Culture
The first book in Lithuanian, prepared by Martynas Mažvydas, was printed in Königsberg in 1547, while the first Lithuanian grammar, Daniel Klein's Grammatica Litvanica, was printed there in 1653.
Lithuania Minor was the home of Kristijonas Donelaitis, pastor and poet and author of The Seasons, which mark the beginning of Lithuanian literature. The Seasons gave vivid depiction of the everyday life of Prussian Lithuanian country.
Lithuania Minor was an important center for Lithuanian culture, which was persecuted in Russian Empire occupied Lithuania proper. That territory had been slowly Polonized when being part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and was heavily Russificied while part of the Russian Empire, especially in the second half of the 19th century. During the ban on Lithuanian printing in Russia from 1864 until 1904, Lithuanian books were printed in East Prussian towns such as Tilsit, Ragnit, Memel, and Königsberg, and smuggled to Russia by knygnešiai. The first Lithuanian language periodicals appeared during the period in Lithuania Minor, such as Auszra, edited by Jonas Basanavičius, succeeded by Varpas by Vincas Kudirka. They had contributed greatly to the Lithuanian national revival of the 19th century.
Read more about this topic: Lithuania Minor
Famous quotes containing the word culture:
“As the end of the century approaches, all our culture is like the culture of flies at the beginning of winter. Having lost their agility, dreamy and demented, they turn slowly about the window in the first icy mists of morning. They give themselves a last wash and brush-up, their ocellated eyes roll, and they fall down the curtains.”
—Jean Baudrillard (b. 1929)
“When women finally get liberated, they’ll do the same that men do—dog eat dog— that’s what our culture is.... Not cooperation but assassination. Women will cooperate until they attain certain goals. Then one will begin to destroy the other.”
—Alice Neel (1900–1984)
“Everyone in our culture wants to win a prize. Perhaps that is the grand lesson we have taken with us from kindergarten in the age of perversions of Dewey-style education: everyone gets a ribbon, and praise becomes a meaningless narcotic to soothe egoistic distemper.”
—Gerald Early (b. 1952)