Dūkštos is a village in

Vilnius District Municipality Vilnius District Municipality ( lt, Vilniaus rajono savivaldybė) is one of 60 municipalities in Lithuania. It surrounds the capital city of Vilnius on 3 sides, while the rest borders the Trakai District Municipality. At the 2011 Census, Poles in ...

Lithuania Lithuania (; lt, Lietuva ), officially the Republic of Lithuania ( lt, Lietuvos Respublika, links=no ), is a country in the Baltic region of Europe. It is one of three Baltic states and lies on the eastern shore of the Baltic Sea. Lithuania ...

. According to the 2011 census, the village had a population of 311 people, up from 164 in 1979.

History

Dūkštos village was mentioned for the first time in 1365 when the

Teutonic Order The Order of Brothers of the German House of Saint Mary in Jerusalem, commonly known as the Teutonic Order, is a Catholic religious institution founded as a military society in Acre, Kingdom of Jerusalem. It was formed to aid Christians on ...

attacked nearby

Kernavė Kernavė was a medieval capital of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and today is a tourist attraction and an archeological site (population 272, 2011). It is located in the Širvintos district municipality located in southeast Lithuania. A Lithuanian ...

and local inhabitants evacuated to Dūkštos. In 1647, a church was built, sponsored by a Lithuanian noblewoman Dorota Giedraitytė-Daubarienė. This church was transferred to the

Piarists The Piarists (), officially named the Order of Poor Clerics Regular of the Mother of God of the Pious Schools ( la, Ordo Clericorum Regularium pauperum Matris Dei Scholarum Piarum), abbreviated SchP, is a religious order of clerics regular of the ...

in 1750. From 1777 to 1939, Dūkštos was known as Piarists' Dūkštos as the village was a center of the Piarists, who established a monastery and a school there. Dūkštos was popular with the Lithuanian Piarists as a resort in the 18th century. Piarists together with the

Jesuits The Society of Jesus ( la, Societas Iesu; abbreviation: SJ), also known as the Jesuits (; la, Iesuitæ), is a religious order (Catholic), religious order of clerics regular of pontifical right for men in the Catholic Church headquartered in Rom ...

were active in the education field, establishing schools and academies. After the closure of other Piarist churches, monasteries, and educational establishments in Lithuania by the authorities of the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War. ...

, the last Piarist

provincial Provincial may refer to: Government & Administration * Provincial capitals, an administrative sub-national capital of a country * Provincial city (disambiguation) * Provincial minister (disambiguation) * Provincial Secretary, a position in Can ...

and

rector Rector (Latin for the member of a vessel's crew who steers) may refer to: Style or title *Rector (ecclesiastical), a cleric who functions as an administrative leader in some Christian denominations *Rector (academia), a senior official in an edu ...

moved to Dūkštos. The new

Romanticism Romanticism (also known as the Romantic movement or Romantic era) was an artistic, literary, musical, and intellectual movement that originated in Europe towards the end of the 18th century, and in most areas was at its peak in the approximate ...

style Dūkštos stone church designed by Tomasz Tyszecki and Friedrich Gustav von Schacht was built in 1850–1856. Among sponsors of these construction works was the famous composer

Stanisław Moniuszko Stanisław Moniuszko (; May 5, 1819 – June 4, 1872) was a Polish composer, conductor and teacher. He wrote many popular art songs and operas, and his music is filled with patriotic folk themes of the peoples of the former Polish–Lithuania ...

. A painting, that once belonged to

Adam Mickiewicz Adam Bernard Mickiewicz (; 24 December 179826 November 1855) was a Polish poet, dramatist, essayist, publicist, translator and political activist. He is regarded as national poet in Poland, Lithuania and Belarus. A principal figure in Polish Ro ...

, was brought from

Paris Paris () is the capital and most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

and donated to the church. A number of prominent 18th–19th-century Lithuanian Piarists and professors of

Vilnius University Vilnius University ( lt, Vilniaus universitetas) is a public research university, oldest in the Baltic states and in Northern Europe outside the United Kingdom (or 6th overall following foundations of Oxford, Cambridge, St. Andrews, Glasgow and ...

were buried in the cemetery by the church.

References

Vilnius District Municipality {{Vilnius-geo-stub