In which countries do they speak Lithuanian? About the Lithuanian language. Declension of demonstrative pronouns

Dictionary: Ledieu - Loparev. Source: Vol. XVIIa (1896): Ledier - Loparev, p. 815-817 () Other sources: MESBE

Lithuanian language.- The first more or less complete information about the language of the Lithuanians was reported by P. Keppen (1827) in the third volume of “Materials for the history of education in Russia.” Watson (“Ueber d. lettischen Volksstamm”), comparing L. languages with Slavic, Gothic and Finnish dialects, found that L. dialects and peoples form a transition from the peoples of the Slovenian tribe to the Germans, and on the other hand also a transition to Finns As an independent whole in the series of Sanskrit, Greek, Latin and other Indo-Germanic languages, L. language. appears already in 1833 with Bopp. The antiquity and importance of the L. language was discovered by prof. P. f.-Bohlen (“Ueber die Verwandtschaft zwischen d. Lithauischen u. Sanskritsprache”, in “Hist. u. litter. Abhandlungen d. deutschen Ges. zu Königsberg”, IV, 1830). Hilferding (“Lithuania and Zhmud,” “Collected Works,” II, 366) says: “the current speech of the L. peasant is in many ways more primitive than the language the oldest monument Europe than the language of Homer. It has become significantly impoverished, but has changed least of all in its indigenous sounds and forms: it is a fragment of prehistoric antiquity between young generations of languages, just as among the same L. forests the only representative of the prehistoric kingdom of European animals survived in the bison.” Aug. Pott, having finally separated the Prussian, Lithuanian and Latvian dialects from the Slavic ones, came to the conclusion that in comparison with the Germanic and Slavic languages, the Leto-Lithuanian languages show great antiquity in their grammatical structure (cf. “De linguarum letticarum cum vicinis nexu”, 1841). For Russian Slavicists, the importance of studying L. language. it became clear a long time ago; Preuss had already studied L. language. at Prof. Reza and Kurshat. In 1860, in a dispute with Pogodin, Kostomarov argued that the Varangians were natives of the Lebanese land and that their very calling was accomplished “because of the connection in which ours were then northern Slavs with the coastal Lithuanians." Kostomarov's guess, however, was not accepted by science. In 1856-57 Schleicher's excellent grammar (“Handbuch d. litauischen Sprache. Grammatik, Lesebuch u. Glossar”) was published in Prague, the result of his trip to Prussian Lithuania, made in 1852 at the expense of the Austrian government. According to Schleicher, the L. language belongs to the large family of Indo-Germanic languages, especially close to Slavic and German. In comparison with Slavic, the Lithuanian language. stands at an older stage in the development of sounds; regarding the morphology and especially the conjugation forms of the Slavic language. has an advantage over L. Despite Schleicher's undoubted merits in systematizing linguistic material in setting out the rules of sound changes, morphology and syntax of the Literary language, his information turned out to be inaccurate regarding the stress and length of vowels, and incomplete regarding the dialects and dialects of the Literary language of the former Grand Duchy. Currently, the following provisions have been established in science (cf. “Living Antiquity”, I, issue 1-2: “Review of works on L. ethnography 1879-1890” and “Introduction to catech. H. Daukshi”, I -XXI): 1) to the Slavs. in adverbs, the disappearance of vowels at the end of words and syllables is noticeable, which are completely preserved in L.: vilkas - wolf; sunus - son. 2) Preservation of diphthongs, in glory. turned into long vowels: veidas (face) - glory. view. 3) L. pure sounds i, u, O turn into dull sounds ъ, b: linas - flax, esini - I am, duktë - deshti (daughter). 4) Absence of rhinism in L.: ranka, , ręka (hand); penki - . 5) L. ū goes into s: sunus - son, dumai - smoke. Laryngeal g, k, x go to f, h, w: gyvas - alive, Latvian dzívs.

In 1865, Schleicher met A. Baranovsky, from whose words he gave the first news about the East Lithuanian dialect in additions to Donaleitis’s publication. He expressed the opinion that all, both Prussian and Russian-Lithuanian, dialects are grouped into two dialects: a) Upper Lithuanian and b) Lower Lithuanian, or Zhmud. He sees the main difference between them in the fact that the ancient tj, dj in Upper Lithuanian become tš and dž, but in Zhmud they remain unchanged. In addition, Upper Lithuanian sounds io, ie, ō correspond in Zhmud o, e, ei (ī), a. It turns out, however, that, for example, Akanie is found in different, distant places of Lithuanian territory: in the Memel dialect of the catechism of 1547 and in the East Lithuanian dialect of the “Zhmagus” of Novoaleksandrovsky and Sventsyansky uu. The first attempt at the geographical distribution of Lithuanian dialects was made in 1861 by I. Yushkevich in his experiment on Lithuanian orthography (“Kał bos lëtuviszko l ëż uvo ir lë t. statraszimas”), distinguishing four groups: 1) Prussian-Lithuanian, 2) Zhmud, 3) Eyragol and 4) East Lithuanian dialects, and this distribution depends on the modification of sounds ea, e, ie, uo V ia, a, e; ei,y,é; ou, ū, ua, o. In Kovno province, according to the observations of A. Baranovsky, 2 Zhmud, 2 Western Lithuanian and 7 Eastern Lithuanian dialects can be traced. L. dialect of Oshmyansky district. Vilna province belongs to the group of Eastern Lithuanian dialects; Lida Lithuanians speak, together with the Lithuanians of the southern part of Troki district, the Dzeka dialect, or the language of the Dzuks of the Suwalki province. In the latter, dialects are distinguished: Velensky, corresponding to the southwestern Latvian dialect of the Kovno province; Girinikov, corresponding to the northwestern Latvian dialect; caps talking cap instead of cool(How); Dzukov, corresponding to the South Lithuanian dialect of the former Yatvingians or Sudavians, already speaking with Masurian-Polish admixture (cf. O. Kolberg, “Pieśni ludu lit. Zb. wiad. do antrop. krajowej”, III, introduction; samples of Russian-Lithuanian dialects - "Catechism" of Dauksha, 131-172).

Among the outstanding features of the linguistic language in general are the peculiarities of its stress and vowel length. According to Baranovsky, L. language has three degrees of the number of sounds: 1) an unconditionally short number in the sounds of stressed and unstressed ă, ĕ, ĭ, ŭ , but never in sounds: o, e, ë, uo, i, u; 2) sounds of medium length, which without stress are slightly longer than short ones, with stress slightly shorter than long ones ā, ū in the words ariu, buv ì mas; 3) the sounds are definitely long, with long pronunciation and without stress. Sounds do not have this degree a, e, ia. The emphasis is one and simple. Its effect is that the syllable with stress gains an advantage over other syllables and clearly reveals its phonetic properties, among other things, the degree and composition of the amount of sound. F. Hirt in his book “Der Indogermanische Accent” (Strasb., 1895) came to the conclusion that Lithuanian-Slavic accentuation, if not ancient, is at least equally ancient with Indian-Greek. The relationship between L. stress and Old Prussian is set out by Fortunatov in Art. “On stress and length in the Baltic languages” (“Russian Philol. Bulletin”, 1895, No. 1-2). Thus, the discovery of the peculiarities of stress and number of vowels, described by Kurshat back in 1849 (“Laut und Tonlehre”), and not noticed by Schleicher in modern times, is brilliantly confirmed in the additions to Kurshat’s theory made by Baranovsky, Leskin and Brugman in their “Lit. Volkslieder" 1882), Jaunis and Geert. The forms of L. declension were explained historically and linguistically by A. Leskin in the treatise “Die Declination im Slavisch-Lithauischen und Germanischen” (1876). The works of prof. are devoted to the verb. G. Ulyanova: “Fundamentals of the present tense” 1888 and “Meanings of verbal stems in the Lithuanian-Slavic language” (1891 and 1895). The works of A. A. Potebnya (“Notes on Russian grammar, on the use and origin of the instrumental case”), A. V. Popov (“Syntactic studies”, 1881) and Obelaitis (“Vorpas”, 1893, no. 10). I was especially lucky with the dictionary and, in general, with the etymological study of the L. language. F. Fick devoted a special part of his etymologist. Dictionary of the Lithuanian-Slavic period (“Die litauisch-slavische Spracheinheit”). Already in 1840, Preuss pointed to the main source of Slavic borrowings in the Latvian language. into the Belarusian dialect, and in 1877 prof. Al. Brückner in Berlin devoted an entire dissertation to this issue (“Die Slavischen Fremdwörter ini Litauischen” 1886). Wed. also E. Wolter, “Einfluss West-russlands auf Litauen vor d. XII Jahrhundert” (“Mitteilungen” II, p. 306). Review of Germanisms and borrowings from German language gives Walter Prellwitz: “Die deutschen Bestandtheile in den lett. Sprachen" (Göttingen, 1891). About the Celticisms of Prussian and L. languages. Wed Pearson, “Spuren des Cellischen” (“Catechism” by Dauksha, p. XLIX), and Joseph Zubaty: “O alliteraci v p ísních lotyšskich a litevských” (l894, p. 18). In even more ancient times Lituanisms transport us Finnish languages: It is obvious that the Proto-Finns met the Proto-Litians even before the beginning of the Christian chronology. Wed. Thomsen, "Beröringer" (1890), and "Philological. Library" (1894, No. 175). The composition of the roots and word-forming elements of the Lithuanian language is presented in the fundamental research of A. Leskin: “Ablaut d. Wurzelsilben" (1884) and "Bildung d. Nomina" (1891). Serious attention to the historical side of grammar was first paid by Prof. Adalbert Bezzenberger in his essay “Beiträge z. Gesch. d. Lit. Sprache auf Grund litauischer Texte des XVI u. XVII Jhdts.” (Göttingen, J877). Since 1874, with the participation of F. Bechtel and Garbe, he has been reprinting Lithuanian early printed books with explanatory grammatical comments. Other works by the same author on Lithuanian studies are reviewed in “Living Antiquity” (I, 2 1890, pp. 177-79). Wed. "Archive f. Slav. Philol.” (VIII, 524 ff.); introduction to the Catechism by N. Dauksha, pp. VII-XXI; Karłowicz, “O języku litewskim” in “Rospraw. wydz. fil." krak. Academy of Sciences (1875). The best grammar of F. Kurshat, ed., should still be considered the best. in 1876 in Halle. Dictionaries of the Latvian language with German explanatory text were published by F. Nesselman in 1851, and by Kurshat in 1870-83; Issue 1 was recently released. “Lithuanian-Polish-Russian dictionary” by A. I. Yushkevich. The most complete collection of Eastern Lithuanian words is represented by the trilingual dictionary of K. Shirvid. For practical purposes, “Lietuviszka Gramatika” by M. Mežinis (Tilsit, 1886) and his “Lithuanian-Latvian-Polish-Russian Dictionary” (Tilsit, 1894) were published. For people who speak English, a useful guide for learning the English language can be “Spasabas grejto izsymokinimo angelskos kałbos del Lietuwinku Amerykie” (Plymouth, 1886). He published a grammar of L. language in Polish. M. Akielewicz (“Głosowina”, Poznań, 1890). The study of the L. language was carried out by St. Mikutsky (1855-60) and Yul. P. Kuznetsov, seconded by Imp. R. Geographer. General to the northwestern region in 1869-75. (cf. “Calendar of the North-West Region” for 1890, p. 38). Precious material for the dialectology of the Godlevo dialect of the Suwalki province. given by Brugman in songs and fairy tales, published by him together with Leskin in 1882 with a grammar and glossary attached. At one time, lively debate was caused by the question of the applicability of the Russian alphabet to the Latvian language, and the following became clear: 1) a letter in the Latvian language. has no etymological meaning, and at the endings of words, for example. How pan or son, it corresponds to a sound made from complete syllables as And us; 2) Russian e, And correspond to Church Slavonic iotized je, ji, and therefore must be distinguishable from non-iotized e, i; 3) there are no diphthongs in Russian au, eu, ou or jau, jeu, jou, which results in an inaccurate transcription of aw, ev, ov or yav; 4) Lithuanian ё or iе has no correspondence in Russian graphics and is therefore confused with e(=je) or yat; 5) in L. language. there is no sound equivalent for the letter s; s used in L. words to denote non-iotized i; 6) in Russian. there is no length of vowels, and therefore it is impossible to convey long ī or at through And, which also has the meaning of iotized i; 7) the Russian language does not know nasals, as a result of which ę, ą or are replaced in an artless transcription of Lithuanian-Russian acts en, an, or they fall out; 8) diphthong io in unartificial transcription it is replaced by a letter e or even Yu, denoting ju; 9) in L. language. there are three l, in Russian - only two; therefore, simple spelling inaccurately conveys the middle, non-glottal and unmitigated l, through l. Thus, the Russian alphabet, in order to be applied to linguistic sounds, needs new signs and the replacement of the syllabic system of Russian orthography with a sound phonological one. The experience of more accurate application of Russian letters to the L. language is presented by songs of the Ludwinovskaya gmina, ed. Fortunatov and Miller in “Moskovsk. Univ. Izv." in 1872, songs of Yushkevich, ed. 1867, and “Divine Liturgy of St. John Chrysostom", ed. St. Synod in 1887. According to Ulyanov, the Russian alphabet can be applied to the Latvian language. only with known restrictions (need to throw away ъ, add sign j, yo, ie to denote lit. ů, ie or e). Wed. “Analysis of the ancient dictionary. Zhomoit land XVI century." I. Sprogis in “Warsaw Philologist”. Herald" for 1889 and "Deutsche Literaturzeitung" 1889, No. 5.

For Russian schools, a Lithuanian grammar (courses for junior and senior ages), compiled according to the abbreviated Kurshat-Šikop grammar, textbooks “Russian literacy for Lithuanians,” gospels and catechisms were published for Russian schools in 1891, by order of the authorities of the educational districts of Warsaw and Vilnius. All these books are not distributed among the mass of the Latvian population and are met with hostility. There is no complete guide for studying L. language and questions. A. Kochubinsky recently wrote and spoke about the language and antiquity; see “Proceedings of the IX Arch. Congress" (I, 92 ff.), "On the archaic nature of the L. language." See also K. Skirmuntt, “Z. na jstarszych czasòw plemenia litèwskiego" (1, 1892, p. 15 ff.); "Balt. Monatsschrift" (vol. 33, p. 514 et seq.): "Zur Jett. litauischen Urgeschichte" by Berkholtz; Saussure, " Sur le nom. pluriel et le gen. sing. de la decl. consonantique en Lithuanie"(1895). The theory of close kinship between Lithuanians and Thracians is supported by I. Basanovich in “Etnologškos smulkmenes” (Tilsit, 1893). Reader for studying the Lithuanian language. published by L. Heitler in 1875 under the title “Litauische Studien”. An extensive bibliography of Lithuanian studies was compiled by Baltromaitis: “Collection of bibliographic materials for geography, ethnography and statistics of Lithuania” (St. Petersburg, 1891).

"Lithuanian language".

“The Aukštaitian Lithuanian language was used until the uprising of 1863, then very soon - within only a few years - it was completely forgotten.”

What does this term mean? What kind of language is this: Lithuanian or Aukštaitian? The very doubling of the term “Aukštaitsky Lithuanian” is the same gibberish as, for example, “Russian Tatar language” or “Latvian Estonian language”.

The absurdity is obvious - after all, one language does not require a double name.

The double name means that the Aukštaitians had their own language and that it began to be “ranked” with the Lithuanian language only in the period between the uprisings of 1830-31 and 1863-64, when tsarism was actively turning our Litvin ethnic group into the Belarusian ethnic group.

Moreover, we are not talking about the historical language of the Aukštaitians, but only about the literary language. For example, in the work of Academician of the Academy of Sciences of the Lithuanian SSR K. Korsakas and senior researcher at the Institute of Lithuanian Language and Literature of the Academy of Sciences of the Lithuanian SSR A. Sabaliauskas “Baltic languages”, published in the journal “Russian Speech” in 1971 (No. 4), it is said: “Lithuanian the literary language was formed on the basis of the dialects of Western Aukštayts.” That is: literary, which arose after the ethnic experiments of tsarism, and not Lithuanian.

By the way, Pope Pius II (1405-1464) in his “History of the Czech Republic” wrote:

“Lituania et ipsa late patents regio Polonis ad orientem connexa est... Rara inter Lituanos opida, neque frequentes villae... Sermo gentis Sclavonicus est, latissima est enim haec lingua et in varias divisa sectas. Ex Sclavis enim alii Romanam ecclesiam sequuntur, ut Dalmatae, Croatini, Carni ac Poloni. Alii Graecorum sequuntur errores, ut Bulgari, Rutheni et multi ex Lituanis.”

Translated this means:

“Lithuania, with its vast expanses, borders Poland from the east... The Lithuanians have few cities, and also few villages... The language of the people is Slavic. This language is the most widespread and is divided into different dialects. Among the Slavs, some submit to the Roman Church, like the Dalmatians, Croats, Carnians and Poles. Others adhere to the mistakes of the Greeks, like the Bulgarians, Rusyns and many of the Litvins.”

Are the Aukštayts, in the Pope’s view, “Slavs”? No, he understood his flock very well...

From the book Between Asia and Europe. History of the Russian state. From Ivan III to Boris Godunov author Akunin Boris

“Lithuanian” period Second Rus' The entire western half of pre-Mongol Rus' - modern Ukraine, Belarus, as well as a large piece of Great Russia from Smolensk almost to Kaluga - after Batu’s invasions found themselves in the zone of “soft occupation” and by the middle of the 14th century

From the book Saint Demetrius Donskoy [Ill. Sergey Mikhailovich Goncharov] author Voskoboynikov Valery Mikhailovich

Prince Olgerd of Lithuania Only Rus' did not rest from battles for long. The storm clouds in the east had barely cleared when they approached from the west. Grand Duke Lithuania Olgerd gathered a huge army and moved it to Moscow. If he had marched alone, Dimitri would have dealt with him. But him

From the book Individual and Society in the Medieval West author Gurevich Aron Yakovlevich

3. The language of bureaucracy and the language of autobiography Opitsin appears in many respects as a unique and stand-alone personality. He was in service at the papal court in Avignon, but there is no information about any of his human connections. This is his social loneliness

From the book Our Prince and Khan author Mikhail Weller

Russian-Lithuanian balance Question: did Lithuania not understand that the war with Muscovite Russia, that is, with the Grand Duchy of Vladimir, as well as Suzdal or Tver, is a war with the ulus of the Horde, an armed conflict with the huge Mongol Empire? There were suicides in Lithuania or

From the book Unperverted History of Ukraine-Rus Volume I by Dikiy Andrey

Statute of Lithuania The statute is written in Russian (Old Russian, “book”) language of that time and establishes this language as the state language throughout the territory of Lithuania, for all acts, courts, administrative relations. Ukrainian and Belarusian chauvinists-separatists, perverting

From the book Secrets of Belarusian History. author Deruzhinsky Vadim Vladimirovich

"Lithuanian language". Among the authors of today's Lietuva one can come across the strange term “Aukštaitsky Lithuanian language”. For example: “The Aukštaitsky Lithuanian language was used until the uprising of 1863, then very soon - within only a few years - it was completely forgotten.” What does it mean?

From the book Eastern Volunteers in the Wehrmacht, Police and SS author Karashchuk Andrey

Lithuanian SS Legion. In January 1943, the German authorities, represented by the chief of the SS and police of Lithuania, Brigadeführer Vysotsky, attempted to organize an SS legion from volunteers of Lithuanian nationality. However, this event ended in failure. In response, the Germans closed

author Zuev Georgy Ivanovich

LITHUANIA CASTLE Behind the complex of brick buildings of the Kryukov Naval Barracks, the canal intersects with the Moika River. In this place, along the axis of the embankment of the left bank of the Moika in 1782–1787, a wooden Prison Bridge was built, located near the extensive land plot, on which

From the book Where the Kryukov Canal is... author Zuev Georgy Ivanovich

LITHUANIA MARKET After the completion of the construction of the Lithuanian Castle on the corner of the even side of Officers Street and the odd embankment of the Kryukov Canal on site No. 6/34, in 1787–1789 the Lithuanian meat market was built according to the design of the architect J. Quarenghi. Stone shopping arcades

From the book 1812 - the tragedy of Belarus author Taras Anatoly Efimovich

“Lithuanian Plan” The plan for a surprise attack by Russia together with Prussia on the Duchy of Warsaw remained unrealized. The Kaiser chickened out and at the decisive moment abandoned the war, and then completely went over to Napoleon’s side. Seeing the hesitations and vacillations of his “friend, brother and

author Zuev Georgy Ivanovich

From the book Petersburg Kolomna author Zuev Georgy Ivanovich

From the book History of Lithuania from ancient times to 1569 author Gudavičius Edwardas

b. Lithuanian language The emergence of the state gave rise to the need to establish and strengthen ties between elites various areas, A state organization for its service it required new concepts and means of expression. All this affected

From the book The Beginning of Russia author Shambarov Valery Evgenievich

21. Vytautas of Lithuania The Lithuanians were one of the most backward peoples in Europe. How many millennia have they sat in their swamps! Having seized a fair part of Kievan Rus, Lithuania absorbed a much higher culture. The craftsmen studied with Russian builders, gunsmiths, jewelers,

From the book Russia - Ukraine. Roads of history author Ivanov Sergey Mikhailovich

Lithuanian period Formation of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. The history of the formation of the Principality of Lithuania is amazing. Pressed from the west by the Polish tribes of the Mazovians and Pomorians, from the east by the Russian Krivichi and Dregovichi, the Lithuanian tribes lived along the banks until the end of the 12th century

From the book The Missing Letter. The unperverted history of Ukraine-Rus by Dikiy Andrey

Statute of Lithuania The statute is written in Russian (ancient Russian “book”) language of that time and establishes this language as the state language throughout the territory of Lithuania, for all acts, courts, administrative relations. Ukrainian and Belarusian chauvinists-separatists, perverting

Lithuanian belongs to the Baltic group of languages. official language Lithuania and one of the official languages of the European Union. Today it is spoken by more than 3 million people - both in Lithuania and abroad. The Lithuanian language is unusual, difficult to learn and simply incredibly interesting. This is evidenced by the facts below.

1. Many philologists consider the Lithuanian language to be the most ancient of all existing living languages. The fact is that in terms of phonetics and morphology it is as close as possible to the Proto-Indo-European language, from which all modern languages of Europe originated. “Anyone who wants to know how the Indo-Europeans spoke should listen to a Lithuanian peasant,” French linguist Antoine Meillet once said. That is why, when reconstructing the Proto-Indo-European language, experts rely primarily on Latin, Sanskrit, Greek language and Lithuanian.

2. Lithuanian language is very similar to Sanskrit. The reason for the similarity lies not in kinship (the languages belong to different groups), but in large quantities preserved Proto-Indo-European elements in them. Lithuanian and Sanskrit have similar grammar, as well as many words with similar pronunciation and meaning.

3. The Lithuanian nation historically consists of 4 ethnic groups. The Aukštaitians live in the north of Lithuania, the Samogitians in the west, the Dzuks in the southeast and the Suvalkeci in the south. Each of these ethnic groups is different external features, rituals, traditions, as well as dialect. Even 150 years ago the difference between ethnic groups was so great that the Samogitians, for example, did not understand the Suvalkechi dialect at all. The differences were smoothed out only by the modern literary Lithuanian language, which was created artificially at the end of the 19th century on the basis of all four dialects.

4. The first written record of the Lithuanian language was a handwritten entry on the last page of the book “Tractatus secerdotalis”, published in Strasbourg in 1503. This recording contained the Ave Maria and Nicene Creed prayers, written in the Dzoukian dialect.

5. The marital status of Lithuanian women can be easily understood by the ending of their last names. Thus, the surnames of unmarried women end in -aitė, -iūtė or -ytė, and those of married women end in -ienė. Recently, it has become fashionable among women in public professions to add the ending -ė to their surname, which cannot be used to judge whether they are married or not.

6. The Lithuanian language boasts an unusually old language vocabulary- almost invaluable from the point of view of lexicology. The number of foreign words used in speech is carefully regulated by a specially created for these purposes state commission. Whenever possible, borrowed words are replaced with Lithuanian equivalents. However, despite all efforts, the influence in English is becoming more and more noticeable.

7. There are almost no curse words in the Lithuanian language. For example, one of the harshest swear words is rupūžė, which translates as “toad.” If Lithuanians want to swear properly, they use English words and expressions.

8. Many Lithuanians over the age of 30 still remember Russian, but refuse to speak it on principle. However, sometimes in their speech the words “like”, “in short”, “in any case” slip through. The older generation can still use Russian in everyday life. Most young people under 30 don’t even understand Russian.

9. There are many diminutive suffixes in the Lithuanian language. So, for example, “child” in Lithuanian will be vaikas, but the word “baby” can be translated in completely different ways - vaikelis, vaikiukas, vaikeliukas, vaikelėlis, vaikužėlis, vaikučiukas.

10. The longest word in the Lithuanian language is nebeprisikiškiakopūsteliaudavome, which translates as “not picking enough hare cabbage” (we are talking about the common sorrel).

11. There are no double consonants in the Lithuanian language: allo - alio, program - programa and so on.

12. The phrase “Are you getting off here?”, uttered by passengers on public transport, sounds like “ar Jūs lipsite čia?” (Ar ius lipsite cha). But the Lithuanians significantly simplified and changed it. That’s why today you can hear “Lipsi, lipsi, čia-čia-čia” (Lipsi, lipsi, cha-cha-cha) on all buses and trolleybuses.

ISO 639-3: See also: Project: Linguistics

Lithuanian (lit. Lietùvių kalbà) is the language of the Lithuanians, the official language of Lithuania and one of the official languages of the European Union. Lithuanian is spoken by about 2 million people in Lithuania and about 170 thousand outside its borders. It belongs to the Baltic group of the Indo-European family of languages, in origin it is close to the modern Latvian language, the Latgalian dialect (although mutual understanding between speakers of Lithuanian and these two languages is currently impossible) and the dead ancient Prussian and Yatvingian languages.

Geographical distribution

The earliest written monument of the Lithuanian language dates back to 1503 and consists of prayers (“Ave Maria” and “Nicene Creed”), handwritten on the last page of the book “Tractatus sacerdotalis” published in Strasbourg. The text adheres to the Dzukian dialect and appears to have been copied from an earlier original. There is no doubt that Lithuanian church texts existed earlier, perhaps even at the end of the 14th century, because Christianity introduced in Aukštaitija certainly required such texts for religious practice (in historical sources it is mentioned that the first church texts were translated into Lithuanian by Jagiello himself).

Lithuanian prayer book, printed in Cyrillic. 1866

Typography begins with the catechism of Martynas Mažvydas, written in the Samogitian dialect and published in Königsberg (now Kaliningrad). The book contains the first Lithuanian textbook - “Easy and quick science of reading and writing”, in which the author gives the alphabet and several grammatical terms he invented on 4 pages. The literacy level of Lithuanians throughout the 18th century remained low, so books were not publicly available, and yet, with the publication of the first book, the development of the literary Lithuanian language began.

The literary Lithuanian language has gone through the following stages of development:

I. Pre-national period (XVI-XVIII centuries):

Lithuanian literary language of the 16th-17th centuries;
Lithuanian literary language XVIII century.

II. National period:

Lithuanian literary language from the first half of the 19th century until 1883;
Lithuanian literary language from the end of the 19th century to the beginning of the 20th century (1883-1919);
Lithuanian literary language from the times of the Republic of Lithuania (1919-1940);
Lithuanian literary language since the time of the LSSR as part of the USSR (since 1940).

In each period, the Lithuanian literary language had its own stylistic, written, lexical, morphological, phonetic and other features.

Alphabet

Since the 16th century, a slightly modified Latin alphabet has been used to write the Lithuanian language. The planting of the Cyrillic alphabet began in the second half of the 1860s (a, b, c, d, e, f, g, h, i, k, l, m, n, o, ô, p, r, s, t, y, c, h, w, sch, b , ѣ , yu, i, io, iô, th, ў) caused resistance; and in 1904 the Cyrillic alphabet was rejected. B - the spelling reform carried out included changes in the alphabet. The modern Lithuanian alphabet has 32 letters:

A a	Ą ą	B b	C c	Č č	D d	E e	Ę ę
Ė ė	F f	G g	H h	I i	Į į	Y y	J j
K k	Ll	Mm	Nn	O o	P p	R r	Ss
Š š	T t	U u	Ų ų	Ū ū	V v	Z z	Ž ž

Combinations are used to record some sounds, consonants and vowels, e.g. ch - X. There are also sounds uo - woah And ie - yeah.

Dialects

The Lithuanian language is divided into two main dialects: Aukštaitskiy and Samogitian (these names are respectively aukštaičių ir žemaičių tarmės, come from the Lithuanian words “high” and “low” and denote the settlement of their speakers relative to the course of the Neman River). These dialects themselves, in turn, are divided into adverbs, etc. Currently, in the Aukštait dialect there are three main dialects: eastern, western and southern Aukštayts (Dzuks), in the Samogitian dialect there are also three: western or Klaipėda (donininkai), north -western or Telšiai (dounininkai), and southern or Raseinish (dūnininkai) (the words in brackets are the way the speakers of these adverbs pronounce the word duona, “bread”). See adverb distribution map, English.

Modern literary Lithuanian is based on the dialect of the Western Aukštaitians (Suvalkians).

Phonetics

Vowels

There are 12 vowels in the Lithuanian language. In addition to standard Latin letters, diacritics are used to mark long vowels (nosinė - the hook under the letters ą, ę, į, ų), left over from the time when these letters were pronounced nasally, like some vowels in modern Polish.

Uppercase

Lowercase

MFA

aː

ɛː

eː

iː

uː

Consonants

Lithuanian has 20 consonant marks of Latin origin, and the digraph “Ch” represents a velar fricative (IPA [x]); the pronunciation of other digraphs follows from their components.

Uppercase

Lowercase

MFA

Phonology

Consonants

		labial	dental	alveo- dental	alveolar	alveo- palatal	velar
explosive	deaf	p	t				k
explosive	voiced	b	d				g
fricatives	deaf	f		s		ʃ	x
fricatives	voiced			z		ʒ	ɣ
affricates	voiced			ʣ		ʤ
affricates	deaf			ʦ		ʧ
nasal		m	n
smooth	lateral				l
smooth	glide	ʋ					j
trembling					r

All consonants, except “j”, have two forms: palatalized (“soft”) and non-palatalized (“hard”).

Accent system

The Lithuanian language has most fully preserved the system of ancient Indo-European musical stress, therefore specific signs (˜, ́) are used for it.

Long Lithuanian vowels, elements of rising diphthongs, as well as r, l, m, n in diphthongoid combinations can be pronounced with a rising tone (marked by a tilde):

Ãã Ą̃ą̃ Ẽẽ Ę̃ę̃ Ė̃ė̃ Ĩĩ Į̃į̃ Ỹỹ Õõ Ũũ Ų̃ų̃ Ū̃ū̃ R̃r̃ L̃l̃ M̃m̃ Ññ

all long vowels, as well as elements of descending diphthongs, can also be pronounced with a descending tone (marked by an acute accent):

Áá Ą́ą́ Éé Ę́ę́ Ė́ė́ Íí Į́į́ Ýý Óó Úú Ų́ų́ Ū́ū́

the stress on short vowels is expiratory, marked by gravitational stress:

Àà (Èè) Ìì (Òò) Ùù, and the short stressed è is relatively rare, and the short o is atypical for Lithuanian vocabulary proper.

Accentology

One of the features of the Lithuanian language is accentuation. Few languages have this type of stress (for example, Spanish). If in other languages (for example, in English) the stress is individual and you just need to learn it for each word, or it is fixed on a certain syllable (for example, in Hungarian and Czech - on the first, in Polish - on the penultimate, and in French and Turkish - on the latter), then in Lithuanian there are rules indicating which syllable the stress falls on and the intonation of this syllable. In addition to the fact that the stress in the Lithuanian language is tonic, it has three syllabic intonations - one short and two long (descending and prolonged); so, in the words laukti and laukas there is a stressed diphthong au pronounced with different intonation. Almost the same stress system is present in Prussian and Sanskrit.

Grammar

Lithuanian is a language with a developed system of inflections, and is thus similar to Latin, especially in its fixation case endings and the use of adjectives or other nouns (which are placed in the genitive case) to describe nouns.

Two examples:

naujas vyrų ir moterų drabužių salonas= a new salon of men's and women's clothing, but verbatim: new men and women's clothing salon
nacionalinis dramos teatras= National Drama Theatre, however literally: national drama theatre.

Nouns with endings -as, -ias, -ys or -jas, belong to the first declension. With endings -a, -ia or -ė to the second declension. With endings -us or -ius- to the 4th declension. Happy ending -uo, as well as a few on -ė - to the fifth declension. The main difficulty here is represented by nouns in -is, since they can belong to the 1st or 3rd declension.

1st declension

Masculine

Case	Singular					Plural
Nominative	-as	-ias	-is	-ys	-jas	-ai	-iai	-iai	-iai	-jai
Genitive	-o	-io	-io	-io	-jo	-ų	-ių	-ių	-ių	-jų
Dative	-ui	-iui	-iui	-iui	-jui	-ams	-iams	-iams	-iams	-jams
Accusative	-ą	-ią	-į	-į	-ją	-us	-ius	-ius	-ius	-jus
Instrumental	-u	-iu	-iu	-iu	-ju	-ais	-iais	-iais	-iais	-jais
Local	-e	-yje	-yje	-yje	-juje	-uose	-iuose	-iuose	-iuose	-juose
Vocative	-e,-ai	-e	-i	-y	-jau	-ai	-iai	-iai	-iai	-jai

Examples:

vakaras(vakaro) - evening
tarnautojas(tarnautojo) - employee
butelis(butelio) - bottle

2nd declension

Feminine

Case	Singular			Plural
Nominative(Vardininkas Kas?)	-a	-ia	-ė	-os	-ios	-ės
Genitive(Kilmininkas Ko?)	-os	-ios	-ės	-ų	-ių	-ių
Dative (Naudininkas Kam?)	-ai	-iai	-ei	-oms	-ioms	-ėms
Accusative(Galininkas Ką?)	-ą	-ią	-ę	-as	-ias	-es
Creative(Įnagininkas Kuo?)	-a	-ia	-e	-omis	-iomis	-ėmis
Local(Vietininkas Kur?)	-oje	-ioje	-ėje	-ose	-iose	-ėse
Vocative(Šauksmininkas-o!)	-a	-ia	-e	-os	-ios	-ės

Examples:

daina(dainos) - song
giesmė(giesmės) - song

3rd declension

Feminine and some exceptions masculine

A small number of masculine nouns also belong to the 3rd declension: dantis(tooth), debesis(cloud), vagis(thief), žvėris(beast) and some others.
Most third declension nouns in them. case have stress on the last syllable, that is, at the end -is. Exceptions (emphasis based): iltis(fang), etis(a spear), kartis(pole), etc.

Examples:

akis(akies) - eye
ausis(ausies) - ear
dalis(dalies) - part

4th and 5th declensions

Mainly native Lithuanian (Baltic) words are declined according to the 4th and 5th declensions.

Singular

Name	-us (m.)	-ius (m.)	-uo (m.)	-uo/-ė (f.)	mėnuo
Rod.p.	-aus	-iaus	-(e)ns	-ers	-esio
Daten.p.	-ui	-iui	-(e)niui	-eriai	-esiui
Vin.p.	-ų	-ių	-(e)nį	-erį	-esį
Tv.p.	-umi	-iumi	-(e)niu	-eria	-esiu
Local location	-uje	-iuje	-(e)nyje	-eryje	-esyje
Sv.p.	-au	-iau	-(e)nie	-erie	-esi

Plural

Name	-ūs (m.)	-iai (m.)	-(e)nys (m.)	-erys (f.)	mėnesiai
Rod.p.	-ų	-ių	-(e)nų	-erų	-esių
Daten.p.	-ums	-iams	-(e)nims	-erims	-esiams
Vin.p.	-us	-ius	-(e)nis	-eris	-esius
Tv.p.	-umis	-iais	-(e)nimis	-erimis	-esiais
Local location	-uose	-iuose	-(e)nyse	-eryse	-esiuose
Sv.p.	-ūs	-iai	-(e)nys	-erys	-esiai

Examples:
4th declension:

alus(alaus) - beer
sunus(sūnaus) - son

5th declension:

vanduo(vandens) - water
akmuo(akmens) - stone
šuo(šuns) - dog
sesuo(sesers) - sister
duktė(dukters) - daughter
mėnuo(mėnesio) - month

Verbs and personal pronouns

To conjugate Lithuanian verbs, you need to know what type of conjugation the verb belongs to. This can be determined by the endings of the 3rd person (singular or plural - it doesn’t matter if they coincide in the Literary language). Based on these endings, three conjugations are distinguished in the present tense and two in the past. Present tense: 1 conjugation: -a or -ia, 2nd conjugation: -i, 3 conjugation: -o; past tense (single): 1 conjugation -o, 2 conjugation -ė . For reflexive verbs it is added at the end -si. In the infinitive form, verbs end in -ti, reflexive verbs in -tis. If the verb has a prefix or negative particle ne-(which is always written together), then the reflexive particle -si (-s) is moved forward and placed between the prefix and the stem of the verb.

Present time, 1 conjugation:

Present time, 2nd (-i) and 3rd (-o) conjugation:

Past tense, 1st (-o/-jo) and 2nd (-ė) conjugations

	-o	-osi (return)	-jo	-josi (return)	-ė	-ėsi (rev.)
1 l. units	-au	-ausi	-jau	-jausi	-iau	-iausi
2 l. units	-ai	-aisi	-jai	-jaisi	-ei	-eisi
3 l. units	-o	-osi	-jo	-josi	-ė	-ėsi


1 l. plural	-ome	-omės	-jome	-jomės	-ėmė	-ėmės
2 l. plural	-ote	-otės	-jote	-jotės	-ėtė	-ėtės
3 l. plural	-o	-osi	-jo	-josi	-ė	-ėsi

In multiple past and future tenses there are no types of conjugations; all regular verbs are conjugated the same way:

	multiple past	multiple past (return)	Future	Future (return)
1 l. units	-davau	-davausi	-siu	-siuos
2 l. units	-davai	-davaisi	-si	-sies
3 l. units	-davo	-davosi	-s	-sis


1 l. plural	-davome	-davomės	-sime	-simės
2 l. plural	-davote	-davotės	-site	-sites
3 l. plural	-davo	-davosi	-s	-sis

Verb conjugations būti(be):

ašesu- I am (am)
tu esi- you are (are)
jis/ji yra (esti)- he/she is (is)
mes esame- we are (are)
jūs esate- you are (are)
jie/jos yra (esti)- they are (are)

(Old Church Slavonic forms of the verb “to be”, not used in modern Russian, are used here as Russian analogues)

Verb conjugations turėti(to have, also used in the sense of “to have”):

aš turiu- I have
tu turi- do you have
jis/ji turi- he/she has
mes turime- we have
jūs turite- you have
jie/jos turi- they have

In Russian, “I have”, “you have”, etc. are used less frequently, and more often as part of phrases, for example: “You have the right”, “I have the right to evict you”, “you have the opportunity”.

For polite address, the 2nd person plural form is used. numbers: Jūs(i.e. "you"). The pronoun is written with capital letter. The respectful form of the pronoun “you” has also been preserved - tam(i)sta, although in modern language it is used less often.

Declension of personal pronouns

Units	1 l.	2 l.	3 l. (m.)	3 l. (and.)
Name	aš	tu	jis	ji
Rod.p.	manęs	tavęs	jo	jos
Daten.p.	man	tau	jam	jai
Vin.p.	mane	tave	jį	ją
Tv.p.	manimi	tavimi	juo	ja
Local location	manyje	tavyje	jame	joje

Pl.	1 l.	2 l.	3 l. (m.)	3 l. (and.)
Name	mes	jūs	jie	jos
Rod.p.	mūsų	jūsų	jų	jų
Daten.p.	mums	jums	jiems	joms
Vin.p.	mus	jus	juos	jas
Tv.p.	mumis	jumis	jais	jomis
Local location	mumyse	jumyse	juose	jose

Demonstrative pronouns

Degrees of demonstrative pronouns

Demonstrative pronouns in Lithuanian have three degrees. 1. When talking about something located near the speaker (šitas, šis, šita, ši, šitai, šit) 2. When speaking about something located not near the speaker, but near the listener (tas, ta, tai, tat ) 3. When talking about an object that is distant from both (anas, ana).

1. Masculine

šitas this one (here)
tas this (there)
anas That
kitas another

2. Feminine

šita this one (here)
ta this (there)
ana that
kita other

3. šis this, ši this
4. Unchangeable pronouns

tai This
šitai(this
Tai... This …

Declension of demonstrative pronouns

	1.	2.	šis	ši
Rod.p.	-o	-os	-io	-ios
Daten.p.	-am	-ai	-iam	-iai
Vin.p.	-ą	-ą	-į	-ią
Tv.p.	-uo	-a	-iuo	-ia
Local location	-ame	-oje	-iame	-ioje

Adjectives and adverbs

Adjectives

Adjectives in Lithuanian are placed before nouns and agree with them in gender, number and case. Masculine adjectives have endings -as, -ias, -us or -is; feminine adjectives - -a, -ia, -i, -ė . To obtain comparative and superlative degrees, the suffix resp. is inserted between the stem and the ending. -esn- or -(i)aus-.

	Neutral	Comp.	Excellent
m.	-(i)as / -us	-esnis	-iausias
and.	-(i)a / -i	-esnė	-iausia


m.	-i/-ūs	-esni	-iausi
and.	-(i)os	-esnes	-iausios

Declension of adjectives:

1 cl. units h.:

Them. P.	-as (m.)	-is (m.)	-a (f.)
Genus. P.	-o	-io	-os
Dat. P.	-am	-iam	-ai
Vin. P.	-ą	-į	-ą
TV P.	-u	-iu	-a
Location P.	-ame	-iame	-oje

1 cl. pl. h.:

Them. P.	-i	-i	-os
Genus. P.	-ų	-ių	-ų
Dat. P.	-iems	-iems	-oms
Vin. P.	-us	-ius	-as
TV P.	-ais	-iais	-omis
Location P.	-uose	-iuose	-ose

From adjectives ending -is Only the adjective is inflected in the first declension didelis(big) and adjectives in comparative degree on -esnis; other adjectives with endings -is conjugated according to the third declension.

2 cl. pl. h.:

3 cl. pl. h.:

Them. P.	-iai	-ės
Genus. P.	-ių	-ių
Dat. P.	-iems	-ėms
Vin. P.	-ius	-es
TV P.	-iais	-ėmis
Location P.	-iuose	-ėse

Pronominal forms

One of characteristic features Lithuanian language - the presence of the so-called. pronominal forms, which are most often used with adjectives (but pronouns can also have them). Pronominal forms do not exist in most Western European languages (formally preserved in Russian as “full adjectives”, here they have lost their original meaning). Pronominal forms are used to distinguish an object with its properties from many similar ones. The formation of pronominal forms occurs by adding a pronominal postfix to adjectives, and goes back to the connection full form adjective with pronoun jis And ji("he and she"). A postfix may consist of several syllables (eg. -iesiems, -uosiuose, -osiomis).

Adverbs

Adverbs can be formed from adjectives. For this purpose, the endings of masculine adjectives are changed as follows:

from -as - -ai
from -us - -iai

To form the comparative degree of an adverb, an ending is added to the base. -iau, for excellent education - -iausiai.

Degrees

Adjectives and adverbs in Lithuanian, as in most languages, vary in degrees. Degrees from three to five: three basic (positive, comparative, superlative) and two intermediate.

Numerals

Numeral agreement

1 = Im.p. units
2-9 = Im.p. plural
10 or more, as well as an indefinite number = Rod.p. plural
21 (that is, twenty and 1!) again Im.p. units etc.

Examples: 1 vyras= 1 man, 2 vyrai= 2 men, 10 vyrų= 10 men, keletas vyrų= several men. Also worth noting: when ordering beer: "vieną alaus", Where "vieną"= “one/one” (accusative), "alaus"= “beer” (i.e. genitive), the word “glass”/“mug” is implied between these words (i.e.: “one mug of beer”). Likewise "du alaus"= “two beers”, etc.

Declension of numerals

1 ... vienas (m.) / viena (f.) (inflected as an adjective)
2…du/dvi (Nom./Acc.)

dviejų (Gen.)
dviem (Dat./Instr.)
dviejuose / dviejose (Loc.)

3...trys (Nom.)

trijo (Gen.)
trims (Dat.)
tris (Acc.)
trimis (Instr.)
trijuose / trijose (Loc.)

4 … keturi / keturios (Nom.)

keturių (Gen.)
keturiems / keturioms (Dat.)
keturis/keturias (Acc.)
keturiais/keturiomis (Instr.)
keturiuose / keturiose (Lok.)

5 ... penki /penkios (inflected as keturi / keturios)
6 … šeši / šešios (declined as keturi / keturios)
7 ... septyni / septynios (declined as keturi / keturios)
8 … aštuoni / aštuonios (declined as keturi / keturios)
9 ... devyni / devynios (declined as keturi / keturios)
10 … dešimt (does not bow)
11 ... vienuolika (declined as a 2nd declension noun with ending -a; but in Acc. -a)
12 ... dvylika (leans like vienuolika)
13 ... trylika (leans like vienuolika)
14-19 (number in symbols plus -olika) ... keturiolika - devyniolika (declined as vienuolika)
20 ... dvidešimt (does not bow)
21-29 … dvidešimt vienas / dvidešimt viena - dvidešimt devyni / dvidešimt devynios (numbers 1-9 decline, dvidešimt remains unchanged)
30 … trisdešimt (does not bow)
40 … keturiasdešimt (does not bow)
50 … penkiasdešimt (does not bow)
60 … šešiasdešimt (does not bow)
70 ... septyniasdešimt (does not bow)
80 … aštuoniasdešimt (does not bow)
90 ... devyniasdešimt (does not bow)
100 … šimtas (declined as a 1st declension noun with ending -as)
101 … šimtas vienas / šimtas viena (declined as vienas / viena, šimtas remains unchanged)
111 … šimtas vienuolika (declined as vienuolika, šimtas remains unchanged)
155 … šimtas penkiasdešimt penki / šimtas penkiasdešimt penkios (declined as penki / penkios, šimtas and penkiasdešimt remain unchanged)
200-900 … du šimtai - devyni šimtai (declined as a plural noun, du - devyni remains unchanged)
1000 … tūkstantis (declined as a 1st declension noun with -is)
2000 - 9000 … du tūkstančiai - devyni tūkstančiai (declined as a noun of 1st declension in the plural, du - devyni remain unchanged)
1000000 … milijonas (declined as a 1st declension noun with -as)

Vocabulary

The basic vocabulary of the Lithuanian language contains a small number of borrowings. There are old borrowings ( senieji skoliniai) from the languages of neighboring regions. Among them: stiklas from

It’s been two months since I started learning Lithuanian. To be honest, it turned out to be more difficult than I expected. None of the languages I know help here. Lithuanian is one of the most archaic languages in the world; perhaps the closest to it in grammar is Russian. But Russian doesn’t always save you either) The worst thing about Lithuanian is the cases, there are no CASES. :)

A little about history:
The Lithuanian language has largely preserved the original phonetics and morphological features of the prototypical Indo-European language and is thus of interest for linguistic research. There is an opinion that among modern languages Lithuanian is the closest to Proto-Indo-European (the speech of a Lithuanian peasant, perhaps the closest resemblance to the speech of hypothetical Proto-Indo-Europeans). Some facts indicate that the group of Baltic languages existed separately from other Indo-European languages already from the 10th century BC. e. Despite the fact that many archaic properties of the Lithuanian language are obvious, the path of development of the Baltic languages from Proto-Indo-European remains unclear.
The Eastern Baltic languages split from the Western Baltic languages (or, apparently, from a hypothetical Proto-Baltic language) between the 400s and 600s. The differentiation between the Lithuanian and Latvian languages began in the 800s, however, they remained dialects of the same language for a long time. Intermediate dialects existed at least until the 14th - 15th centuries, and, apparently, until the 17th century. The occupation of the Livonian Order in the 13th and 13th centuries also had a significant impact on the independent development of languages. XIV centuries basin of the Daugava River (almost coinciding with the territory of modern Latvia).
The earliest written monument of the Lithuanian language dates back to 1545 and is a prayer written by hand on the last page of the book “Tractatus sacerdotalis” published in Strasbourg. The text adheres to the Dzukian dialect and is apparently copied from an earlier original. There is no doubt that Lithuanian church texts existed earlier, perhaps even at the end of the 14th century, because Christianity, introduced in 1387 in Aukštaitija, certainly required such texts for religious practice (historical sources mention that the first church texts into Lithuanian were translated by Jogaila himself ).
Printing began in 1547 with the catechism of Martynas Mažvydas, written in the Samogitian dialect and published in Karaliaučius (Kaliningrad). The book contains the first Lithuanian textbook - “Easy and Quick Science of Reading and Writing”, in which the author gives the alphabet and several grammatical terms he invented. The literacy level of Lithuanians throughout the 18th century was low, so books did not become publicly available, and yet the development of the literary Lithuanian language began with the publication of the first book.

In 1620, the first textbook of the Lithuanian language appeared, which subsequently went through five editions - “Dictionarium trium linguarum” by Konstantinas Sirvydas. In 1653, a grammar textbook, “Grammatica Litvanica” by Danielius Kleinas, was published. This is how it begins in the 17th century Scientific research Lithuanian language, which became especially intensive with the advent of comparative linguistics in the 19th century.
In 1864, after the January uprising, Mikhail Muravyov, the Governor-General of Lithuania, introduced a ban on the use of the Latin alphabet and printed texts in the Lithuanian language. Lithuanian books continued to be published abroad, in East Prussia and the United States of America. Books imported into the country, despite harsh court sentences, helped to grow national feeling, which in 1904 led to the lifting of the ban.

He's the only one.
It’s difficult to say what is the most difficult thing about Lithuanian, because almost everything is difficult. In addition to cases, there is also a completely incomprehensible accent. I singled out one rule for myself, and after talking with other representatives of the Russian-speaking community, I became convinced that it was correct, because the guys think the same. So, about accents: if it seems to you that the stress should be in one place, 100% it will be in another :) One of the “wonderful” features of the Lithuanian language is accentuation. Few languages have this type of stress. If in other languages (for example, in English) the stress is individual and you just need to learn it for each word, or it is fixed on a certain syllable (for example, in French), then in Lithuanian there is a whole system of rules indicating which syllable the stress falls on and the intonation of this syllable. The Lithuanian language has two syllabic intonations - rising and falling; so in words laukti And laukas the stressed diphthong is pronounced with different intonation. Essentially the same stress system is present in Latin, Prussian and Sanskrit. The Latvian language lost this system due to Finnish influence, and the emphasis in it shifted to the first syllable. Lithuanian is a language with a developed system of inflections, and is thus similar to Latin, especially in its fixation of case endings and the use of adjectives or other nouns (which are placed in the genitive case) to describe nouns.
Two examples:

naujas vyrų ir moterų drabužių salonas= new salon of men's and women's clothing, however literally: new men's and women's clothing salon

nacionalinis dramos teatras= National Drama Theatre, however literally: national drama theatre.

About cases
This is my pain. There are seven cases in Lithuanian. And despite the name, they don’t look anything like Russian cases, because the questions don’t match! Look here:
Lithuanian names of cases (the question to which each of them answers is indicated in brackets):

Vardininkas(Kas?) (nominative)

Kilmininkas(Ko?) (Genitive)

Naudininkas(Kam?) (Dative)

Galininkas(Ką?) (Accusative)

Įnagininkas(Kuo?) (Instrumental (creative))

Vietininkas(Kur?) (Local)

Sauksmininkas(Vocative)

About declinations
There are 5 declensions in the Lithuanian language. Nouns with endings-as, -ias, -ys or -jas, belong to the first declension. With endings-a, -ia or -ė to the second declension. With endings-us or -ius- to the 4th declension. Happy ending-uo, as well as a few on-ė - to the fifth declension. The main difficulty here is represented by nouns in-is, since they can belong to the 1st or 3rd declension. Of course, they all lean differently, who would doubt it!

Verbs
This is the second pain, but here at least you can find some logic. So, there are several conjugations. To understand which conjugation a verb belongs to, you do not need to know the indefinite form, but you need to know the third person singular or plural. That is, the form “do” will not bring you any knowledge, but “does” very well. As I wrote above, fortunately, there are not many times. As always, there is something good, here it is the rule “in multiple past and future tenses there are no types of conjugations, all regular verbs are conjugated the same way.” That is, no exceptions, uff.
My favorite is the conjugation of the verb (to be):

ašesu- I am)

tu esi- you (you)

jis/ji yra- he/she exists

mes esame- we (we)

jūs esate- you (are)

jie/jos yra- they (the essence)

So the Lithuanian language is amazing, complex and incredibly interesting. It seemed to be preserved with love by its bearers and almost avoided borrowing. There are old loanwords from the languages of neighboring regions, among them: "stiklas" from Russian "glass", "muilas" from Russian "soap", "gatvė" from Slavic "gatvo", paved road, "spinta", from German "der Spind" ". There are also international words of Latin and Greek origin “ciklas”, “schema”, etc.). After Lithuania gained independence in 1991, the influence of the English language increased (“young” Anglicisms: “dispenseris”, “hakeris”, “singlas”, etc.). Currently, there is controversy surrounding the increasing amount of borrowing.

In general, I’m just immersing myself in this interesting world of a new language, but if you have any questions, I promise to answer. :)
Geros dienos!