnius under the name "Taiwanese
Representative Office in Lithuania". This led to tensions and economic
sanctions by China against Lithuania. The EU remained indifferent.
Lithuania had previously withdrawn from the 17+1 summit.
Lithuania has been a member state of the European Union since May 1,
2004. The accession negotiations between Lithuania and the EU made
important progress in 2001, which was mainly achieved under the then
Swedish EU Council Presidency. In a referendum in May 2003, Lithuania
voted in favor of membership (from May 2004) in the European Union with
over 90% approval. For the first time since the start of the monetary
union, the European Commission refused to allow a member state to
introduce the euro in 2006. Lithuania was not allowed to join the euro
zone due to excessive inflation of the litas. The country has only been
part of the euro zone since January 2015. This means that the euro is
the national currency in Lithuania.
In the second half of 2013
(July to December 2013), Lithuania took over the EU Council Presidency,
succeeding Ireland (January to June 2013). Lithuania was replaced by
Greece (January to June 2014).
Economy
The transition from a planned to a market economy was accompanied by
structural change. This has intensified since the country joined the EU
in 2004. The Lithuanian economy has been growing for several years now
(around 3% annually). The gross domestic product (GDP) was 37.2 billion
euros in 2015, and GDP per capita was 13,282 euros. In the Global
Competitiveness Index, which measures a country's competitiveness,
Lithuania ranks 41st out of 137 countries (as of 2017-2018). In the
Index for Economic Freedom, Lithuania ranked 16th out of 180 countries
in 2017.
Lithuania's most important exports are machinery,
electrical goods, textiles and food.
The unemployment rate was 6.8% in June 2018, slightly below the EU average. In 2017, youth unemployment was 13.5%. In 2015, 9.1% of the total workforce worked in agriculture, 25.2% in industry and 65.8% in the service sector. The total number of employed people in 2017 is estimated at 1.47 million, of whom 50.6% are women.
The country had 1.79 million foreign tourists in 2011, with Russians making up the largest group by country of origin.
In 2016, the budget included expenditures of the equivalent of 15.1
billion US dollars, compared with revenues of the equivalent of 14.6
billion US dollars. This results in a budget deficit of 1.0% of GDP.
Public debt in 2016 was 40.0% of GDP.
In 2020, the share of
government spending (in % of GDP) in the following areas was:
Health:
7.5%
Education: 4.0% (2019)
Military: 2.9% (2024)
In Lithuania, in the 1990s and 2000s, more than 75 percent of the
electricity needed was provided by the Ignalina nuclear power plant
(type: RBMK, as in Chernobyl). During this time, Lithuania, along with
France, had the highest percentage of nuclear power in the world. After
the first reactor was shut down at the beginning of 2005, the second
(and last) reactor was taken off the grid on December 31, 2009, due to
obligations under the EU accession agreement. A referendum put forward
by the Lithuanian government in the 2008 parliamentary elections on
extending the operating life of the Ignalina nuclear power plant was
approved by over 90% of voters, but failed due to low voter turnout
(48.4%). In any case, the EU Commission would probably not have agreed
to amend the accession treaty.
The gas and heavy oil power plant
of Lietuvos energija in Elektrėnai, which currently only covers peak
loads, will be able to ensure Lithuania's self-sufficiency in
electricity until 2015. However, this means a high dependence on
supplies of fossil fuels (gas, heavy oil) from Russia. In order to
reduce this dependence in the foreseeable future, the construction of
the Visaginas nuclear power plant is planned. In the referendum on
Lithuania's return to the use of nuclear energy on October 14, 2012,
64.8% of voters voted against the plant.
Renewable energies have
been increasingly used in recent years, especially energy generation
from biomass. This is mainly due to EU subsidies as well as
non-governmental organizations and associations of energy producers. In
2009, 68 wind turbines were in operation in Lithuania, with an installed
capacity of 91.2 MWe and an annual capacity utilization of 21.89%. There
is no state funding.
Lithuania has the best developed fiber optic network in the EU and
Europe. According to an annual study published by the FTTH Council
Europe in 2013, around 32% of households in the country are supplied
with FTTH. Of these, around 31% have signed a corresponding contract.
This puts Lithuania in the lead in terms of percentage in Europe. Sweden
has the next highest FTTH penetration in Europe at just under 23%.
The connection to the landline network is financed by the connection
owner, so that, especially in rural areas, landline connections are
usually only available where they were built under Soviet occupation.
The Lithuanian mobile network (telephone and internet) is therefore very
well developed, even in rural areas and in the forest there are rarely
any dead spots. In 2023, 88.5 percent of Lithuanian residents used the
internet.
Lithuania is of great importance as a transit country between Central
Europe and Northern Europe, between the Kaliningrad Oblast and the
Russian heartland, and between Belarus and Scandinavia. Lithuania also
has an important function as an oil transit country.
The capital
city of Vilnius is in a kind of "blind spot" due to its proximity to the
heavily sealed EU external border with Belarus. Therefore, the second
largest city of Kaunas is more important for Lithuania in terms of
traffic planning than Vilnius.
The entire road network in 2012 covered around 84,166 km, of which
72,297 km are asphalted. Lithuania's road network is still being
expanded. The most important connections are the Vilnius–Kaunas–Klaipėda
(Memel) and Vilnius–Panevėžys motorways and the E 67 “Via Baltica”
highway from Warsaw via Kaunas and Riga to Tallinn and Helsinki, which
is to be expanded into a full motorway in the long term. Motorways
around Šiauliai and in the Telšiai region are also under construction.
Freight transport in Lithuania amounted to 5,960 million tkm in
2012, of which around 40% was domestic transport. In the same year,
almost 30% of goods were transported domestically by road (modal split,
measured in tkm).
Klaipėda is an important seaport with ferry connections to the entire Baltic region (including Kiel) and is becoming increasingly important for freight transport. The Memel and Neris are also navigable for inland shipping, but this is of no importance.
Lithuania has four international airports: Vilnius, Kaunas (in
Karmėlava); Palanga and Šiauliai are rarely or only seasonally served.
There are connections to numerous European countries. The catchment area
of Riga Airport in Latvia extends to Lithuania.
Low-cost
flights with Air Baltic, Ryanair and Wizz Air are also offered from
German cities such as Frankfurt am Main, Hahn, Berlin, Bremen, Hamburg,
Hanover, Munich, Düsseldorf, Dortmund and Karlsruhe.
Until 1990, the fast direct train services between Vilnius and Warsaw
ran through Belarusian territory, which was then part of the Soviet
Union. To avoid the resulting border formalities, an alternative branch
line is operated via Šeštokai (LT) and Suwałki (PL) with the reopened
Mockava railway border crossing. Since June 2016, there have been direct
train connections from Poland to Lithuania (Białystok - Kaunas) on
weekends; there is no need to change trains in Šeštokai as the route has
been converted to standard gauge.
Until 2011, direct night
services were operated by an IC bus service operated by PKP Intercity.
This bus service replaced the direct night train that ran between
Vilnius and Warsaw until 2004.
Most of Lithuania's railways (like
the entire former Soviet Union and Finland) run on a wider gauge of 1520
mm (Central Europe, however, has a standard gauge of 1435 mm), which is
why trains from Poland to the Baltic States have to be converted. Modern
gauge conversion systems such as the Polish SUW-2000 system are
sometimes used for this purpose.
Bus transport (e.g. the long-distance bus lines of Eurolines, Ecolines or Lux-Express) also plays an important role in national and international passenger transport.
In 2019, the Lithuanian fire service was organized nationwide by 2845 professional and 1765 volunteer firefighters, who work in 81 fire stations and firehouses, in which 224 fire engines and 48 turntable ladders or telescopic masts are available. The Lithuanian fire services were called out to 30,666 operations in the same year, and 11,509 fires had to be extinguished. The fire services rescued 70 dead from fires and rescued 164 injured people. The national fire and rescue organisation Priešgaisrinės apsaugos ir gelbėjimo departmentas prie Vidaus reikalų ministerijos represents the Lithuanian fire service in the International Fire Brigade Federation CTIF.