Grand Duchy of Lithuania - Languages

Languages

In the 13th century, the center of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, was inhabited by a majority which spoke Lithuanian, but it was not a written language till 16th century. In the other parts of the duchy, the majority of the population, including Ruthenian nobles and normal people used both spoken and written Ruthenian languages. Nobles who migrated from one place to another would adapt to a new locality and adopt the local religion and culture and those Lithuanian noble families which moved to Slavic areas, often took up the local culture quickly over subsequent generations. Ruthenians were native to the east-central and south-eastern parts of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.

The Ruthenian language, also called Chancery Slavonic in its written form, was used to write laws alongside Lithuanian, Latin and German, but use varied between regions. From the time of Vytautas, there are fewer remaining documents written in Ruthenian than there are in Latin and German, but later Ruthenian became the main language of documentation and writings, especially in eastern and southern parts of the Duchy. In the 16th century at the time of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, Lithuanian lands became increasingly polonized over time and started to use the Polish language instead of the Lithuanian and Ruthenian languages and Polish officially became the chancellery language of the Lithuanian-Polish Commonwealth in 1697.

The voivodeships with the predominant ethnic Lithuanian population, Vilnius, Trakai and Samogitian voivodeships, remained almost wholly Lithuanian speaking, both colloquially and by ruling nobility. In the extreme southern parts of Trakai voivodeship, and south-eastern parts of Vilnius voivodeship Ruthenian communities were also present. In addition to Lithuanians and Ruthenians, other important ethnic groups on throughout the Grand Duchy of Lithuania were Jews and Tatars. Vilnius city population and its surroundings were multi-ethnic, among languages spoken here, there were Lithuanian, Polish, Belarusian, Yiddish, German also Tatar, Karaim etc.