Lithuanization

Lithuanization (or Lithuanianization) is a process of cultural assimilation, where Lithuanian culture or its language is voluntarily or forcibly adopted. The Lithuanian annexation of Ruthenian lands between the 13th and 15th centuries was accompanied by some Lithuanization. A large part of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania remained Ruthenian; due to religious, linguistic and cultural dissimilarity, there was less assimilation between the ruling nobility of the pagan Lithuanians and the conquered Orthodox East Slavs. After the military and diplomatic expansion of the duchy into Ruthenian (Kievan Rus') lands, local leaders retained autonomy which limited the amalgamation of cultures. When some localities received appointed Gediminids (rulers), the Lithuanian nobility in Ruthenia largely embraced Slavic customs and Orthodox Christianity and became indistinguishable from Ruthenian nobility. The cultures merged; many upper-class Ruthenians merged with the Lithuanian nobility and began to call themselves Lithuanians (Litvins) gente Rutenus natione Lituanus, but still spoke Ruthenian. The Lithuanian nobility became largely Ruthenian, and the nobility of ethnic Lithuania and Samogitia continued to use their native Lithuanian. It adapted Old Church Slavonic and (later) Ruthenian, and acquired main-chancery-language status in local matters and relations with other Orthodox principalities as a lingua franca; Latin was used in relations with Western Europe. It was gradually reversed by the Polonization of Lithuania beginning in the 15th century and the 19th- and early-20th-century Russification of the former Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. A notable example of Lithuanization was the 19th-century replacement of Jews (many Lithuanian Jews, but also Polish Jews), until then the largest ethnic group in Lithuania's major towns, with ethnic Lithuanians migrating from the countryside. Lithuanization was primarily demographic, rather than institutionalized. When Lithuania became an independent state after World War I, its government institutionalized Lithuanization.