Lithuanian ( ) is an Eastern Baltic language belonging to the Baltic branch of the

Indo-European language family The Indo-European languages are a language family native to the overwhelming majority of Europe, the Iranian plateau, and the northern Indian subcontinent. Some European languages of this family, English, French, Portuguese, Russian, Dutch ...

. It is the

official language An official language is a language given supreme status in a particular country, state, or other jurisdiction. Typically the term "official language" does not refer to the language used by a people or country, but by its government (e.g. judiciary, ...

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 ...

and one of the official languages of the

European Union The European Union (EU) is a supranational political and economic union of member states that are located primarily in Europe. The union has a total area of and an estimated total population of about 447million. The EU has often been des ...

. There are about 2.8 million native Lithuanian speakers in Lithuania and about 200,000 speakers elsewhere. Lithuanian is closely related to the neighbouring

Latvian language Latvian ( ), also known as Lettish, is an Eastern Baltic language belonging to the Baltic branch of the Indo-European language family, spoken in the Baltic region. It is the language of Latvians and the official language of Latvia as well as ...

. It is written in a

Latin script The Latin script, also known as Roman script, is an alphabetic writing system based on the letters of the classical Latin alphabet, derived from a form of the Greek alphabet which was in use in the ancient Greek city of Cumae, in southern Italy ...

. It is said to be the most conservative of the existing

Indo-European language The Indo-European languages are a language family native to the overwhelming majority of Europe, the Iranian plateau, and the northern Indian subcontinent. Some European languages of this family, English, French, Portuguese, Russian, Dutch ...

s, retaining features of the

Proto-Indo-European language Proto-Indo-European (PIE) is the reconstructed common ancestor of the Indo-European language family. Its proposed features have been derived by linguistic reconstruction from documented Indo-European languages. No direct record of Proto-Indo-E ...

that had disappeared through development from other

descendant language In historical linguistics, a daughter language, also known as descendant language, is a language descended from another language, its mother language, through a process of genetic descent. If more than one language has developed from the same pro ...

History

Oldest surviving writing in Lithuanian language

Lithuanian language in European language map 1741

Among

Indo-European languages The Indo-European languages are a language family native to the overwhelming majority of Europe, the Iranian plateau, and the northern Indian subcontinent. Some European languages of this family, English, French, Portuguese, Russian, Dutc ...

, Lithuanian is conservative in some aspects of its grammar and phonology, retaining archaic features otherwise found only in ancient languages such as

Sanskrit Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had diffused there from the northwest in the late ...

(particularly its early form,

Vedic Sanskrit Vedic Sanskrit was an ancient language of the Indo-Aryan subgroup of the Indo-European language family. It is attested in the Vedas and related literature compiled over the period of the mid- 2nd to mid-1st millennium BCE. It was orally preser ...

) or

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Dark Ages (), the Archaic peri ...

. For this reason, it is an important source for the reconstruction of the

despite its late attestation (with the earliest texts dating only to c. 1500). Lithuanian was studied by linguists such as Franz Bopp, August Schleicher,

Adalbert Bezzenberger Adalbert Bezzenberger (14 April 1851 – 31 October 1922) was a German philologist. He was born at Kassel and died at Königsberg. He is considered to be the founder of Baltic philology.Louis Hjelmslev,

Ferdinand de Saussure Ferdinand de Saussure (; ; 26 November 1857 – 22 February 1913) was a Swiss linguist, semiotician and philosopher. His ideas laid a foundation for many significant developments in both linguistics and semiotics in the 20th century. He is widel ...

Winfred P. Lehmann Winfred Philip Lehmann (June 23, 1916August 1, 2007) was an American linguist who specialized in historical, Germanic, and Indo-European linguistics. He was for many years a professor and head of departments for linguistics at the University of ...

and

Vladimir Toporov Vladimir Nikolayevich Toporov (russian: Влади́мир Никола́евич Топоро́в; 5 July 1928 in Moscow5 December 2005 in Moscow) was a leading Russian philologist associated with the Tartu-Moscow semiotic school. His wife was ...

and others. The Proto-Balto-Slavic language branched off directly from Proto-Indo-European, then sub-branched into Proto-Baltic and Proto-Slavic. Proto-Baltic branched off into Proto-West Baltic and Proto-East Baltic. Baltic languages passed through a Proto-Balto-Slavic stage, from which Baltic languages retain numerous exclusive and non-exclusive lexical, morphological, phonological and accentual isoglosses in common with the

Slavic languages The Slavic languages, also known as the Slavonic languages, are Indo-European languages spoken primarily by the Slavic peoples and their descendants. They are thought to descend from a proto-language called Proto-Slavic, spoken during the Ear ...

, which represent their closest living Indo-European relatives. Moreover, with Lithuanian being so archaic in phonology, Slavic words can often be deduced from Lithuanian by regular

sound law A sound change, in historical linguistics, is a change in the pronunciation of a language. A sound change can involve the replacement of one speech sound (or, more generally, one phonetic feature value) by a different one (called phonetic chang ...

s; for example, Lith. ''

vilkas Vilkas is a Lithuanian language family name. The word means "wolf" in Lithuanian. The surname may refer to: *Eduardas Vilkas (1935-2008), Lithuanian economist and politician * Pranas Vilkas (born 1936), Lithuanian politician *Tuula Vilkas ...

'' and

Polish Polish may refer to: * Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe * Polish language * Poles, people from Poland or of Polish descent * Polish chicken *Polish brothers (Mark Polish and Michael Polish, born 1970), American twin screenwr ...

wilk Wilk is a surname of English and Polish-language origin. In Poland, the surname means wolf and is pronounced . It has 35,000 bearers in Poland and ranks about 60th on the list of the most popular Polish surnames (fifth in Podkarpackie Voivodeship ...

← PBSl. *wilkás (cf. PSl. *vьlkъ) ←

PIE A pie is a baked dish which is usually made of a pastry dough casing that contains a filling of various sweet or savoury ingredients. Sweet pies may be filled with fruit (as in an apple pie), nuts ( pecan pie), brown sugar ( sugar pie), swe ...

*wĺ̥kʷos, all meaning "

wolf The wolf (''Canis lupus''; : wolves), also known as the gray wolf or grey wolf, is a large canine native to Eurasia and North America. More than thirty subspecies of ''Canis lupus'' have been recognized, and gray wolves, as popularly u ...

". According to some glottochronological speculations, the Eastern Baltic languages split from the Western Baltic ones between AD 400 and 600. The Greek geographer

Ptolemy Claudius Ptolemy (; grc-gre, Πτολεμαῖος, ; la, Claudius Ptolemaeus; AD) was a mathematician, astronomer, astrologer, geographer, and music theorist, who wrote about a dozen scientific treatises, three of which were of importanc ...

had already written of two Baltic tribe/nations by name, the Galindai and Sudinoi (Γαλίνδαι, Σουδινοί) in the 2nd century AD. The differentiation between Lithuanian and Latvian started after 800; for a long period, they could be considered dialects of a single language. At a minimum, transitional dialects existed until the 14th or 15th century and perhaps as late as the 17th century. Also, the 13th and 14th century occupation of the western part of the Daugava basin (closely coinciding with the territory of modern

Latvia Latvia ( or ; lv, Latvija ; ltg, Latveja; liv, Leţmō), officially the Republic of Latvia ( lv, Latvijas Republika, links=no, ltg, Latvejas Republika, links=no, liv, Leţmō Vabāmō, links=no), is a country in the Baltic region of ...

) by the

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) **Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ger ...

Sword Brethren had a significant influence on the language's independent development. The earliest surviving written Lithuanian text is a translation dating from about 1503–1525 of the

Lord's Prayer The Lord's Prayer, also called the Our Father or Pater Noster, is a central Christian prayer which Jesus taught as the way to pray. Two versions of this prayer are recorded in the gospels: a longer form within the Sermon on the Mount in the Gosp ...

, the

Hail Mary The Hail Mary ( la, Ave Maria) is a traditional Christian prayer addressing Mary, the mother of Jesus. The prayer is based on two biblical passages featured in the Gospel of Luke: the Angel Gabriel's visit to Mary (the Annunciation) and Mary's ...

, and the

Nicene Creed The original Nicene Creed (; grc-gre, Σύμβολον τῆς Νικαίας; la, Symbolum Nicaenum) was first adopted at the First Council of Nicaea in 325. In 381, it was amended at the First Council of Constantinople. The amended form is a ...

written in the Southern Aukštaitian dialect. Printed books existed after 1547, but the level of literacy among Lithuanians was low through the 18th century, and books were not commonly available. In 1864, following the

January Uprising The January Uprising ( pl, powstanie styczniowe; lt, 1863 metų sukilimas; ua, Січневе повстання; russian: Польское восстание; ) was an insurrection principally in Russia's Kingdom of Poland that was aimed at ...

, Mikhail Muravyov, the Russian

Governor General of Lithuania Vilna Governorate-General, known as Lithuania Governorate-General (russian: Литовское генерал-губернаторство, li, Vilniaus generalgubernatorija) before 1830, was a Governorate-General of the Russian Empire from 1794 ...

, banned the language in education and publishing and barred use of the Latin alphabet altogether, although books printed in Lithuanian continued to be printed across the border in

East Prussia East Prussia ; german: Ostpreißen, label=Low Prussian; pl, Prusy Wschodnie; lt, Rytų Prūsija was a province of the Kingdom of Prussia from 1773 to 1829 and again from 1878 (with the Kingdom itself being part of the German Empire from 187 ...

and in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

. Brought into the country by book smugglers ( lt, knygnešiai, links=no) despite the threat of stiff prison sentences, they helped fuel a growing nationalist sentiment that finally led to the lifting of the ban in 1904.

Jonas Jablonskis Jonas Jablonskis (; 30 December 1860, in Kubilėliai, Šakiai district – 23 February 1930, in Kaunas) was a distinguished Lithuanian linguist and one of the founders of the standard Lithuanian language. He used the pseudonym ''Rygiškių Jonas' ...

(1860–1930) made significant contributions to the formation of the standard Lithuanian language. The conventions of written Lithuanian had been evolving during the 19th century, but Jablonskis, in the introduction to his ''Lietuviškos kalbos gramatika'', was the first to formulate and expound the essential principles that were so indispensable to its later development. His proposal for Standard Lithuanian was based on his native Western Aukštaitijan dialect with some features of the eastern Prussian Lithuanians' dialect spoken in

Lithuania Minor Lithuania Minor ( lt, Mažoji Lietuva; german: Kleinlitauen; pl, Litwa Mniejsza; russian: Ма́лая Литва́), or Prussian Lithuania ( lt, Prūsų Lietuva; german: Preußisch-Litauen, pl, Litwa Pruska), is a historical ethnographic re ...

. These dialects had preserved archaic phonetics mostly intact due to the influence of the neighbouring Old Prussian language, while the other dialects had experienced different phonetic shifts. Lithuanian has been the official language of Lithuania since 1918. During the Soviet era (see History of Lithuania), it was used in official discourse along with Russian, which, as the official language of the

USSR The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...

, took precedence over Lithuanian.

Classification

Lithuanian is one of two living

Baltic languages The Baltic languages are a branch of the Indo-European language family spoken natively by a population of about 4.5 million people mainly in areas extending east and southeast of the Baltic Sea in Northern Europe. Together with the Slavic lang ...

, along with Latvian, and they constitute the eastern branch of Baltic languages family. An earlier

Baltic Baltic may refer to: Peoples and languages * Baltic languages, a subfamily of Indo-European languages, including Lithuanian, Latvian and extinct Old Prussian *Balts (or Baltic peoples), ethnic groups speaking the Baltic languages and/or originati ...

language, Old Prussian, was extinct by the 18th century; the other Western Baltic languages, Curonian and

Sudovian Sudovian (also known as Yotvingian, or Jatvingian) was a Western Baltic language of Northeastern Europe. Sudovian was closely related to Old Prussian. It was formerly spoken southwest of the Nemunas river in what is now Lithuania, east of Gali ...

, became extinct earlier. Some theories, such as that of

Jānis Endzelīns Jānis Endzelīns (22 February 1873 – 1 July 1961) was a Latvian linguist. He graduated from the University of Tartu. In 1908, he and Kārlis Mīlenbahs developed the modern Latvian alphabet, which slowly replaced the old orthography used bef ...

, considered that the Baltic languages form their own distinct branch of the family of

. There is also an opinion that suggests the union of Baltic and Slavic languages into a distinct sub-family of Balto-Slavic languages amongst the Indo-European family of languages. Such an opinion was first represented by the likes of August Schleicher, and to a certain extent,

Antoine Meillet Paul Jules Antoine Meillet (; 11 November 1866 Moulins, France – 21 September 1936 Châteaumeillant, France) was one of the most important French linguists of the early 20th century. He began his studies at the Sorbonne University, where he was ...

. Endzelīns thought that the similarity between Baltic and Slavic was explicable through language contact while Schleicher, Meillet and others argued for a genetic kinship between the two families. An attempt to reconcile the opposing stances was made by

Jan Michał Rozwadowski Jan Michał Rozwadowski (7 December 1867 – 13 March 1935) was a Poles, Polish linguist and a professor at the Jagiellonian University. He was also the president of the Polish Academy of Learning. References

1867 births 1935 deaths ...

. He proposed that the two language groups were indeed a unity after the division of Indo-European, but also suggested that after the two had divided into separate entities (Baltic and Slavic), they had posterior contact. The genetic kinship view is augmented by the fact that Proto-Balto-Slavic is easily reconstructible with important proofs in historic prosody. The alleged (or certain, as certain as historic linguistics can be) similarities due to contact are seen in such phenomena as the existence of definite adjectives formed by the addition of an inflected pronoun (descended from the same Proto-Indo-European pronoun), which exist in both Baltic and Slavic yet nowhere else in the Indo-European family (languages such as Albanian and the

Germanic languages The Germanic languages are a branch of the Indo-European language family spoken natively by a population of about 515 million people mainly in Europe, North America, Oceania and Southern Africa. The most widely spoken Germanic language, Engli ...

developed definite adjectives independently), and that are not reconstructible for Proto-Balto-Slavic, meaning that they most probably developed through language contact. The Baltic hydronyms area stretches from the

Vistula The Vistula (; pl, Wisła, ) is the longest river in Poland and the ninth-longest river in Europe, at in length. The drainage basin, reaching into three other nations, covers , of which is in Poland. The Vistula rises at Barania Góra in ...

River in the west to the east of

Moscow Moscow ( , US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the capital and largest city of Russia. The city stands on the Moskva River in Central Russia, with a population estimated at 13.0 million ...

and from the

Baltic Sea The Baltic Sea is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that is enclosed by Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Russia, Sweden and the North and Central European Plain. The sea stretches from 53°N to 66°N latitude and from ...

in the north to the south of

Kyiv Kyiv, also spelled Kiev, is the capital and most populous city of Ukraine. It is in north-central Ukraine along the Dnieper, Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2021, its population was 2,962,180, making Kyiv the List of European cities by populat ...

. Vladimir Toporov and

Oleg Trubachyov Oleg Nikolayevich Trubachyov (also transliterated as Trubachev or Trubačev, russian: Оле́г Никола́евич Трубачёв; 23 October 1930, in Stalingrad – 9 March 2002, in Moscow) was a Soviet and Russian linguist. A res ...

(1961, 1962) studied Baltic hydronyms in the

Russia Russia (, , ), or the Russian Federation, is a List of transcontinental countries, transcontinental country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia, Northern Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the ...

n and

Ukrainian Ukrainian may refer to: * Something of, from, or related to Ukraine * Something relating to Ukrainians, an East Slavic people from Eastern Europe * Something relating to demographics of Ukraine in terms of demography and population of Ukraine * So ...

territory. Hydronyms and

archeology Archaeology or archeology is the scientific study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of artifacts, architecture, biofacts or ecofacts, sites, and cultural landscap ...

analysis show that the Slavs started migrating to the Baltic areas east and north-east directions in the 6–7th centuries, before then, the Baltic and Slavic boundary was south of the Pripyat River. In the 1960s

and Vyacheslav Ivanov made the following conclusions about the relationship between the Baltic and Slavic languages: a) the Proto-Slavic language formed from the peripheral-type Baltic dialects; b) the Slavic linguistic type formed later from the structural model of the Baltic languages; c) the Slavic structural model is a result of a transformation of the structural model of the Baltic languages. These scholars’ theses do not contradict the Baltic and Slavic languages closeness and from a historical perspective specify the Baltic-Slavic languages evolution.

Geographic distribution

Lithuanian is spoken mainly in

. It is also spoken by ethnic Lithuanians living in today's

Belarus Belarus,, , ; alternatively and formerly known as Byelorussia (from Russian ). officially the Republic of Belarus,; rus, Республика Беларусь, Respublika Belarus. is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe. It is bordered by R ...

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It is divided into 16 administrative provinces called voivodeships, covering an area of . Poland has a population of over 38 million and is the fifth-most populous ...

, and the

Kaliningrad Oblast Kaliningrad Oblast (russian: Калинингра́дская о́бласть, translit=Kaliningradskaya oblast') is the westernmost federal subject of Russia. It is a semi-exclave situated on the Baltic Sea. The largest city and administr ...

of Russia, as well as by sizable emigrant communities in

Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...

Australia Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a Sovereign state, sovereign country comprising the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous List of islands of Australia, sma ...

Brazil Brazil ( pt, Brasil; ), officially the Federative Republic of Brazil (Portuguese: ), is the largest country in both South America and Latin America. At and with over 217 million people, Brazil is the world's fifth-largest country by area ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

Denmark ) , song = ( en, "King Christian stood by the lofty mast") , song_type = National and royal anthem , image_map = EU-Denmark.svg , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Danish Realm, Kingdom of Denmark ...

Estonia Estonia, formally the Republic of Estonia, is a country by the Baltic Sea in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, a ...

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

Iceland Iceland ( is, Ísland; ) is a Nordic island country in the North Atlantic Ocean and in the Arctic Ocean. Iceland is the most sparsely populated country in Europe. Iceland's capital and largest city is Reykjavík, which (along with its s ...

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and t ...

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...

, the

United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...

, the

Uruguay Uruguay (; ), officially the Oriental Republic of Uruguay ( es, República Oriental del Uruguay), is a country in South America. It shares borders with Argentina to its west and southwest and Brazil to its north and northeast; while bordering ...

, and

Spain , image_flag = Bandera de España.svg , image_coat = Escudo de España (mazonado).svg , national_motto = ''Plus ultra'' (Latin)(English: "Further Beyond") , national_anthem = (English: "Royal March") , i ...

. 2,955,200 people in Lithuania (including 3,460

Tatars The Tatars ()Tatar
in the Collins English Dictionary is an umbrella term for different

), or about 86% of the 2015 population, are native Lithuanian speakers; most Lithuanian inhabitants of other nationalities also speak Lithuanian to some extent. The total worldwide Lithuanian-speaking population is about 3,200,000.

Official status

Lithuanian is the state language of Lithuania and an official language of the

Dialects

The Lithuanian language has two dialects: Aukštaitian (Highland Lithuanian), and Samogitian (Lowland Lithuanian). There are significant differences between standard Lithuanian and Samogitian and these are often described as separate languages. The modern Samogitian dialect formed in the 13th–16th centuries under the influence of the

Curonian language The Curonian language (german: Kurisch; lv, kuršu valoda; lt, kuršių kalba), or Old Curonian, was a nearly unattested Baltic language spoken by the Curonians, a Baltic tribe who inhabited the Courland Peninsula (now western Latvia) and t ...

. Lithuanian dialects are closely connected with ethnographical regions of Lithuania. Dialects are divided into subdialects. Both dialects have three subdialects. Samogitian is divided into West, North and South; Aukštaitian into West (Suvalkiečiai), South (Dzūkai) and East. Standard Lithuanian is derived mostly from Western Aukštaitian dialects, including the Eastern dialect of

. The influence of other dialects is more significant in the vocabulary of standard Lithuanian.

Script

Lithuanian uses the

supplemented with

diacritic A diacritic (also diacritical mark, diacritical point, diacritical sign, or accent) is a glyph added to a letter or to a basic glyph. The term derives from the Ancient Greek (, "distinguishing"), from (, "to distinguish"). The word ''diacriti ...

s. It has 32

letters Letter, letters, or literature may refer to: Characters typeface * Letter (alphabet), a character representing one or more of the sounds used in speech; any of the symbols of an alphabet. * Letterform, the graphic form of a letter of the alphabe ...

. In the collation order, ''y'' follows immediately after ''į'' (called ''i nosinė''), because both ''y'' and ''į'' represent the same long vowel : In addition, the following digraphs are used, but are treated as sequences of two letters for collation purposes. The digraph ''ch'' represents a single sound, the velar fricative , while ''dz'' and ''dž'' are pronounced like straightforward combinations of their component letters (sounds): Dz dz (dzė), Dž dž (džė), Ch ch (cha). The Lithuanian writing system is largely phonemic, i.e., one letter usually corresponds to a single

phoneme In phonology and linguistics, a phoneme () is a unit of sound that can distinguish one word from another in a particular language. For example, in most dialects of English, with the notable exception of the West Midlands and the north-west o ...

(sound). There are a few exceptions: for example, the letter ''i'' represents either the vowel , as in the English ''sit'', or is silent and merely indicates that the preceding consonant is palatalized. The latter is largely the case when ''i'' occurs after a consonant and is followed by a back or a

central vowel A central vowel, formerly also known as a mixed vowel, is any in a class of vowel sound used in some spoken languages. The defining characteristic of a central vowel is that the tongue is positioned halfway between a front vowel and a back v ...

, except in some borrowed words (e.g., the first consonant in ''lūpa'' , "lip", is a velarized dental lateral approximant; on the other hand, the first consonant in ''liūtas'' , "lion", is a palatalized

alveolar lateral approximant The voiced alveolar lateral approximant is a type of consonantal sound used in many spoken languages. The symbol in the International Phonetic Alphabet that represents dental, alveolar, and postalveolar lateral approximants is , and the eq ...

; both consonants are followed by the same vowel, the long , and no can be pronounced in ''liūtas''). Before the 20th century, due to the Polish influence, the Lithuanian alphabet included the Polish Ł for the first sound and regular L (without a following i) for the second: ''łupa'', ''lutas''. A macron (on ''u''), an

ogonek The (; Polish: , "little tail", diminutive of ) is a diacritic hook placed under the lower right corner of a vowel in the Latin alphabet used in several European languages, and directly under a vowel in several Native American languages. It i ...

(on ''a'', ''e'', ''i'', and ''u''), and ''y'' (in place of ''i'') are used for grammatical and historical reasons and always denote

vowel length In linguistics, vowel length is the perceived length of a vowel sound: the corresponding physical measurement is duration. In some languages vowel length is an important phonemic factor, meaning vowel length can change the meaning of the word, f ...

in Modern Standard Lithuanian.

Acute Acute may refer to: Science and technology * Acute angle ** Acute triangle ** Acute, a leaf shape in the glossary of leaf morphology * Acute (medicine), a disease that it is of short duration and of recent onset. ** Acute toxicity, the adverse eff ...

grave A grave is a location where a dead body (typically that of a human, although sometimes that of an animal) is buried or interred after a funeral. Graves are usually located in special areas set aside for the purpose of burial, such as grave ...

, and

tilde The tilde () or , is a grapheme with several uses. The name of the character came into English from Spanish, which in turn came from the Latin '' titulus'', meaning "title" or "superscription". Its primary use is as a diacritic (accent) in ...

diacritics are used to indicate

pitch accent A pitch-accent language, when spoken, has word accents in which one syllable in a word or morpheme is more prominent than the others, but the accentuated syllable is indicated by a contrasting pitch ( linguistic tone) rather than by loudness ( ...

s. However, these pitch accents are generally not written, except in dictionaries, grammars, and where needed for clarity, such as to differentiate homonyms and dialectal use.

Phonology

Consonants

All Lithuanian consonants except have two variants: the non- palatalized one represented by the

IPA IPA commonly refers to: * India pale ale, a style of beer * International Phonetic Alphabet, a system of phonetic notation * Isopropyl alcohol, a chemical compound IPA may also refer to: Organizations International * Insolvency Practitioners ...

symbols in the chart, and the palatalized one (i.e. – , – , – , and so on). The consonants , , and their palatalized variants are only found in

loanword A loanword (also loan word or loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language. This is in contrast to cognates, which are words in two or more languages that are similar because th ...

s. have been traditionally transcribed with , but they can be seen as equivalent transcriptions, with the former set being somewhat easier to write.

Vowels

Lithuanian has six long vowels and four short ones (not including disputed phonemes marked in brackets). Length has traditionally been considered the distinctive feature, though short vowels are also more centralized and long vowels more peripheral: * are restricted to loanwords. Many speakers merge the former with .

Diphthongs

Lithuanian is traditionally described as having nine

diphthong A diphthong ( ; , ), also known as a gliding vowel, is a combination of two adjacent vowel sounds within the same syllable. Technically, a diphthong is a vowel with two different targets: that is, the tongue (and/or other parts of the speech o ...

s, ''ai'','' au'','' ei'','' eu'','' oi'','' ou'','' ui'','' ie'', and'' uo.'' However, some approaches (i.e., Schmalstieg 1982) treat them as vowel sequences rather than diphthongs; indeed, the longer component depends on the type of stress, whereas in diphthongs, the longer segment is fixed.

Pitch accent

The Lithuanian prosodic system is characterized by free accent and distinctive quantity. Its accentuation is sometimes described as a simple tone system, often called

. In lexical words, one syllable will be tonically prominent. A

heavy syllable In linguistics, syllable weight is the concept that syllables pattern together according to the number and/or duration of segments in the rime. In classical Indo-European verse, as developed in Greek, Sanskrit, and Latin, distinctions of syllable ...

—that is, a syllable containing a

long vowel In linguistics, vowel length is the perceived length of a vowel sound: the corresponding physical measurement is duration. In some languages vowel length is an important phonemic factor, meaning vowel length can change the meaning of the word, f ...

, or a

sonorant In phonetics and phonology, a sonorant or resonant is a speech sound that is produced with continuous, non-turbulent airflow in the vocal tract; these are the manners of articulation that are most often voiced in the world's languages. Vowels are ...

coda—may have one of two tones, ''falling tone'' (or ''acute tone'') or ''rising tone'' (or ''circumflex tone''). Light syllables (syllables with short vowels and optionally also

obstruent An obstruent () is a speech sound such as , , or that is formed by ''obstructing'' airflow. Obstruents contrast with sonorants, which have no such obstruction and so resonate. All obstruents are consonants, but sonorants include vowels as well as ...

codas) do not have the two-way contrast of heavy syllables.

Grammar

Lithuanian is a highly inflected language. In Lithuanian, there are two

grammatical gender In linguistics, grammatical gender system is a specific form of noun class system, where nouns are assigned with gender categories that are often not related to their real-world qualities. In languages with grammatical gender, most or all nouns ...

s for nouns (masculine and feminine) and three genders for adjectives, pronouns, numerals and participles (masculine, feminine and neuter). Every attribute must agree with the gender and number of the noun. The neuter forms of other parts of speech are used with a

subject Subject ( la, subiectus "lying beneath") may refer to: Philosophy *''Hypokeimenon'', or ''subiectum'', in metaphysics, the "internal", non-objective being of a thing **Subject (philosophy), a being that has subjective experiences, subjective cons ...

of an undefined gender (a pronoun, an infinitive etc.). There are twelve

noun A noun () is a word that generally functions as the name of a specific object or set of objects, such as living creatures, places, actions, qualities, states of existence, or ideas.Example nouns for: * Living creatures (including people, alive, d ...

and five

adjective In linguistics, an adjective (list of glossing abbreviations, abbreviated ) is a word that generally grammatical modifier, modifies a noun or noun phrase or describes its referent. Its semantic role is to change information given by the noun. Tra ...

declension In linguistics, declension (verb: ''to decline'') is the changing of the form of a word, generally to express its syntactic function in the sentence, by way of some inflection. Declensions may apply to nouns, pronouns, adjectives, adverbs, and ar ...

s and one (masculine and feminine) participle declension. Nouns and other parts of nominal morphology are declined in seven cases:

nominative In grammar, the nominative case (abbreviated ), subjective case, straight case or upright case is one of the grammatical cases of a noun or other part of speech, which generally marks the subject of a verb or (in Latin and formal variants of Engl ...

genitive In grammar, the genitive case (abbreviated ) is the grammatical case that marks a word, usually a noun, as modifying another word, also usually a noun—thus indicating an attributive relationship of one noun to the other noun. A genitive can al ...

dative In grammar, the dative case (abbreviated , or sometimes when it is a core argument) is a grammatical case used in some languages to indicate the recipient or beneficiary of an action, as in "Maria Jacobo potum dedit", Latin for "Maria gave Jacob a ...

accusative The accusative case (abbreviated ) of a noun is the grammatical case used to mark the direct object of a transitive verb. In the English language, the only words that occur in the accusative case are pronouns: 'me,' 'him,' 'her,' 'us,' and ‘the ...

instrumental An instrumental is a recording normally without any vocals, although it might include some inarticulate vocals, such as shouted backup vocals in a big band setting. Through semantic widening, a broader sense of the word song may refer to instru ...

locative In grammar, the locative case (abbreviated ) is a grammatical case which indicates a location. It corresponds vaguely to the English prepositions "in", "on", "at", and "by". The locative case belongs to the general local cases, together with the ...

, and

vocative In grammar, the vocative Grammatical case, case (list of glossing abbreviations, abbreviated ) is a grammatical case which is used for a noun that identifies a person (animal, object, etc.) being addressed, or occasionally for the noun modifiers ...

. In older Lithuanian texts, three additional varieties of the locative case are found:

illative In grammar, the illative case (; abbreviated ; from la, illatus "brought in") is a grammatical case used in the Finnish, Estonian, Lithuanian, Latvian and Hungarian languages. It is one of the locative cases, and has the basic meaning of "int ...

adessive In grammar, an adessive case (abbreviated ; from Latin '' adesse'' "to be present (at)": ''ad'' "at" + ''esse'' "to be") is a grammatical case generally denoting location at, upon, or adjacent to the referent of the noun; the term is most frequentl ...

and allative. The most common are the

, which still is used, mostly in spoken language, and the allative, which survives in the standard language in some idiomatic usages. The adessive is nearly extinct. These additional cases are probably due to the influence of

Uralic languages The Uralic languages (; sometimes called Uralian languages ) form a language family of 38 languages spoken by approximately 25million people, predominantly in Northern Eurasia. The Uralic languages with the most native speakers are Hungarian (w ...

, with which Baltic languages have had a longstanding contact. (Uralic languages possess a great variety of noun cases, a number of which are specialised locative cases.) Lithuanian verbal morphology shows a number of innovations; namely, the loss of synthetic passive (which is hypothesized based on other archaic Indo-European languages, such as Greek and Latin),

synthetic perfect Synthetic things are composed of multiple parts, often with the implication that they are artificial. In particular, 'synthetic' may refer to: Science * Synthetic chemical or compound, produced by the process of chemical synthesis * Synthetic o ...

(formed by means of reduplication) and

aorist Aorist (; abbreviated ) verb forms usually express perfective aspect and refer to past events, similar to a preterite. Ancient Greek grammar had the aorist form, and the grammars of other Indo-European languages and languages influenced by the I ...

; forming

subjunctive The subjunctive (also known as conjunctive in some languages) is a grammatical mood, a feature of the utterance that indicates the speaker's attitude towards it. Subjunctive forms of verbs are typically used to express various states of unreality ...

and imperative with the use of suffixes plus flexions as opposed to solely flections in, e.g.,

; loss of the

optative mood The optative mood ( or ; abbreviated ) is a grammatical mood that indicates a wish or hope regarding a given action. It is a superset of the cohortative mood and is closely related to the subjunctive mood but is distinct from the desiderative mood. ...

; merging and disappearing of the -''t''- and -''nt''- markers for the third-person singular and plural, respectively (this, however, occurs in Latvian and Old Prussian as well and may indicate a collective feature of all Baltic languages). On the other hand, the Lithuanian verbal morphology retains a number of archaic features absent from most modern Indo-European languages (but shared with Latvian). This includes the synthetic form of the future tense with the help of the -''s''- suffix and three principal verbal forms with the present tense stem employing the -''n''- and -''st''- infixes. There are three

verb A verb () is a word (part of speech) that in syntax generally conveys an action (''bring'', ''read'', ''walk'', ''run'', ''learn''), an occurrence (''happen'', ''become''), or a state of being (''be'', ''exist'', ''stand''). In the usual descri ...

conjugation Conjugation or conjugate may refer to: Linguistics * Grammatical conjugation, the modification of a verb from its basic form * Emotive conjugation or Russell's conjugation, the use of loaded language Mathematics * Complex conjugation, the chang ...

s. The verb ''būti'' is the only auxiliary verb in the language. Together with

participle In linguistics, a participle () (from Latin ' a "sharing, partaking") is a nonfinite verb form that has some of the characteristics and functions of both verbs and adjectives. More narrowly, ''participle'' has been defined as "a word derived from ...

s, it is used to form dozens of compound forms. In the active voice, each verb can be inflected for any of the following moods: # Indicative # Indirect # Imperative # Conditional/subjunctive In the indicative mood and indirect moods, all verbs can have eleven

tenses In grammar, tense is a category that expresses time reference. Tenses are usually manifested by the use of specific forms of verbs, particularly in their conjugation patterns. The main tenses found in many languages include the past, present, ...

: # simple:

present The present (or here'' and ''now) is the time that is associated with the events perception, perceived directly and in the first time, not as a recollection (perceived more than once) or a speculation (predicted, hypothesis, uncertain). It is ...

(''nešu''), past (''nešiau''), past iterative (''nešdavau'') and

future The future is the time after the past and present. Its arrival is considered inevitable due to the existence of time and the laws of physics. Due to the apparent nature of reality and the unavoidability of the future, everything that currently ...

(''nešiu'') # compound: ## present perfect (''esu nešęs''), past perfect (''buvau nešęs''), past iterative perfect (''būdavau nešęs''), future perfect (''būsiu nešęs'') ## past inchoative (''buvau benešąs''), past iterative inchoative (''būdavau benešąs''), future inchoative (''būsiu benešąs'') The

indirect mood Indirect, the opposite of direct, may refer to: *Indirect approach, a battle strategy *Indirect DNA damage, caused by UV-photons *Indirect agonist or indirect-acting agonist, a substance that enhances the release or action of an endogenous neurotra ...

, used only in written narrative speech, has the same tenses corresponding to the appropriate active participle in nominative case; e.g., the past of the indirect mood would be ''nešęs'', while the past iterative inchoative of the indirect mood would be ''būdavęs benešąs''. Since it is a nominal form, this mood cannot be conjugated but must match the subject's number and gender. The

(or

conditional Conditional (if then) may refer to: * Causal conditional, if X then Y, where X is a cause of Y * Conditional probability, the probability of an event A given that another event B has occurred *Conditional proof, in logic: a proof that asserts a ...

) and the

imperative mood The imperative mood is a grammatical mood that forms a command or request. The imperative mood is used to demand or require that an action be performed. It is usually found only in the present tense, second person. To form the imperative mood, ...

s have three tenses. Subjunctive: present (''neščiau''), past (''būčiau nešęs''), inchoative (''būčiau benešąs''); imperative: present (''nešk''), perfect (''būk nešęs'') and inchoative (''būk benešąs''). The

infinitive Infinitive (abbreviated ) is a linguistics term for certain verb forms existing in many languages, most often used as non-finite verbs. As with many linguistic concepts, there is not a single definition applicable to all languages. The word is deri ...

has only one form (''nešti''). These forms, except the infinitive and indirect mood, are conjugative, having two singular, two plural persons, and the third person form common both for plural and singular. In the passive voice, the form number is not as rich as in the active voice. There are two types of passive voice in Lithuanian: present participle (type I) and past participle (type II) (in the examples below types I and II are separated with a slash). They both have the same moods and tenses: # Indicative mood:

(''esu nešamas/neštas''), past (''buvau nešamas/neštas''), past iterative (''būdavau nešamas/neštas'') and

(''būsiu nešamas/neštas'') # Indirect mood:

(''esąs nešamas/neštas''), past (''buvęs nešamas/neštas''), past iterative (''būdavęs nešamas/neštas'') and

(''būsiąs nešamas/neštas''). # Imperative mood: present (type I only: ''būk nešamas''), past (type II only: ''būk neštas''). # Subjunctive / conditional mood: present (type I only: ''būčiau nešamas''), past (type II only: ''būčiau neštas''). Lithuanian has the richest

system of all Indo-European languages, having participles derived from all simple tenses with distinct active and passive forms, and two gerund forms. In practical terms, the rich overall inflectional system makes the word order have a different meaning than in more

analytic language In linguistic typology, an analytic language is a language that conveys relationships between words in sentences primarily by way of ''helper'' words (particles, prepositions, etc.) and word order, as opposed to using inflections (changing the ...

s such as English. The English phrase "a car is coming" translates as "atvažiuoja automobilis" (the

theme Theme or themes may refer to: * Theme (arts), the unifying subject or idea of the type of visual work * Theme (Byzantine district), an administrative district in the Byzantine Empire governed by a Strategos * Theme (computing), a custom graphical ...

first), while "the car is coming" – "automobilis atvažiuoja" (the theme first; word order inversion). Lithuanian also has a very rich word derivation system and an array of diminutive suffixes. The first prescriptive grammar book of Lithuanian was commissioned by the Duke of Prussia, Frederick William, for use in the Lithuanian-speaking parishes of East Prussia. It was written in

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

and German by Daniel Klein and published in

Königsberg Königsberg (, ) was the historic Prussian city that is now Kaliningrad, Russia. Königsberg was founded in 1255 on the site of the ancient Old Prussian settlement ''Twangste'' by the Teutonic Knights during the Northern Crusades, and was named ...

in 1653 or 1654. The first scientific ''Compendium of Lithuanian language'' was published in German in 1856/57 by August Schleicher, a professor at

Prague Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 million people. The city has a temperate ...

University. In it he describes Prussian-Lithuanian, which later became the "skeleton" (Būga) of modern Lithuanian. Today there are two definitive books on Lithuanian grammar: one in English, the ''Introduction to Modern Lithuanian'' (called ''Beginner's Lithuanian'' in its newer editions) by

Leonardas Dambriūnas Leonardas is a Lithuanian masculine given name. List of people named Leonardas *Leonardas Abramavičius (?-1960), Lithuanian chess player *Leonardas Andriekus Leonardas Andriekus (born July 15, 1914 in Barstyčiai, district of Mažeikiai ...

, Antanas Klimas and

William R. Schmalstieg William is a male given name of Germanic origin.Hanks, Hardcastle and Hodges, ''Oxford Dictionary of First Names'', Oxford University Press, 2nd edition, , p. 276. It became very popular in the English language after the Norman conquest of Engl ...

; and another in Russian,

Vytautas Ambrazas Vytautas (c. 135027 October 1430), also known as Vytautas the Great (Lithuanian: ', be, Вітаўт, ''Vitaŭt'', pl, Witold Kiejstutowicz, ''Witold Aleksander'' or ''Witold Wielki'' Ruthenian: ''Vitovt'', Latin: ''Alexander Vitoldus'', Ol ...

' ''Грамматика литовского языка'' (''The Grammar of the Lithuanian Language''). Another recent book on Lithuanian grammar is the second edition of ''Review of Modern Lithuanian Grammar'' by Edmund Remys, published by Lithuanian Research and Studies Center, Chicago, 2003.

Vocabulary

Indo-European vocabulary

Lithuanian retains

cognate In historical linguistics, cognates or lexical cognates are sets of words in different languages that have been inherited in direct descent from an etymology, etymological ancestor in a proto-language, common parent language. Because language c ...

s to many words found in classical languages, such as

and

. These words are descended from

Proto-Indo-European Proto-Indo-European (PIE) is the reconstructed common ancestor of the Indo-European language family. Its proposed features have been derived by linguistic reconstruction from documented Indo-European languages. No direct record of Proto-Indo-E ...

. A few examples are the following: * Lith. and Skt. (son) * Lith. and Skt. and Lat. ''ovis'' (sheep) * Lith. and Skt. ''d^hūma'' and Lat. ''fumus'' (fumes, smoke) * Lith. and Skt. (second, the other) * Lith. and Skt. ''vṛka'' (wolf) * Lith. and Lat. ''rota'' (wheel) and Skt. ''rat^ha'' (carriage) * Lith. and Lat. ''senex'' (an old man) and Skt. ''sanas'' (old) * Lith. and Lat. ''vir'' (a man) and Skt. ''vīra'' (man) * Lith. and Lat. ''anguis'' (a snake in Latin, a species of snakes in Lithuanian) * Lith. and Lat. ''linum'' (flax, compare with English 'linen') * Lith. and Lat. ''aro'' (I plow) * Lith. and Lat. ''iungo'', and Skt. ''yuñje'' (mid.), (I join) * Lith. and Lat. ''gentes'' and Skt. ''játi'' (tribes) * Lith. and Lat. ''mensis'' and Skt. ''masa'' (month) * Lith. and Lat. ''dens'' and Skt. ''danta'' (tooth) * Lith. and Lat. ''noctes'' (plural of ''nox'') and Skt. ''naktam'' (night) * Lith. and Lat. ''ignis'' and Skt. ''agni'' (fire) * Lith. and Lat. ''sedemus'' and Skt. ''sīdama'' (we sit) This even extends to grammar, where for example Latin noun declensions ending in ''-um'' often correspond to Lithuanian ''-ų'', with the

and Lithuanian fourth declensions being particularly close. Many of the words from this list are similar to other Indo-European languages, including English and Russian. The contribution of Lithuanian was influential in the reconstruction of the

. Lexical and grammatical similarities between Baltic and

suggest an affinity between these two language groups. On the other hand, there exist a number of Baltic (particularly Lithuanian) words without counterparts in Slavic languages, but which are similar to words in Sanskrit or Latin. The history of the relationship between Baltic and Slavic languages, and our understanding of the affinity between the two groups, remain in dispute (see: Balto-Slavic languages).

Loanwords

In a 1934 book entitled ''Die Germanismen des Litauischen. Teil I: Die deutschen Lehnwörter im Litauischen'', K. Alminauskis found 2,770 loanwords, of which about 130 were of uncertain origin. The majority of the loanwords were found to have been derived from the

Belarusian Belarusian may refer to: * Something of, or related to Belarus * Belarusians, people from Belarus, or of Belarusian descent * A citizen of Belarus, see Demographics of Belarus * Belarusian language * Belarusian culture * Belarusian cuisine * Byelor ...

, and

languages, with some evidence that these languages all acquired the words from contacts and trade with

Prussia Prussia, , Old Prussian: ''Prūsa'' or ''Prūsija'' was a German state on the southeast coast of the Baltic Sea. It formed the German Empire under Prussian rule when it united the German states in 1871. It was ''de facto'' dissolved by an em ...

during the era of the

Grand Duchy of Lithuania The Grand Duchy of Lithuania was a European state that existed from the 13th century to 1795, when the territory was partitioned among the Russian Empire, the Kingdom of Prussia, and the Habsburg Empire of Austria. The state was founded by Li ...

. Loanwords comprised about 20% of the vocabulary used in the first book printed in the Lithuanian language in 1547, Martynas Mažvydas's ''

Catechism A catechism (; from grc, κατηχέω, "to teach orally") is a summary or exposition of doctrine and serves as a learning introduction to the Sacraments traditionally used in catechesis, or Christian religious teaching of children and adult c ...

''. But as a result of language preservation and purging policies, Slavic loanwords currently constitute only 1.5% of the Standard Lithuanian lexicon, while German loanwords constitute only 0.5% of it. The majority of loanwords in the 20th century arrived from the

Russian language Russian (russian: русский язык, russkij jazyk, link=no, ) is an East Slavic languages, East Slavic language mainly spoken in Russia. It is the First language, native language of the Russians, and belongs to the Indo-European langua ...

. Towards the end of the 20th century, a number of words and expressions related to new technologies and telecommunications were borrowed from the

English language English is a West Germanic language of the Indo-European language family, with its earliest forms spoken by the inhabitants of early medieval England. It is named after the Angles, one of the ancient Germanic peoples that migrated to the is ...

. The Lithuanian government has an established language policy that encourages the development of equivalent vocabulary to replace loanwords. However, despite the government's best efforts to avoid the use of loanwords in the Lithuanian language, many English words have become accepted and are now included in Lithuanian language dictionaries. In particular, words having to do with new technologies have permeated the Lithuanian vernacular, including such words as: * Monitorius (vaizduoklis) (

computer monitor A computer monitor is an output device that displays information in pictorial or textual form. A discrete monitor comprises a visual display, support electronics, power supply, housing, electrical connectors, and external user controls. The di ...

) * Faksas ( fax) * Kompiuteris (

computer A computer is a machine that can be programmed to Execution (computing), carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations (computation) automatically. Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic sets of operations known as C ...

) * Failas (byla, rinkmena) (

electronic file A computer file is a computer resource for recording data in a computer storage device, primarily identified by its file name. Just as words can be written to paper, so can data be written to a computer file. Files can be shared with and transfe ...

) Other common foreign words have also been adopted by the Lithuanian language. Some of these include: * Taksi (

taxi A taxi, also known as a taxicab or simply a cab, is a type of vehicle for hire with a driver, used by a single passenger or small group of passengers, often for a non-shared ride. A taxicab conveys passengers between locations of their choice ...

) * Pica (

pizza Pizza (, ) is a dish of Italian origin consisting of a usually round, flat base of leavened wheat-based dough topped with tomatoes, cheese, and often various other ingredients (such as various types of sausage, anchovies, mushrooms, onions ...

) * Alkoholis (

alcohol Alcohol most commonly refers to: * Alcohol (chemistry), an organic compound in which a hydroxyl group is bound to a carbon atom * Alcohol (drug), an intoxicant found in alcoholic drinks Alcohol may also refer to: Chemicals * Ethanol, one of sev ...

) * Bankas (

bank A bank is a financial institution that accepts deposits from the public and creates a demand deposit while simultaneously making loans. Lending activities can be directly performed by the bank or indirectly through capital markets. Because ...

) * Pasas (

passport A passport is an official travel document issued by a government that contains a person's identity. A person with a passport can travel to and from foreign countries more easily and access consular assistance. A passport certifies the personal ...

, pass) * Parkas (

park A park is an area of natural, semi-natural or planted space set aside for human enjoyment and recreation or for the protection of wildlife or natural habitats. Urban parks are urban green space, green spaces set aside for recreation inside t ...

, park) These words have been modified to suit the grammatical and phonetic requirements of the Lithuanian language, mostly by adding -as suffix, but their foreign roots are obvious.

Old Lithuanian

Lithuanian primer for kids, published in Vilnius, Grand Duchy of Lithuania, 1783 edition

The language of the earliest Lithuanian writings, in the 16th and 17th centuries, is known as Old Lithuanian and differs in some significant respects from the Lithuanian of today. ''

Universitas lingvarum Litvaniae ''Universitas lingvarum Litvaniæ'' ( lt, Lietuvos kalbų visuma; en, The Entirety of the Lithuanian language) is the oldest surviving grammar of the Lithuanian language published in the territory of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. It was written ...

'', published in

Vilnius Vilnius ( , ; see also other names) is the capital and largest city of Lithuania, with a population of 592,389 (according to the state register) or 625,107 (according to the municipality of Vilnius). The population of Vilnius's functional urb ...

, 1737, is the oldest surviving grammar of the Lithuanian language published in the territory of the

. Besides the specific differences given below, nouns, verbs, and adjectives still had separate endings for the dual number. The dual persists today in some dialects. Example:

Pronunciation

The vowels written ''ą, ę, į, ų'' were still pronounced as long

nasal vowel A nasal vowel is a vowel that is produced with a lowering of the soft palate (or velum) so that the air flow escapes through the nose and the mouth simultaneously, as in the French vowel or Amoy []. By contrast, oral vowels are produced wit ...

s, not as long oral vowels as in today's Lithuanian. The original Baltic long ''ā'' was still retained as such, e.g. ''bralis'' "brother" (modern ''brólis'').

Nouns

Compared to the modern language, there were three additional cases, formed under the influence of the

Finnic languages The Finnic (''Fennic'') or more precisely Balto-Finnic (Balto-Fennic, Baltic Finnic, Baltic Fennic) languages constitute a branch of the Uralic language family spoken around the Baltic Sea by the Baltic Finnic peoples. There are around 7 mi ...

. The original

locative case In grammar, the locative case (abbreviated ) is a grammatical case which indicates a location. It corresponds vaguely to the English prepositions "in", "on", "at", and "by". The locative case belongs to the general local cases, together with the ...

had been replaced by four so-called ''postpositive'' cases, the inessive case, illative case, adessive case and allative case, which correspond to the prepositions "in", "into", "at" and "towards", respectively. They were formed by affixing a postposition to one of the previous cases: * The inessive added ''-en'' to the original locative. * The illative added to the accusative. * The adessive added ''-pie'' to the original locative. * The allative added ''-pie'' to the genitive. The inessive has become the modern locative case, while the other three have disappeared. Note, however, that the illative case is still used occasionally in the colloquial language (mostly in the singular): ''Lietuvon'' "to Lithuania", ''miestan'' "to the city". This form is relatively productive: for instance, it is not uncommon to hear "skrendame Niujorkan (we are flying to New York)". The uncontracted dative plural ''-mus'' was still common.

Adjectives

Adjectives could belong to all four accent classes in Old Lithuanian (now they can only belong to classes 3 and 4). Additional remnants of i-stem adjectives still existed, e.g.: * loc. sg. "in the big crowd" (now ) * loc. sg. ''gerèsnime'' "better" (now ''geresniamè'') * loc. sg. ''mažiáusime'' "smallest" (now ''mažiáusiame'') Additional remnants of u-stem adjectives still existed, e.g. ''rūgštùs'' "sour": No u-stem remnants existed in the dative singular and locative plural. Definite adjectives, originally involving a pronoun suffixed to an adjective, had not merged into a single word in Old Lithuanian. Examples: * ''pa-jo-prasto'' "ordinary" (now ''pàprastojo'') * ''nu-jie-vargę'' "tired" (now ''nuvar̃gusieji'')

Verbs

The

class of

athematic verb In Indo-European studies, a thematic vowel or theme vowel is the vowel or from ablaut placed before the ending of a Proto-Indo-European (PIE) word. Nouns, adjectives, and verbs in the Indo-European languages with this vowel are thematic, and thos ...

s still existed in Old Lithuanian: The

(i.e. the third-person imperative) still had its own endings, ''-ai'' for third-conjugation verbs and ''-ie'' for other verbs, instead of using regular third-person present endings.

Syntax

Word order was freer in Old Lithuanian. For example, a noun in the

genitive case In grammar, the genitive case (abbreviated ) is the grammatical case that marks a word, usually a noun, as modifying another word, also usually a noun—thus indicating an attributive relationship of one noun to the other noun. A genitive can al ...

could either precede or follow the noun it modifies.

Citations

General sources

* * Dambriūnas, Leonardas; Antanas Klimas, William R. Schmalstieg, ''Beginner's Lithuanian'', Hippocrene Books, 1999, . Older editions (copyright 1966) called "Introduction to modern Lithuanian". * * * * Remys, Edmund, ''Review of Modern Lithuanian Grammar'', Lithuanian Research and Studies Center, Chicago, 2nd revised edition, 2003. * Remys, Edmund, ''General distinguishing features of various Indo-European languages and their relationship to Lithuanian'', Indogermanische Forschungen, Berlin, New York, 2007. * Zinkevičius, Zigmas, "Lietuvių kalbos istorija" ("History of Lithuanian Language") Vol.1,

: Mokslas, 1984, .

External links

Baltic Online (part of Early Indo-European Online) – Lithuanian and Old Lithuanian grammar

Academic Dictionary of Lithuanian

2005 analysis of Indo-European linguistic relationships

Lithuanian verbs training

Lithuanian verbs test

Encyclopaedia Britannica – Lithuanian language

an online collection of introductory videos to Ancient Indo-European languages produced by the University of Göttingen {{DEFAULTSORT:Lithuanian Language Articles containing video clips East Baltic languages Languages of Lithuania Languages of Poland

History

Classification

Geographic distribution

Official status

Dialects

Script

Phonology

Consonants

Vowels

Diphthongs

Pitch accent

Grammar

Vocabulary

Indo-European vocabulary

Loanwords

Old Lithuanian

Pronunciation

Nouns

Adjectives

Verbs

Syntax

See also

Citations

General sources

External links