Grand Duchy of Lithuania , state, including Lithuania , Belarus and western Ukraine , which became one of the most influential powers in Eastern Europe (14th - 16th centuries). Pressed by the Crusaders Germans and Livian Knights united the Lithuanian tribes Mindaugas (d. 1263) and formed during the reign of a strong, contiguous Grand Duchy Gediminas (reg. 1316–41), which has its borders above the upper Dvina in the northeast to Dnepr to the southeast and to the Pripet swamps to the south extended . After Gediminas' death, he was succeeded by two of his sons: Kęstutis ruled Lithuania itself, preventing territorial encroachments by the German knights and their allies Algirdas , the titular Grand Duke , continued his father's policy of expansion and stretched by capturing huge Russian and Tatar Areas its area from the Baltic Sea to Black Sea .
Heavily influenced by their Russian subjects, the Lithuanians didn't just organize their army, Government Administration as well as legal and financial systems based on Russian models, but also made it possible for the Russian nobility to his orthodox religion , its privileges and local authority keep .
However, the Lithuanians also remained connected to their western neighbors; 1385 under pressure from the enemy Teutonic Knights, the Grand Duke Jogaila (r. 1377–1434) made a pact with Poland (Union of Krewo), which agrees to implement the Roman Catholic Believe assume , the polish queen to marry to become king of Poland and unite Poland and Lithuania under a single ruler. Jogaila took the Polish name Władysław II Jagiełło.
Polish influence later began to replace Russian influence in Lithuania. However, the Grand Duchy retained its Autonomy and ruled by Vytautas , Jogaila's cousin and former political rival who was made viceroy in 1392, stretched to the rivers Ugra and okay from the east, assumed a dominant role in Tatar and East Russian political affairs and became the most powerful state in Eastern Europe. In 1410, Lithuania led by Vytautas also joined Poland and decisively defeated the country German Knights (Battle of Tannenberg). As a result, it gained control of the north-western territory of Samogitia (confirmed 1422) and permanently reduced the German threat to Lithuania.
After the death of Vytautas (1430), Lithuania continued to have its own rulers, nominally subordinate to the Polish king, but the Maintained Lithuania's autonomy and authority in Eastern European affairs. When the Poles elected the 19-year-old Grand Duke of Lithuania Casimir as their king (1447), the two countries became somewhat more closely connected. In an attempt to guarantee Lithuania's independent status, Casimir granted the Lithuanian boyars who had appointed him grand duke (1447) a charter outlining the rights and privileges of the Nobles were reviewed, given extensive authority over the peasantry, and thereby increased their political power.
The Grand Duke's authority then declined, and without its strong ruler, Lithuania could not prevent the Tatars from conquering its southern lands constantly being attacked. nor could it stop Muscovy from the annexation of the Novgorod principalities (1479) and Tver (1485), who had maintained close ties with Lithuania, reported the conquest of a third of the Russian lands of Lithuania (1499– 1503) and from the conquest of Smolensk (1514), which had held Lithuania since 1408.
During the 16th century, Lithuania made great economic advances, including agrarian reforms, and generally seemed to be stronger, dynamic State to assert . When the wars between Moscow and Lithuania resumed in the US In the Livonian War (1558–83), however, Lithuania's resources were strained and it was forced to turn to Poland for help. The Poles refused unless the two states were formally united. Lithuanian resistance to a union was strong, but when Sigismund II Augustus (Grand Duke of Lithuania 1544–72; King of Poland 1548–72) united one third of Lithuanian territories ( Volhynia , Kyiv, Bratslav and Podlasia) with Poland, the Lithuanians had to accept Union of Lublin (1569).
Under the terms of the Union, Lithuania officially remained an independent state and formed an equal partner with Poland in a Polish-Lithuanian confederation. Nevertheless, it soon became the subordinate member of the new state. His nobility adopted Polish customs and language; Their administration was organized along Polish lines and followed Polish politics. Although the peasants retained their Lithuanian identity, Lithuania was from 1569 to the late 18th century when the Division of Poland it into the Russian Empire politically integral Part of Poland .