History of Lithuanian Culture - Pre-Lithuanian Period (before The 10th Century AD)

Pre-Lithuanian Period (before The 10th Century AD)

The Lithuanian nation rose between the 7th and 9th centuries CE. Earlier, the Balts, ancestors of Lithuanians and Latvians, had arrived at the territories between the Dnepr and Daugava rivers and the Baltic Sea. An Indo-European people, the Balts are presumed to have come from a hypothetic original homeland of the Proto-Indo-Europeans; many scientists date this arrival to 3rd millennium BCE.

The Balts, who are believed to have arrived with the main wave of Indo-Europeans, were unconnected with the formation of later Indo-European nations in Southern and Western Europe. Thus, the Balts' culture is believed to have preserved primeval features of Indo-European culture for a longer time. When later contacts with newly-formed European nations increased, differences between the Balts' primeval culture and the culture of the new European nations were so great that closer cultural interchange was difficult. This resulted in preservation of the Balts' Indo-European roots but may also have contributed to their isolation.

After the period of Gothic domination in Europe, the culture of the Balts appeared in a more restricted territory between the Wisla and Daugava rivers. Almost anything said about the Balts' cultural isolation level in these times is speculation, but it was likely decreasing. Still, the Balts conserved forms of ancient Indo-European proto-language until much later times. The most archaic language forms were preserved by the Western Balts, who lived approximately in the territory of later Prussia (today's Kaliningrad and north-west Poland). These dialects developed into Old Prussian language, which became extinct by the beginning of the 18th century.

The Eastern Balts had less archaic forms of language. For example, some popular simplifications took hold, such as a decrease in the number of verb forms, which presumably happened when the ancient cultural elite lost its influence over the people. It may have taken place, for example, in times of "barbarian" invasions (not later than the 8th century). Later, eastern dialects of Balts developed into the modern Lithuanian and Latvian languages.

Knowledge about the Balts' cultural life in these times is scanty. It is known that Balts at the end of this period had a social structure comparable with that of Celtic people in South-West Europe during the 2nd—1st centuries BC.

In the 10th century, religious life of the Balts was not unified, with various forms of cults present. An important feature of Balt culture was willful avoidance of using material attainments in their religious life. Some more complicated forms of architecture, equipment, and literacy were disapproved of, even when these things were allowed by and were well-known from neighbouring nations. Religious life was concentrated on verbal tradition, with singing and perhaps with some elements of mystery theatre. Material forms of this life were closely connected with unsophisticated wooden shrines, nature objects ( such as trees and stones), and special ornamented vestments and their accessories.