Lituanistica

Title

Tue, 07 May 2024 00:00:00 +0300

The Period of Turmoil in the Late Thirteenth Century in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania: The Case of Daumantas in 1285

Ričardas Dediala — Tue, 07 May 2024 00:00:00 +0300

As the position is usually formed in historiography, in the first half of 1282, probably after the violent death of Traidenis (1268–1282), Grand Duke of Lithuania, the throne was taken over or seized by another influential group. The sources do not reveal any other name of the grand duke who ruled Lithuania from this moment until August 1285. In 1285, the mysterious death of the no-less-mysterious grand duke of Lithuania Daumantas was recorded in the Russian chronicles in the Oleshnya district belonging to the land of Tver. The historical sources about this event are scarce, and the historical circumstances are vague. Daumantas’s attack on Oleshnya is recorded in nine chronicles, each of which contains a laconic message about his death. Taking into account the directions of Lithuanian politics, the analysis of the campaigns following the death of Grand Duke Traidenis in the first half of 1282 until the middle of 1284 leads to the following conclusions:
(1) from the first half of 1282 until mid-1284, we do not see any new established dynasty (a consolidated political force) and its representative on the throne of Lithuania; (2) further continuity of Traidenis’s policy in relations with Galicia-Volhynia is observed, only at this time the degree of involvement in Galician-Volhynian politics was even higher, indicating also a considerable political dependence; (3) Daumantas’s emergence must be linked to the events of 1284: the withdrawals of Skomantas, Tautenis, and Mantsiekis and the direction of Daumantas’s campaign to the land of Tver in 1285; (4) the attack on the Oleshnya volost of the land of Tver in August 1285 is related to the pro-Mindaugas activity of Simeon of Polotsk, the bishop of Tver, and the potential establishment of Andrew, the son of Girdenis, who was Vaišelga’s protégé in Polotsk, in his place. The attack on the Simeon’s volost placed Daumantas in the camp of the enemies of Girdenis and Mindaugas’s clan. As Simeon acted against the establishment of the political faction hostile to the politics of Mindaugas’s clan in Polotsk and undermined the relations of the Lithuanians with Tver, the campaign was directed specifically against this bishop; (5) Daumantas’s preliminary reign on the throne of Lithuania lasted from mid-1284 to August 1285. The events of 1286 demonstrate that at this time a pro-Mindaugas party’s dynasty returned to the throne of Lithuania; (6) the emergence of Butigeidis and Butvydas was recorded only in 1288–1289, but we do not see any specific data on the focussed politics of the first Gediminids until then.cs of the first Gediminids until then.

The Governor-General of Vilnius: The Chair of the Interrogation Commission and the Liquidation Commission of Vilnius Governorate

Lukas Pocius — Tue, 07 May 2024 00:00:00 +0300

The 1830-1831 uprising led to serious changes in the policy of Russian Empire in western provinces. Before the insurgency, there was a policy of coexistence with the local elites, but after it, Russian policy shifted towards assimilation. However, before starting the integration of the western provinces, the biggest challenge was the liquidation of the uprising and the trial of its leaders and participants. Between December 1830 and June 1831, several imperial decrees were issued to establish punishments for the leaders of the uprising, namely, expropriation of their property and a court-martial for the most active participants. The emperor allowed amnesty, especially for those who had abandoned the uprising themselves. However, no systematic process had been put in place to consider these expropriation cases. Thus, on 17 July 1831, a decree was issued to set up interrogation commissions in the governorates affected by the uprising to determine the categories of punishment, of which there were three: category 1 for the most active participants and leaders of the uprising, which allowed them to be stripped of all their property and sent to a court martial; category 2 was reserved for subversives and law-breakers of the Russian army, who could be tried in a court-martial for more serious activities, and category 3 was given to assigned to propagandists who, however, had not taken part in the uprising. The commissions were in place for about three years, but their work was ineffective because the commissioners stole assets from the confiscated property, while the bureaucracy was slow and rigid. The research showed that the work was continued by another commission, the Liquidation Commission, which was formed in 1832 to liquidate debts from confiscated property. After 1834, when the Interrogation Commission stopped its activities, the Vilnius Liquidation Commission continued its work under the governor-general of Vilnius, but unlike the Vilnius Interrogation Commission, it did not consider categories of punishment but rather amnesties and compensation of property. Research in this study focuses on Nikolai Dolgorukov, governor-general of Vilnius, who headed both the interrogation and liquidation commissions of Vilnius Governorate. As a head of the Interrogation Commission, his most important activity was the consideration and approval of the categories of punishment. However, in the course of our research we found that his other two areas of activity that he carried out as the head of both the Interrogation Commission and the Liquidation Commission, such as consideration of amnesties and payment of property compensations, overlapped with his activities as the governor-general. In the light of this information, however, we can see that despite his autonomy as defined in the decree of 17 July 1831, he was constrained by the emperor himself, because the emperor was the highest head of the Interrogation Commission and the Liquidation Commission. It was he who decided whether to accept or reject the results sent over by the governor-general of Vilnius. He also gave instructions on working principles and the like. Another person, Field Marshal Fabien Osten-Sacken of the 1st Army, was involved in the cases concerning the martial law in the western provinces, but he did not have the same influence on the governor-general of Vilnius as the emperor.

Arguments for the Lithuanian miestas ‘town’ Not Being a Slavism

Dainius Razauskas — Tue, 07 May 2024 00:00:00 +0300

The article maintains that, contrary to the linguists’ unanimous assumption, the Lithuanian word miestas ‘town’ could not be a Slavism. The article consists of six parts. In the first one, the introduction, the very problem is identified. Part 2 focuses on the analysis of the Proto-Slavic *město ‘place’ > ‘town’, previous attempts at its etymologisation are mentioned, and a connection to Lithuanian mietas ‘pale, stake’ and Latvian miet ‘to pale, to stake up, enclose’, among others, is indicated. Parts 3 and 4 show the characteristic semantic evolution from the meaning ‘enclosure, paled up site’ to the meanings ‘place’ and ‘town’, respectively. Section 5 gives a possible coherent explanation of the word miestas by means of the Lithuanian (Baltic) language without any resort to Slavic whatsoever (contrary to the Proto-Slavic *mesto, which cannot be explained independently). Finally, in part 6 (the conclusion), the single argument primarily proposed by Kazimieras Būga for the miestas to be a borrowing from Slavic is considered and refuted as not sufficient for such an assertion.

Classification of Information Collected on the Ethnography of Life. Part 2: The Contribution of Antanas Mažiulis

Irma Šidiškienė — Tue, 07 May 2024 00:00:00 +0300

This is the second of the two articles that address the problem of how the historiography of methodological tools, instructions, and questionnaires helps to reveal the formation of the discipline of ethnology in Lithuania (for Part 1, see Lituanistica, 69 (3), 225–240). The question is raised why only four out of Mažiulis’s sixteen published articles on the methodology of material collection and its popularisation appeared in Vacys Milius’s bibliography. By examining Antanas Mažiulis’s articles on the issues of collecting folklore and local history materials and comparing them with earlier methodological tools written between 1934 and 1940, we found that the methodological instructions of Antanas Mažiulis were often characterised by a simpler and improved systematisation of the information collected. In one of his first articles, he identified three types of folklore: (a) songs; (b) fairy tales, stories; (c) small folklore. He also distinguished the fourth type, that of ‘Customs’, which lists the main church festivals and groups other festivals by the seasons of the year. Most importantly, Mažiulis developed the structure of the marriage questionnaire in his methodological tools. The classification of museum collections was improved, although, unlike in the methodological programme of the Aušra Museum, he classified ‘Folk Art’ in a separate section from ‘Ethnography’. Looking at how the regulations on metrics and etiquette were formulated for recording material in the nineteenth–the first half of the twentieth century, it is clear that the instructions on metrics changed insignificantly and that the regulations on etiquette changed little in the 1930s. Then the data on the nationality and religion of the respondents were included. The idea of discovering one’s own land, which became popular from the nineteenth century onwards, shaped the view that one should start collecting material in one’s own locality, where the collector is known to the people. This was also supported by Mažiulis. In the communication with the respondent, a change in the attitude towards the relationship with the respondent is observed. From the advocacy of direct communication with respondents (without emphasising that material is being collected), there was a shift towards mutual communication by sharing information with each other. Later, Mažiulis urged and advised the collector of information to maintain a student-teacher relationship when interviewing the respondent. Since the beginning of the twentieth century, the question of the authenticity of the recorded material has remained a topical issue, which has dynamically manifested itself in methodological tools as a dilemma between the reliability of the respondents and the honesty of the recorders. Mažiulis stressed the duty of the note-takers to do their job honestly. Another important area of communication with the respondent to which Mažiulis made a significant contribution is how to gain the respondent’s trust. He recommended certain etiquette in showing respect, friendliness, consideration, etc. to the respondent. This was how the researcher’s etiquette was formed. He was also instrumental in organising the collection of the material and drafting the directives. His methodological tool, the article ‘Tautos papročių rinkimas’ (Collecting folk customs), is considered the first directive for the preparation of the ‘Ancient Days’ in Lithuania. Antanas Mažiulis was a creator of methodological instructions in the field of material collection, a thinker, agitator, and practitioner (material collector, one of the founders of the museum in Dusetos (a town in Zarasai district, Lithuania), a member of the board of the Dusetos branch of ‘Pavasaris’ (Spring), an organisation of Lithuanian Catholic youth, etc.). His contribution to the historiography of methodological tools in Lithuanian ethnology is notable for the systematic nature of the methodological instructions for collecting the material, a new approach to communication with the respondents, and practical application of the collected material.

LAUDATE DOMINUM OMNES GENTES

Vytas Jankauskas — Tue, 07 May 2024 00:00:00 +0300

Gitana Vanagaitė. Vaižganto asmuo ir kūryba: Krikščionybės ir modernybės sąveika. Kaunas: Vytauto Didžiojo universitetas, 2023. 168 p.