Lithuania Minor or Prussian Lithuania is a historical region divided between Lithuania and the Kaliningrad Oblast of Russia, and one of five ethnographic regions of Lithuania. It is a subregion of Prussia, where Prussian Lithuanians (or Lietuvininkai) lived, and got its name from the territory's substantial Lithuanian-speaking population.
Prior to the invasion of the Teutonic Knights in the 13th century, the main part of the territory later known as Lithuania Minor was inhabited by the tribes of Skalvians and Nadruvians. The land depopulated during the incessant war between Lithuania and the Teutonic Order. The war ended with the Treaty of Melno and the land was repopulated by Lithuanian newcomers, returning refugees, and the remaining indigenous Baltic peoples; the term Lithuania Minor appeared for the first time between 1517 and 1526.
With the exception of the Klaipėda Region, which became a mandated territory of the League of Nations in 1920 by the Treaty of Versailles and was unified with Lithuania from 1923 to 1939, the area was part of the state of Prussia until 1945, which was fief of the Kingdom of Poland until 1657 and later developed into the Kingdom of Prussia, from 1871 within the German Reich. Since 1945, a small portion of Lithuania Minor has been retained within the borders of modern-day Lithuania and Poland while most of the territory is part of the Kaliningrad Oblast of Russia, which was part of the Soviet Union until December 1991.
Although hardly anything remains of the original Lithuanian culture of the area due to the Germanisation policies of the German Empire in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, Lithuania Minor has contributed significantly to Lithuanian culture overall. The standard written form of Prussian-Lithuanian provided the basis for modern Lithuanian, evolved from people close to Stanislovas Rapalionis and graduates from Lithuanian-language schools established in Vilnius, who were expelled from the Grand Duchy during Counter-Reformation years. Those include notable names like Abraomas Kulvietis and Martynas Mažvydas. During the years of the 19th-century Lithuanian press ban, most of the Lithuanian books printed using the Latin alphabet were published in Lithuania Minor.
Terminology
The term "Lithuania Minor" refers to the northernmost part of the former province of East Prussia (about ). It was first mentioned as in Simon Grunau's Prussian Chronicle of the early 16th century (between 1517 and 1526) and was later repeated by another Prussian chronicler, Lucas David. The term Lithuania Minor was first applied during the 19th century and used more widely during the 20th century, mostly among historians and ethnographers.
The northeastern limit of the area of Prussia inhabited by Lithuanians was the state border between Lithuania and Prussia, and the northern border was along the Neman river, but the southwestern limit was not clear. Thus, the territory of Lithuania Minor has been understood differently by different parties; it could be:
either the area limited in the south by Max Toeppen – Adalbert Bezzenberger's line (about ) what is roughly the area of the former administrative Lithuania Province (about ), where the population was almost entirely Lithuanian until 1709–1711, or the area of the former region with actual Lithuanian majority or of considerable percentage (about 17–18,000 km2 or 6,500–7,000 sq mi).
The administrative terms "Lithuanian province" (), "Lithuanian districts" (), "Lithuanian county" () or simply "Prussian Lithuania" (), "Lithuania" () were used to refer to the Lithuanian inhabited administrative units (Nadruvia and Scalovia) in the legal documentation of Prussian state since 1618. The Lithuanian Province was named , , , Little Lithuania, Litvania in the maps of Prussia since 1738. The official use of the concepts Prussian Lithuania etc. decreased considerably from the administrative reform of 1815–1818.
Geography
The area of Lithuania Minor embraced the land between the lower reaches of the river Dangė to the north and the major headstreams of the river Pregolya () to the south. The southwestern line ran from the Curonian Lagoon along the Deimena river to its south, continued along the Prieglius river to the Łyna () river, up to the town of Alna (modern Druzhba) and hence southward along the Ašvinė river to Lake Ašvinis and from there eastward to the border of Lithuania Major. The region embraced about 11 400 km2. The broader understanding of Lithuania Minor includes the area west from the Łyna and south form the lower reaches of the Prieglius and the Sambian Peninsula, making up 17–18 thousand km2 in total.
The former ethnic region of Lithuania Minor belongs to different states today. The part of Kaliningrad Oblast (excluding the city of Kaliningrad and its surroundings), a few territories in Poland's Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship, as well as the following territories in modern-day Lithuania: the Klaipėda district municipality, the Šilutė district municipality, Klaipėda city, Pagėgiai municipality, and Neringa municipality had once ethnically, linguistically and culturally been the latter Lithuanian region. Although now divided among countries, Lithuania Minor had been intact formerly, all these areas were once part of Prussia and thus politically separated from Lithuania Major.
From 1773 to 1918, all of Lithuania Minor was part of the Kingdom of Prussia's province of East Prussia, the core of medieval Prussia. It was a region outside of the former Lithuanian state, inhabited by a large number of Prussian Lithuanians. Ethnic Prussian Lithuanians were mostly Protestants, in contrast to the inhabitants of Lithuania Major, who predominantly were Roman Catholics.
Cities and towns The largest, oldest and historically most important cities are Klaipėda, Sovetsk and Chernyakhovsk.
Cities and towns in the Lithuanian part: Katyčiai Kintai Klaipėda Kretingalė Neringa Pagėgiai Panemunė Plikiai Priekulė Rusnė Šilutė Smalininkai Viešvilė Vilkyškiai
Cities and towns in the Russian part: Chernyakhovsk ChernyshevskoyeLost town rights after WW2. Dobrovolsk Gusev Krasnoznamensk Kutuzovo Neman Nesterov Ozyorsk Polessk Slavsk Sovetsk
History
Pre-Lithuania Minor The territory, which was given the denomination Lithuania Minor in the 16th century, was not alien to Lithuanians ethnically as well as politically in earlier times. It had once been partly subject to Mindaugas' Lithuania in the 13th century. Later, captured (1275–76) and ruled by the Teutonic Knights, the land was reckoned, what is recorded in the historical sources, to be their patrimony by Algirdas (officially said) and Vytautas (recorded to be said unofficially).Lietuvos istorija [The history of Lithuania]; redactor A.Šapoka; Kaunas 1936; p.140
German-Lithuanian rivalry
The territory of western Lithuania began to be threatened by the Livonian order from the north and Teutonic Knights from the south in the 13th century. The Orders were seizing the lands of Baltic tribes, one of which – Lithuanians – had its state and was also expanding its power among neighbouring Baltic and Ruthenian people. The Order was granted the right over the pagan lands by popes and emperors of the Holy Roman Empire. It was conqueror's right – awarded them as much lands as they would conquer. After the Battle of Saule the Livonian order was crushed and incorporated to the Teutonic Order as part of it. Mindaugas, in critical political circumstances for his rule, undertook to grant Samogitia to the Order in exchange for baptism and the crown from the pope. After Mindaugas became a king, a direct subject of the Pope, in 1253, the acts of grants of the lands for Livonian Order were written: 1253 July, the act granting Nadruvia and Karšuva to the Order, written in Lithuanian curia by Mindaugas. 1259 the act granting Dainava and Scalovia to the Order, written by Mindaugas. In the historiography this act is considered to be falsified by the Order.
All Baltic tribes rose against the Order after the Battle of Durbe (1260). Mindaugas officially canceled his relations with the Livonian Order in 1261 and the acts of grants became invalid. Mindaugas's royal dynasty discontinued when he and two sons were assassinated in 1263. Lithuanian dukes did not join the Prussians in their uprising due to inside instability of the Lithuanian throne. Nadruvia and Scalovia (which comprised much of later Lithuania Minor) had been taken by the Teutonic Knights in 1275–1276 after the Prussian uprising and they reached Neman from the south in 1282. Lithuania also did not manage to retain Semigallian castles lying north from Lithuania and the Semigallians fell under the Order finally during Gediminas's rule. Samogitians, whose land lay between the Livonian Order and the Teutonic Order, had been many times granted to the Order juridically by Lithuanian dukes, popes, emperors of Holy Roman Empire, but either the Order did not managed to take it, or the Lithuanian dukes departed from their treaty and grant. Klaipėda was passed to Teutonic Order from its Livonian branch in 1328.
The patrimony for Nadruvia and Scalovia was remembered by post-Mindaugas grand dukes of Lithuania: Algirdas, during the negotiation on Lithuania's Christianization, postulated (1358) for the emperor of Holy Roman Empire, Charles IV, that he would accept Christianity when the Order was transferred to Russia's border to fight Tatars and Lithuania would be given back the lands to Łyna, Pregolya rivers and Baltic sea. Lithuanian grand dukes probably considered the Order to be illegitimate state, propagandizing the mission of Christianization as the fundamental aim and factually seeking political authority at one time. Additionally, after the Order had become Protestant state, the conquered Baltic lands were not acknowledged as its possession by the popes.
After the Battle of Grunwald the dispute between Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Order on Samogitia started. Vytautas wanted the border to be the Neman river, while the Order wanted to have Veliuona and Klaipėda in the right side of the river. Both sides agreed to accept the prospective solution of Emperor Sigismund's representative Benedict Makrai. He decided that the right side of Neman (Veliuona, Klaipėda) had to be left for Lithuania (1413). Makrai is known to have stated:
The Order did not accept the solution. Later Vytautas agreed the solution to be made by Emperor Sigismund. He acknowledged Samogitians for the Order (1420). Vytautas did not accept the solution. Polish and Lithuanian military, not capturing the castles, devastated Prussia then and the Treaty of Melno was made. Klaipėda was left for the Order. Since the Melno treaty the land later become Lithuania Minor had been officially separated from Lithuania. It became part of the state of the Teutonic Order. In 1454, King Casimir IV Jagiellon incorporated the region into the Kingdom of Poland upon the request of the Prussian Confederation – a league formed in opposition to the Teutonic Order. After the subsequent Thirteen Years' War (1454–1466), the longest of all Polish-Teutonic wars, the Teutonic Order regained authority over the city as a fief of the Polish Crown (and thus the Polish–Lithuanian union).
Emergence