EXHIBITION "CHRISTIANITY IN LITHUANIAN ART"
(28 December, 1999 - 31 December, 2003)

CHRISTIANITY SIGNS IN LITHUANIA

Showcase 1 - The first Attempts to Baptize Lithuania. 1008-1009
Showcase 2 - From Netimeras to Mindaugas. 11th-13th c. 
Showcase 3 - Baptism and Coronation of Mindaugas. 1251-1253
Showcase 4 - Christian Kingdom of Lithuania. 1253-1263
Showcase 5 - The Ideas of the Grand Duke of Lithuania Gediminas to adopt Christianity. 1317-1324, 1341
Showcase 6 - The Intentions of the Grand Duke of Lithuania Kestutis to Adopt Christianity. 1349-1351, 1357-1358, 1373
Showcase 7 - Baptism of Lithuania. 1387
Showcase 8 - Baptism of Samogitia (Zemaitija). 1413-1417
Showcase 9 - Prince Casimir (3 October 1458-4 March 1484)
Showcase 10 - The Interaction between the Catholic and Orthodox Churches
Showcase 11 - The Oldest Text of Lithuanian Prayers
Showcase 12 - Reformation in Lithuania
Showcase 13 - Seals of Lithuanian Rulers and Nobility. 14th-16th c. 
Showcase 14 - Jesuits in Lithuania. The Foundation of an Academy
Showcase 15 - The Catholic Reform (Counter-Reformation)
Showcase 16 - The Brest (Lithuanian Brasta) Church Union. 1596
Showcase 17 - St Casimir. Canonized in 1602
Showcase 18 - The Vilnius Cathedral. 1782-1801
Showcase 19 - Bishop Motiejus Valancius. 1850-1875
Showcase 20 - The Establishment of the Independent Church Province. 1926
Showcase 21 - The Congratulatory Address of Cardinal Vincentas Sladkevicius

The path of Lithuania to Christianity was far from easy. The first missions of Christians from Middle Europe and Scandinavia reached Lithuanian and other Baltic lands prior to the great Eastern schisms. The earliest known mention of the name Lithuania in Quedlinburg Annals in 1009 is also related to one of such missions, whose initiator and guide was the archbishop and monk Bruno Bonifacius of Querfurt, who baptized the Lithuanian duke Netimeras later assassinated by the enemies of the new faith (showcase 1; the fragment of Quedlinburg Annals; the 17th c. frescos by Michelangelo Palloni). Due to the aggression waged by the rulers of the Kiev Russia, a natural development of Lithuania’s self-dependence and the conversion to Western Christianity was broken for a long time. And it was as early as that period of time that the south-eastern regions of the future state of Lithuania experienced the influence of the cultural sphere of the Orthodox Church (showcase 2; the 11th c. Orthodox Turov Gospel, the 13th c. Catholic Bible of the North Italian St Jerome). In the mid 13th century Duke Mindaugas established a unified state of Lithuania and making efforts to repel the military campaigns of the Teutonic Order accepted the Catholic faith together with the members of his family, a number of his courtiers and warriors in 1251. In 1253 he was crowned as the first and the only King of Lithuania (showcase 3; the 1251 copies of the six bulls announced by Pope Innocentius IV concerning Mindaugas and the baptism of Lithuania, the 1255 Donation Act of the King of Lithuania Mindaugas with the ruler’s stamp and its copy, the fragment of the 17th c. portrait of the Blessed Vitus with the baptism scene of Mindaugas, the 1951-1955 picture The Coronation of Mindaugas by Adomas Varnas). It was the time when the first Lithuanian bishops were consecrated - the monk of the Livonian Order Christianus and the Dominican Blessed Vitus, the Lithuanian diocese established which due to Mindaugas’ efforts was directly patronized by the Holy Throne, the Pope consolidated Lithuanian monarchy inherited by one dynasty, took it under his patronage and recognized it a heir to the heritage of the Kiev Principality (showcase 4; the 1253 and 1259 privileges granted by King Mindaugas, the 1298 Act witnessing the determination of the Lithuanians to accept the Catholic faith as well as the baptism and coronation of Mindaugas, the cover of the 14th c. Orthodox Laurushavo Gospel with the picture of Mindaugas’ son Vaisvilkas and the title page of the Gospel). Mindaugas, however, was assassinated and the efforts of the Grand Duke Gediminas (showcase 5; the transumpts of Gediminas’ 1323 letters and the treaty with the Livonian Order, the copy of the letter of Pope Johannes XXII referring to baptism) and the Grand Duke Kestutis (showcase 6; the 1349 letters of Pope Clement VI to Gediminas referring to baptism and coronation, the 1379 treaty of the Lithuanian rulers Jogaila (Vladislaus Jagiello), Kestutis, Lengvenis and Vytautas the Great with the Teutonic Order and the copies of those dukes’ seals) to adopt Christianity were not crowned with success due to various reasons. The vast territories of Eastern Slavs that in the period between the 2nd half of the 13th century and the early 15th century became the integral part of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania remained in the sphere of the Orthodox Church influence. Whereas the ethnographic Lithuania finally became a part of the civilization of Catholic Europe and Latin West only at the end of the 14th century, when in 1387 the Grand Duke of Lithuania Jogaila, after he was crowned King of Poland, and Vytautas the Great began to realize one of the major provisions stipulated in the Act of Krewo (Kreva) - the baptism of Lithuania. It was then that the Vilnius Diocese was established, at first also directly subordinate to the Holy Throne, and the first parish churches were built (showcase 7; the 1387 privilege of the ruler of Lithuania and Poland Jogaila to the Vilnius Diocese, the late 14th c. French make ivory diptych from the Vilnius Cathedral treasury, the 1404 letter of the Grand Duke of Lithuania Vytautas to the Master of the Teutonic Order and the copy of the great seal of Lithuania’s ruler). After the Grunwald (Zalgiris) victory in 1410, the cousins Vytautas and Jogaila began the baptism of Samogitia (Zemaitija) (showcase 8; the 1412 bull of Pope Johannes XXIII approving the construction of a chaple on the field of the Grunwald Battle, the 17th c. portrait of the Grand Ruler of Lithuania Vytautas the Great, the 1421 privilege of Vytautas granted to the bishop of Samogitia, the 1422 Meln Peace Treaty between Lithuania and Poland and the Teutonic Order). As soon as the Grand Duchy of Lithuania acquired the status of a Christian state, parishes were formed and monasteries opened in its Christian part. When Pope Martin V announced Vytautas the Great Apostolic Vicar of Novgorod and Pskov (showcase 8; the 1418 copy of the Act concluded by Pope Martin V), he strove not only for a royal crown but also for an independent province of the Lithuanian Catholic Church with the Throne of an archbishop metropolitan in the Vilnius Cathedral. Also wanted independent metropolitate of Lithuania’s Orthodox Church to be established with its metropolis. With a view at consolidating a multinational Lithuanian society split in respect of religious faith (showcase 10; the 14th c. Orthodox Mstizh Gospel and the 15th c. Catholic Venetian Biblia Latina), efforts were renewed to form the union of the Catholic and Orthodox Churches, however, it was realized in Lithuania and Poland only in 1596. (Showcase 16; the collection of resolutions adopted at the Brest (Lithuanian Brasta) Convention and two manuscript books of the Vilnius Uniat Basilian Monastery). 
The signs of writing and print displayed at the entrance hall of the art exhibition Christianity in Lithuanian Art and the exposition spaces presenting the Vilnius and Samogitian historical diocese witness the peripetias of the path followed by that complex Christianity to Lithuania, reveal the major facts and processes of a millenium - long development of Christianity in Lithuania from the 11th century up to the early 20th century and mark the merits of prominent personalities in the sphere of religion and culture. Beside the unique parchments, incunabula and books kept in the library of the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences (showcases 2, 7, 10, 12, 16-20), the library of Vilnius University (showcases 11, 12, 15, 16), the Lithuanian State History Archives (showcase 14), the M. K. Ciurlionis National Museum of Art (showcases 2, 8) and the archives of the Curia of the Kaunas Archdiocese Metropolitate (showcase 20) a big collection of the copies of documents received from foreign depositories is presented for the first time at this exhibition. The collection witnesses Christian missions and the first ages of the spreading of Christianity in Lithuania. It includes the fragment of the Quedlinburg Annals with the first mention of the name Lithuania in 1009 from the Saxony land, the State and University Library in Dresden (Sächsische Landes-, Staats- und Universitätsbibliothek Dresden; showcase 1), the letters and their copies, privileges granted by King Mindaugas, the Grand Dukes Gediminas, Kestutis, Jogaila, Vytautas, Casimir, Alexander, Sigismund the Old and by other Lithuanian rulers, statesmen and high church dignitaries, as well as papal bulls, the interstate treaties from the Vatican Secret Archives (Archivio Segreto Vaticano; showcases 3, 5, 6, 8, 9), the Secret Archives of the Prussian State Cultural Heritage in Berlin (Geheimes Staatsarchiv Preußischer Kulturbesitz, Berlin-Dahlem; showcases 3-8, 13) and the Latvian State History Archives in Riga (Latvijas Valsts Vestures Archivs; showcases 4, 5). The majority of these documents are embellished with authentic seals, splendid initials and miniatures. The P. Gudynas Restoration Centre under the Lithuanian Art Museum has prepared identical copies of the earliest seals attached to the acts of the Lithuanian rulers (showcases 3, 6, 7, 13). The times of the Lithuanian King Mindaugas are also reflected by two unique treasures of plastics - the fragment (leg) of an aquamanile executed in Saxony in the 1st half of the 13th century, discovered during archaeological excavations on the territory of the Lower Castle of the Palace of the Grand Dukes in Vilnius and the 13th century stone statuette of a lion cub with the signs of a cross and crown (showcase 2). According to Dr M. Matusakaite, this collection of treasure possessed by the M. K. Ciurlionis National Museum of Art reveals some features peculiar to Romanesque style.
The treasures of writing and print kept in Lithuanian libraries and archives as well as those borrowed and displayed at the exhibition witness the first steps of the Lithuanian Christian written language (showcase 11) and the book (showcase 12), reflect the processes of Reformation (showcase 12) and the Catholic Reform (Counter-Reformation) (showcases 14, 15), the file of the beatification and canonization of the Lithuanian patron St Casimir (showcases 9, 17), the features of the history peculiar to the traditional Christian confessions in Lithuania - Catholic, Orthodox, Uniat, Old Believers, Lutheran and Evangelican Reformers, submit information on the patrons of sacred art and its talented creators (showcase 18; bishop duke Ignas Jokubas Masalskis (Ignatius Jakobus Massalski) the architect Laurynas Gucevicius, the painter Pranciskus Smuglevicius (Franciszek Smuglewicz), and accentuate the merits of bishop Motiejus Valancius, a promoter of Lithuanianism (showcase 19). This introductory part of the exposition chronologically goes back to the times of the Blessed archbishop Jurgis Matulaitis and the establishment of the independent Lithuanian Catholic Church Province 1926 (showcase 20).
From the showcase of the last hall every visitor to the exhibition is welcomed by one of its patrons - Cardinal of the Holy Rome Church Vincentas Sladkevicius (Showcase 21).

Information of the LAM
Photos by A. Luksenas

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