Lithuania Minor

The historical sources indicate that Lietuvininkai is one of two historical ways to call all Lithuanians. Lietuvninkai (Литовники) are mentioned in the recording (1341) of the second chronicle of Pskov. In what had been the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, the word lietuvis became more popular, while in Lithuania Minor lietuvininkas was preferred. Prussian Lithuanians also called their northern neighbors in Samogitia "Russian Lithuanians" and their south-eastern neighbors of the Suwałki region "Polish Lithuanians". Some sources used the term Lietuvininkai to refer to any inhabitant of Lithuania Minor irrelevant of their ethnic adherence.

Lithuanian population presumably grew after the wars ended with the Treaty of Melno in 1422. The Samogitian newcomers were more common in the northern part of it and Aukštaitian in the western one.

Lithuanians lived mostly in the rural areas. German towns were like islands in the Lithuanian Province. The area was overwhelmingly inhabited by Lithuanians until the plague of 1709–1711. Up to 300,000 people resided in the Lithuanian Province and the Labguva district prior to the plague, during which about 160,000 Lithuanians died in Lithuanian Province and Labguva district, which was 53 percent of the population of the latter area.

Ethnic situation during the 19th century

As a result of the plague of 1709–1711, German colonization and Germanisation policies, the ethnic composition of the region in the 19th centuries changed to the disadvantage of the Lithuanians and Poles and in favor of the Germans. According to Prussian data from 1837, ethnic Lithuanians still formed a sizeable portion of the population in the northern counties of the region, especially in rural areas, ranging from 33,9 percent in the Labiau/Labguva (Polessk) county to 74,4 percent in the Heydekrug (Šilutė) county. Also ethnic Polish, The majority of Polish and Lithuanian inhabitants were Lutherans, not Roman Catholics like their ethnic kinsmen across the border in the Russian Empire.

In 1817, East Prussia had 796,204 Evangelical Christians, 120,123 Roman Catholics, 864 Mennonites and 2,389 Jews.

Pre-1914 and present-day situation

There were Lithuanian speakers and the Lithuanian language was effective throughout Lithuania Minor at the beginning of the 20th century, though the concentration places of Lithuanians were near Neman – Klaipėda, Tilžė (Tilsit), Ragainė (Ragnit). At the end of the war, the German and Lithuanian population of the former East Prussia either fled or was expelled to the western parts of Germany. There resided about 170,000 Prussian Lithuanians in East Prussia previous to 1914. Lithuanian fellowships functioned in Gumbinė, Įsrutis, Koenigsberg, Lithuanian press was printed in Geldapė, Darkiemis, Girdava, Stalupėnai, Eitkūnai, Gumbinė, Pilkalnis, Jurbarkas, Vėluva, Tepliava, Labguva, Koenigsberg, Žuvininkai.

No Germanization was performed in Lithuania Minor prior to 1873. Prussian Lithuanians were affected voluntarily by German culture. In the 20th century, a good number of Lithuanian speakers considered themselves to be Memellandish and also Germans. In 1914, Lithuanian representatives made their first steps to claim Minor Lithuania by signing the Amber Declaration, which called for the unification of ethnic Lithuanian lands. In the interbellum, after the division of Lithuania Minor between Germany and Lithuania, Lithuania started a campaign of Lithuanisation in its acquired region, the Klaipėda Region. In the regional census of 1925, more than 26 percent declared themselves Lithuanian and more than 24 percent simply as Memellandish, compared with more than 41 percent German. The election results to the Parliament of the Klaipėda Region (, ) between 1923 and 1939 revealed approximately 85 percent votes for German political parties and about 15 percent for national Lithuanian parties.

thumb|Early 20th-century view of the [[Lithuanian Church, Sovetsk|Lithuanian Church in Tilsit]]

The former language of Lietuvninkai (which is very similar to standard Lithuanian) is currently spoken and known by only about several hundred people who were sometime residents of Lithuania Minor. Almost all former Prussian Lithuanians – including Lithuanian speakers – had already identified themselves with German speakers, or Prussians, by the end of the 19th century because of the influence of German culture and attitudes of the residents of East Prussia, which had been in quick progress during the 19th century. The majority of the Lietuvininkai population has migrated to Germany, together with Germans and now lives there.

Prussian Lithuanians spoke in western Aukštaitian dialect, those living by the Curonian lagoon spoke in the so-called "Curonianating" (Samogitian "donininkai" subdialect; there are three Samogitian dialects where Lithuanian "duona" (a bread) is said dūna, dona and douna) subdialect, and small part of them spoke in Dzūkian dialect. Prussian Lithuanians never called themselves and their own language Samogitian.

Old Prussians

Prussians were the native and main inhabitants of the lands which later became the core lands of the Teutonic Order. After conquest and conversion to Christianity, the Prussian nobility became vassals of the Order and Germanized. The officers of the Order ceased to speak in Prussian with local inhabitants in 1309. After the extinction of the Order and the spread of the Reformation of the church, the lot of Prussians became somewhat better. Three Reformed catechisms in the Prussian language were published between 1545 and 1561.

Lithuanians and ethnic Prussians made up the majority of inhabitants, and Prussian villagers tended to be assimilated as Lithuanians. The case of Jonas Bretkūnas illustrates the phenomenon of Prussian-Lithuanian bilingualism. The last Prussian speakers disappeared around the end of the 17th century.

Germans

thumb|German Church in Tilsit,

The percentage of Germans in Lithuania Minor was low prior to 1709–1711. With German colonization and Germanization policies, the ethnic composition changed. During and after World War II, the German population was either evacuated westwards by Nazi Germany or expelled by the Soviet Union.

Poles

thumb|left|Act of incorporation of the region into the Kingdom of Poland, 1454

The Darkehmen (, now Ozyorsk) and Gołdap counties, as transitional counties between Lithuania Minor and the Masuria region to the south, were inhabited by notable numbers of both Poles and Lithuanians, There were instances of Polish noble families living in the region, e.g. the Kręckis in Brasnicken, Przeciszewskis in Kazikėnai, Kozickis in Lenkehlischken (), Doręgowskis and Pierzchas in Moritzkehmen, Metalskis in Mehlkehmen (), and Repkas in Tilsewischken.

thumb|upright|The Lutheran Church in Insterburg () hosted Polish-language services in the 17th century

From 1724, new Polish settlement in Lithuania Minor was banned by Frederick William I of Prussia. During the Polish January Uprising in the Russian Partition of Poland, there were secret Polish organizations in Insterburg () and Tilsit (), which smuggled weapons for the insurgents. A Polish consular post and consulate was based in Klaipėda in the interbellum, and once again from 2004.

During World War II, Poles formed the majority of the prisoners of the Hohenbruch concentration camp at modern Gromovo (), Polish prisoners of war were among the prisoners of the Stalag I-C and Stalag Luft VI POW camps, and Polish civilians were also enslaved as forced labour in the region (in the vicinity of Klaipėda and Tilsit). and a branch of the Peasant Battalions in Insterburg ().

French and French-speaking Swiss

thumb|Ruined church in [[Telmanovo, Chernyakhovsky District|Telmanovo (), resting place of Pierre de la Cave, French immigrant and general in the service of Brandenburg]]

Calvinist immigrants of French and Swiss origin settled in the region following the Great Northern War plague of 1709–1711. 40 villages around Gumbinnen (, now Gusev) were settled by French-speaking Swiss immigrants, and also some 350 descendants of French Huguenot immigrants to the Uckermark moved to the area. In the 18th century, French Reformed congregations were founded in Gumbinnen and Judtschen (, now Veselovka), and French-language Reformed church services were also held in Insterburg (, now Chernyakhovsk) and Sadweitschen (, now Pervomayskoye).

Germanization

The process of Germanization of other ethnic groups was complex. It included direct and indirect Germanization. Old Prussians were welcomed with the same civil rights as Germans after they were converted, while the Old Prussian nobility waited to receive their rights. There were about nine thousand farms left empty after the plague of 1709, remedied by the Great East Colonization. Its final stage was 1736–1756. Germans revived the farms vacated by the plagues. Thus, the percentage of Germans increased to 13.4 percent in Prussian villages as well as in neighboring Lithuania, also stricken by the plague. By 1800, most Prussian Lithuanians were literate and bilingual in Lithuanian and German. There was no forced Germanization before 1873. After Germany was unified in 1871, Prussian Lithuanians were influenced by German culture, leading to the teaching of German in schools—a practice common throughout northern and eastern Europe. The Germanization of Lithuania Minor accelerated in the second half of the 19th century, when German was made compulsory in the education system at all levels, although newspapers and books were freely published and church services were held in the Lithuanian language, even during the Nazi era. At the same time, Lithuanian periodicals were printed in areas not far from Russian-controlled Lithuania, such as Auszra or Varpas, and smuggled into Lithuania proper. Between the two world wars, in the regions lost by Russia following the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk, Russian and Jewish communists printed seditious literature in local languages until 1933.

Culture

The first book in Lithuanian, prepared by Martynas Mažvydas, was printed in Königsberg in 1547, while the first Lithuanian grammar, Daniel Klein's Grammatica Litvanica, was printed there in 1653.

Lithuania Minor was the home of Vydūnas, philosopher and writer, and Kristijonas Donelaitis, pastor and poet and author of The Seasons, which mark the beginning of Lithuanian literature. The Seasons give a vivid depiction of the everyday life of Prussian Lithuanian country.

Lithuania Minor was an important center for Lithuanian culture, which was persecuted in Russian-controlled Lithuania proper. That territory had been slowly Polonized when being part of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth and was heavily Russificied while part of the Russian Empire, especially in the second half of the 19th century. During the ban on Lithuanian printing in Russia from 1864 until 1904, Lithuanian books were printed in East Prussian towns such as Tilsit, Ragnit, Memel, and Königsberg, and smuggled to Russia by knygnešiai. The first Lithuanian language periodicals appeared during the period in Lithuania Minor, such as Auszra, edited by Jonas Basanavičius, succeeded by Varpas by Vincas Kudirka. They had contributed greatly to the Lithuanian national revival of the 19th century.

Notes

References

Sources

Simon Gunau, Preussische Chronik. Hrsg. von M. Perlbach etc., Leipzig, 1875.
Adalbert Bezzenberger, Die litauisch-preußische Grenze.- Altpreußische Monatsschrift, XIX–XX, 1882–1883.
K. Lohmeyer, Geschichte von Ost- und Westpreußen, Gotha, 1908
R. Trautmann, Die Altpreußischen Sprachdenkmaler, Göttingen, 1909
L. David. Preussische Chronik. Hrsg. von Hennig, Königsberg, 1812
M. Toeppen, Historische-comparative Geographie von Preußen, Gotha, 1958

External links

Timeline of Lithuania Minor
The Folklore of the Lietuvininkai
Names of Settlements in Lithuania Minor
Map of Lithuania Minor, with Lithuanian-type placenames
Detailed area maps of Kaliningrad Oblast with Lithuanian place names (text in German)

Maps

Under the German Empire (1871–1914)
Under the Kingdom of Prussia (1701–1871)
Under the Duchy of Prussia (1525–1701) (text in Lithuanian with some English translations added)