The Poles in Lithuania (, ), also called Lithuanian Poles, estimated at 183,000 people in the 2021 Lithuanian census or 6.5% of Lithuania's total population, are the country's largest ethnic minority.
The first Polish people in Lithuania were mainly enslaved war captives from the Polish–Lithuanian Wars (13th–14th centuries). During the subsequent Polish–Lithuanian union until the Commonwealth's end in 1795, there was a gradual Polonization of Lithuania's upper classes, namely the nobility, which still maintained a Lithuanian identity. In addition, there was an influx of Poles into the country. Polish migration to Lithuania continued despite the Third Lithuanian Statute's attempt to prohibit Polish settlement.
During the 19th century, Polonization of Lithuanian and Belarusian peasants led to a large Polish-speaking population stretching to Daugavpils and including Vilnius by the 1890s. The rise of Polish nationalism and the Lithuanian National Revival led to irreconcilable differences between Poles and Lithuanians, that, following World War I and the rebirth of both states, escalated into the Polish–Lithuanian War, centred on Vilnius and its region. Thereafter, most, but not all, Poles living in the Lithuanian lands found themselves within the Polish borders. During World War II, the Polish population was persecuted by the USSR and Nazi Germany. Post-World War II, the borders were changed and the disputes were suppressed as the Soviet Union exercised power over both countries and a significant part of the Poles, especially the best-educated, resettled from the Lithuanian SSR to the Polish People's Republic. At the same time, many Poles relocated from nearby areas within the Byelorussian SSR to Vilnius and Vilnius region. After Lithuania regained independence, Lithuania–Poland relations were tense in the 1990s due to alleged discrimination of the Polish minority in Lithuania.Stephen R. Burant and Voytek Zubek, Eastern Europe's Old Memories and New Realities: Resurrecting the Polish–Lithuanian Union, East European Politics and Societies 1993; 7; 370, online (BEHIND A PAYWALL)
Currently, the Polish population is grouped in the Vilnius region, primarily the Vilnius and Šalčininkai districts. In the city of Vilnius alone there are more than 85,000 Poles, who make up about 15% of the Lithuanian capital's population. Most Poles in Lithuania are Roman Catholic and speak Polish, although a minority of them speak Russian or Lithuanian as their first language.
Statistics According to the 2021 Lithuanian census, the Polish minority in Lithuania numbered 183,421 persons or 6.5% of the population of Lithuania. It is the largest ethnic minority in Lithuania, the second largest being the Russian minority. Poles are concentrated in the Vilnius Region. Most Poles live in Vilnius County (170,919 people, or 21% of the county's population); Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania, has 85,438 Poles, or 15.4% of the city's population. Especially large Polish communities are found in the district municipalities of Vilnius (46% of the population) and Šalčininkai (76%).
Lithuanian municipalities with a Polish minority exceeding 15% of the total population (according to the 2021 census) are listed in the table below:
+ Poles in Lithuania according to the 2021 Lithuanian census Municipality name Area Total population Number of Poles Percentage Vilnius city 401 km2 556,490 85,438 15.4% Vilnius district 2,129 km2 96,295 45,020 46.8% Šalčininkai district 1,491 km2 30,052 22,934 76.3% Trakai district 1,208 km2 32,042 8,823 27.5% Švenčionys district 1,692 km2 22,966 5,585 24.3%
Top 10 cities by number of Poles: Vilnius: 85,438 Šalčininkai: 4,930 Lentvaris: 2,859 Nemenčinė: 2,858 Eišiškės: 2,844 Pabradė: 2,681 Grigiškės: 2,518 Visaginas: 2,084 Trakai: 938 Švenčionys: 860
Languages The adoption of Polish cultural features by the nobles, townspeople, and clergy in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, combined with an influx of migrants from Poland, created a Lithuanian variant of the Polish language. The local variety of Polish called became the native tongue of the Lithuanian nobility in the 18th century.
According to Polish professor Jan Otrębski's article published in 1931, the Polish dialect in the Vilnius Region and in the northeastern areas in general are very interesting variant of Polishness as this dialect developed in a foreign territory which was mostly inhabited by the Lithuanians who were Belarusized (mostly) or Polonized, and to prove this Otrębski provided examples of Lithuanianisms in the Tutejszy language. In 2015, Polish linguist Mirosław Jankowiak attested that many of the Vilnius Region's inhabitants who declare Polish nationality speak a Belarusian dialect which they call mowa prosta ('simple speech').
Out of the 234,989 Poles in Lithuania, 187,918 (80.0%) consider Polish to be their first language. 22,439 Poles (9.5%) speak Russian as their first language, while 17,233 (7.3%) speak Lithuanian. 6,279 Poles (2.7%) did not indicate their first language. The remaining 0.5% speak various other languages.Population by ethnicity and mother tongue . Data from Statistikos Departamentas, 2001 Population and Housing Census. The Polish regiolect spoken by Lithuanian Poles is classified under Northern Borderlands dialect. Most of Poles who live southwards of Vilnius speak a form of Belarusian vernacular called there "simple speech", that contains many substratical relics from Lithuanian and Polish.Valerijus Čekmonas, Laima Grumadaitė Kalbų paplitimas rytų Lietuvoje (The distribution of the languages in the east of Lithuania) in Lietuvos rytai; straipsnių rinkinys (The east of Lithuania; the collection of the articles) Vilnius 1993; p. 132;
According to ethnologist Yury Vnukovich, the linguistic situation in the Vilnius Region presents a unique "ethnic anomaly": while the Lithuanians are identified by the local population primarily by their language, for the local Slavic-speakers, their everyday language ("prostaya mova") is not a marker of ethnicity. Residents who speak this Belarusian vernacular identify as Poles based on other factors, primarily their Catholic faith (locally perceived as the "Polish faith") and their origin from the Vilnius region.
Vnukovich notes that the "simple speech" is often stigmatized by its speakers as "uneducated" or "mixed". In contrast, the standard Polish language holds a high prestige and symbolic value. Even if local residents do not speak standard Polish fluently in daily life, they often demonstrate their Polish identity by reciting prayers, songs, or greetings in Polish.
Education Absolute numbers with Polish language education at Lithuanian rural schools (1980)MunicipalityLithuanianRussianPolish Vilnius district1,2504,1506,400 Šalčininkai5002,0503,200 Trakai2,90050950 Širvintos2,400100100 Švenčionys1,350600100 Varėna6,000050Absolute number with Polish language education at Lithuanian urban schools was 5,600 As of 1980, about 20% of Polish Lithuanian students chose Polish as the language of instruction at school."Атлас Литовской ССР" 1981, Государственный плановый комитет Литовской ССР. Министерство высшего и среднего специального образования Литовской ССР. Главное управление геодезии и картографии при Совете Министров СССР. Москва 1981. In the same year, about 60–70% of rural Polish communities chose Polish. However, even in towns with a predominantly Polish population, the share of Polish-language education was less than the percentage of Poles. Even though, historically, Poles tended to strongly oppose Russification, one of the most important reasons to choose Russian language education was the absence of a Polish-language college and university learning in the USSR, and during Soviet times Polish students in Lithuania were not allowed to get college/university education across the border in Poland. Only in 2007, the first small branch of the Polish University of Białystok opened in Vilnius. In 1980 there were 16,400 school students instructed in Polish. Their number declined to 11,400 in 1990. In independent Lithuania between 1990 and 2001, the number of Polish mother tongue children attending schools with Polish as the language of instruction doubled to over 22,300, then gradually decreased to 18,392 in 2005.Mercator – Education information, documentation, research. see: graph on p.16 (PDF file, 2.2 MB) Accessed 2008-01-14. In September 2003, there were 75 Polish-language general education schools and 52 which provided education in Polish in a combination of languages (for example Lithuanian-Polish, Lithuanian-Russian-Polish). These numbers fell to 49 and 41 in 2011, reflecting a general decline in the number of schools in Lithuania.Arvydas Matulionis et al.The Polish Minority in Lithuania . ENRI-East Research Report #8. 2011. p. 18. Polish government was concerned in 2015 about the education in Polish.
History until 1990
Grand Duchy of Lithuania (before 1795)
The first Polish people in Lithuania were mainly enslaved war captives from the Polish–Lithuanian wars. Poles started to migrate to the Grand Duchy in more noticeable numbers after Christianization of the country and establishment of the union between Poland and Lithuania in 1385. In the 15th-16th centuries, there were not many Poles in Lithuania, but they enjoyed a privileged social status – they were found in highly regarded places and their culture was considered prestigious. With time Polish people became part of the local landowning class. Lithuanian nobles welcomed fugitive Polish peasants and settled them on uncultivated land, but they usually assimilated with Belarusians and Lithuanians peasants within few generations. In the 16th century, the largest concentrations of Poles in Lithuania were located in Podlachia, the border areas of Samogitia, Lithuania and Belarus, and the cities of Vilnius, Brest, Kaunas, Grodno, Kėdainiai, and Nyasvizh. During that period, the royal and grand ducal courts were nearly entirely composed of Polish speakers. Polish quickly supplanted Ruthenian as the language of Lithuanian elite after the latter had switched to speaking Ruthenian and Polish at the beginning of the 16th century. Reformation gave another impetus to the spread of Polish, as the Bible and other religious texts were translated from Latin to Polish. Since the second half of the 16th century, Poles predominated in Protestant schools and printing houses in Lithuania, and the life of local protestant congregations. There were also numerous Poles among the Jesuits residing in Lithuania.
The influx of Poles to Lithuania significantly increased after the Union of Lublin. This population movement created a fertile ground for socio-cultural Polonization of ethnically Lithuanian territories. While Poles and foreigners were generally prohibited from holding public offices in the Grand Duchy, Polish people gradually gained this right through the acquisition of Lithuanian land. Poor nobles from the Crown rented land from local magnates. The number of Poles grew also in the towns, among others in Vilnius, Kaunas, and Grodno. Vilnius became the most important center of the Polish intelligentsia in the Grand Duchy, with Poles predominating in the city in the mid-17th century.
Already in the 16th century Polish became the first language of the Lithuanian magnates. In the following centuries it was adopted by the Lithuanian nobility in general. Even the Samogitian nobility used the Polish language already in the 17th century. The Polish language also penetrated other social strata: the clergy, the townspeople, and even the peasants. During the Commonwealth, a Polish-dominated territory started to be slowly formed in the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. The Polish historian estimated that by the end of the 18th century, Polish and Polonized people constituted 25% of the Grand Duchy's inhabitants.
Lithuania under Russian rule (1795–1918)