Lithuania, officially the Republic of Lithuania, is a country in the Baltic region of Europe. It is one of three Baltic states and lies on the eastern shore of the Baltic Sea, bordered by Latvia to the north, Belarus to the east and south, Poland to the south, and the Russian semi-exclave of Kaliningrad Oblast to the southwest, with a maritime border with Sweden to the west. Lithuania covers an area of 65,300 km2 (25,200 sq mi), and has a population of 2.9 million. Its capital and largest city is Vilnius; other major cities include Kaunas, Klaipėda, Šiauliai and Panevėžys. Lithuanians are the titular nation, belong to the ethnolinguistic group of Balts, and speak Lithuanian.
For millennia, the southeastern shores of the Baltic Sea were inhabited by various Baltic tribes. In the 1230s, Lithuanian lands were united for the first time by Mindaugas, who formed the Kingdom of Lithuania on 6 July 1253. Subsequent expansion and consolidation resulted in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, which by the 14th century was the largest country in Europe. In 1386, the grand duchy entered into a de facto personal union with the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland. The two realms were united into the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1569, forming one of the largest and most prosperous states in Europe. The commonwealth lasted more than two centuries, until neighbouring countries gradually dismantled it between 1772 and 1795, with the Russian Empire annexing most of Lithuania's territory.
Towards the end of World War I, Lithuania declared independence in 1918, founding the modern Republic of Lithuania. In World War II, Lithuania was occupied by the Soviet Union, then by Nazi Germany, before being reoccupied by the Soviets in 1944. Lithuanian armed resistance to the Soviet occupation lasted until the early 1950s. On 11 March 1990, a year before the formal dissolution of the Soviet Union, Lithuania became the first Soviet republic to break away when it proclaimed the restoration of its independence.
Lithuania is a developed country with a high-income and an advanced economy ranking very high in Human Development Index. Lithuania ranks highly in digital infrastructure, press freedom and happiness. It is a member of the United Nations, the European Union, the Council of Europe, the Council of the Baltic Sea States, the Eurozone, the Nordic Investment Bank, the International Monetary Fund, the Schengen Agreement, NATO, OECD and the WHO. It also participates in the Nordic-Baltic Eight (NB8) regional co-operation format.
The spelling of Lithuania was a later addition to the original Latinate Lituania since 1800 as a form of hyperforeignism influenced by Greek loanwords with the theta; it is ultimately from Lithuanian: Lietuva. The first known record of Lietuva is in a 1009 story of Saint Bruno in the Annals of Quedlinburg. The chronicle records Latinised form of the name Lietuva: Litua. The true meaning of the name is unknown, and scholars still debate it. There are a few plausible versions.
Lietava, a small stream near Kernavė—the core area of the early Lithuanian state and a possible first capital of the eventual Grand Duchy of Lithuania—is usually credited as the source of the name. However, the stream is very small, and some find it improbable that such a small and localised body of water could have lent its name to an entire nation. On the other hand, such naming is not unprecedented in world history.
Artūras Dubonis proposed another hypothesis, that Lietuva relates to the word leičiai (plural of leitis). From the middle of the 13th century, leičiai were a distinct warrior social group of the Lithuanian society subordinate to the Lithuanian ruler or the state itself. The word leičiai is used in 14–16th century historical sources as an ethnonym for Lithuanians (but not Samogitians) and is still used, usually poetically or in historical contexts, in the Latvian language, which is closely related to Lithuanian.
Early history and Baltic tribes
The history of Lithuania dates back to settlements founded about 10,000 years ago. The first people settled in the territory of Lithuania after the Last Glacial Period in the 10th millennium BC: Kunda, Neman and Narva cultures. They were traveling hunters. In the 8th millennium BC the climate became warmer and forests developed. The inhabitants of what is now Lithuania travelled less and engaged in local hunting, gathering and fresh-water fishing. The Indo-Europeans, who arrived in the 3rd to 2nd millennium BC, mixed with the local population and formed various Baltic tribes. The Balts did not maintain close cultural or political contacts with the Roman Empire, while maintaining trade contacts via the Amber Road.
From the 9th to the 11th centuries, coastal Balts were subjected to raids by the Vikings. Lithuania comprised mainly the culturally different regions of Samogitia (known for its early medieval skeletal burials), and further east Aukštaitija, or Lithuania proper (known for its early medieval cremation burials). The area was remote and unattractive to outsiders, including traders, which accounts for its separate linguistic, cultural and religious identity and delayed integration into general European patterns and trends. Traditional Lithuanian pagan customs and mythology, with many archaic elements, were long preserved. Rulers' bodies were cremated up until the conversion to Christianity.
Kingdom of Lithuania, Grand Duchy of Lithuania and Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth
The first written record of the name for the country dates to 1009 AD. Facing a German threat, Mindaugas in the middle of the 13th century united a large part of the Baltic tribes and founded the State of Lithuania; in 1253, he was crowned the Catholic King of Lithuania. Lithuanian statehood was created on the basis of Lithuania proper, where the Lithuanians tribe lived and spoke the Lithuanian language. Moreover, by taking advantage of the weakened territory of the former Kievan Rus' due to the Mongol invasion, Mindaugas incorporated Black Ruthenia into Lithuania. After Mindaugas' assassination in 1263, pagan Lithuania was again a target of the Christian crusades of the Teutonic Order and Livonian Order. Traidenis during his reign (1270–1282) reunified all Lithuanian lands and achieved military successes against the crusaders, fighting alongside other Baltic tribes, but was unable to militarily assist the Old Prussians in their Great Uprising. Traidenis' main residence was in Kernavė.
From the late 13th century, members of the Gediminids dynasty began ruling Lithuania. Grand Duke Gediminas consolidated a hereditary monarchy and established Vilnius as the capital city in his letters. Lithuania was Christianised and incorporated East Slavs' territories (e.g. principalities of Minsk, Kyiv, Polotsk, Vitebsk, Smolensk, etc.) significantly expanding the Grand Duchy of Lithuania's territory to ~650,000 km2 in the first half of the 14th century. At the end of the 14th century Lithuania was the largest country in Europe. In 1385, Lithuania formed a dynastic union with Poland through the Union of Krewo. By the 15th century patrilineal members of the Lithuanian ruling Gediminids dynasty ruled Lithuania and Poland, as well as Hungary, Croatia, Bohemia, and Moldavia. Wars with the Teutonic State in 1409–1411 and in 1422 concluded with the Treaty of Melno.
In the 15th century the strengthened Grand Duchy of Moscow renewed the Muscovite–Lithuanian Wars for Lithuanian-controlled Eastern Orthodox territories. Due to the unsuccessful beginning of the Livonian War, which resulted in loss of land to the Tsardom of Russia. Pressure by monarch Sigismund II Augustus (a supporter of a close Polish–Lithuanian union), the Lithuanian nobility agreed to conclude the Union of Lublin in 1569 with the Crown of the Kingdom of Poland, which created the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth with a joint monarch, with Lithuania remaining a separate state. After concluding the real union, Lithuania and Poland jointly managed to reach military successes during the Livonian War, occupation of Moscow (1610), war with Sweden (1600–1611), Smolensk war with Russia (1632–1634), etc. In 1588, Sigismund III Vasa personally confirmed the Third Statute of Lithuania where it stated that Lithuania and Poland have equal rights within the Commonwealth and ensured the separation of powers. The real union strongly intensified the Polonisation of Lithuania and Lithuanian nobility.