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GUIDE TO THE
EXHIBITION "CHRISTIANITY IN LITHUANIAN ART"
(28 December, 1999 - 31
December, 2003)
Hall X
The Reformation movement reached Lithuania in the second decade of
the 16th century. Its ideas were brought home and proliferated by the
young Lithuanian nobility such as Abraomas
 Kulvietis,
Jurgis Zablockis, Stanislovas Rapolionis, who
 were
alumni of universities in Western Europe. The first high school in
Lithuania, the school of Abraomas Kulvietis operated in Vilnius from
1539 until 1542.
The Reformation movement sought to render Christianity pure and simple
as it was in its Biblical sources. Protestants cast away dramatized
rites of the liturgy, veneration of saints and their relics. They
recognized personal faith as the only road to salvation, while the
Gospel remained the only authority in the realm of teaching. A small
building topped by a single spire, of ascetic interior, was the unique
style of the Evangelical Lutheran church, which emerged in the 16th
century. Equally simple became liturgical objects and vessels, as well
as the service, which was performed in the language of the majority of
believers.
Evangelical Lutherans were the first to start translating religious
texts into Lithuanian. Many of such books were printed in Königsberg,
among them the Catechism, the first Lithuanian book by
Martynas Mazvydas (Mosvidius), an Evangelical Lutheran pastor.
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Jug. Poland, metalwork
factory of Józef Fraget.
1860. Silver gilt metal.
Evangelical Reformed
Church in Birzai
(showcase 1) |
Chalice. Lithuania,
the 1st half of the 17th c.
Gilt silver. Evangelical
Reformed Church in
Birzai (showcase 1) |
Chalice. Danzig,
Michael Dietrich, 2nd
half of the 18th c. Gilt
silver. Evangelical
Reformed Church in
Birzai (showcase 1) |
Jug with the
coat-of-arms of the
Radvila family.
Donation by Kristupas
Radvila, Governor of
Vilnius. Lithuania, 1613.
Silver. Evangelical
Reformed Church in
Birzai (showcase 1) |
Currently, the Evangelical Lutherans of Lithuania worship in over
40 churches. Most of them are located in the Klaipeda region. The war
and the after-war effects badly devastated the cultural heritage of
the Lutherans. Not only churches but even the cemeteries were
vandalized. Numerous metal crosses from destroyed
Lutheran cemeteries were collected by Dionyzas Varkalis. Graceful
forms and intricate foliage patterns of the metalwork is evidence that
this part of the country had many skilled black smiths. Crosses of
Lithuania-Minor differ from the wooden ones of Lithuania-Major, not
only in their artistic qualities, but also in the absence of the
Crucified Christ on the cross. Instead, oval plaques, ceramic or made
of enamelled wood, were fixed at the centre of such crosses with data
on the buried individual. Many such crosses were products of the
workshops of Gustaw Katzke (founded in 1895) and Franz Grim.
Evangelical Lutherans’ burial markers, krikstai, used
to be put up at the foot of the grave which was a unique practice.
Carved of groove-and-tongue boards, such grave markers were decorated
predominantly in open work patterns of foliage, heart, coo-coo and
other birds. Frequently, the ornamentals of krikstai
incorporated a Latin or Greek cross. Most extant krikstai
are found in the old cemeteries of fishermen on the Nemunas
 delta
and on the Curonian Spit.
Though the first congregations of Evangelical Reformed believers (the
name taken by the Calvinists of Lithuania) in the Grand Duchy of
Lithuania were preceded by those of Lutherans by several years,
Calvinism spread rapidly and was soon to establish itself as the
strongest Protestant faith in Lithuania. The success of Calvinism
rested largely on the active support provided by the Radvila nobles
who spread and established the Evangelical Reformed faith. It was very
important for Lithuania that the ideas of the Reformation take seed as
it developed the norms of civic conduct, which were practiced by the
well-to-do laity who did not limit themselves to supporting the
church, but became involved in organizing schools, publishing books,
and establishing printing houses. Among the illustrious supporters of
the Reformation in Lithuania was Duke Mikalojus Radvila the Black,
Chancellor of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and Governor of Vilnius who
became founder of a printing shop for Protestant writings in Brasta.
In 1563, this printing shop produced a Bible in the
Polish language.
The first Reformed books in the Lithuanian language were printed
abroad. In 1652, Jonusas Radvila, the Commander-in-Chief of Lithuania
and Governor of Vilnius, founded a printing shop in Kedainiai, which
had to print Lithuanian writings for the Calvinists. Evangelical
Reformers operated primary and high schools education in Vilnius,
Birzai and Kedainiai. The Radvila family had plans to establish a
school of higher academic studies.
The Church buildings and the worship services of the Evangelical
Reformed faith are even less adorned than those of the Lutheran
denomination. The requirement of moderation determined the unique
style and form of their liturgical vessels, which are huge and heavy,
usually a work of good quality by local goldsmith or those of Danzig.
Over the period from the 16th to the 18th centuries, such vessels were
commissioned by the Radvila family, other families of the nobility and
gentry, as well as city-dwellers.
There are nine church buildings of the Evangelical Reformed Church in
present-day Lithuania. The centre of the Evangelical Reformed Synod is
located in Birzai.
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