Where the Belarusian language was spoken a century ago, today Polish reigns. What remains of Belarusian dialects in Lithuania

The Franciscan monastery in Norviliškės – the Lithuanian-Belarusian border runs just a hundred meters beyond the forest. In the Dieveniškės salient, everything has changed: once the Soviet authorities handed this territory over to Lithuania because it was a Lithuanian language enclave, and now a "skansen" (open-air museum) has formed here, where the Belarusian dialect is best preserved. Photo: Wikimedia Commons

The fresh issue of the scientific journal Acta Albaruthenica for 2025 featured a large-scale study by Polish linguist Mirosław Jankowiak from the Institute of Slavic Studies of the Czech Academy of Sciences.

The author analyzed the works of his predecessors over the past 120 years and added the results of his own field expeditions, which lasted from 2008 to 2025. The collected material allows tracing how the borders of our language changed in the northwest.

BNR ambitions

The works of Yaukhim Karski are traditionally considered the starting point in determining the historical boundaries of the Belarusian ethnos. During his 1903 expedition, he recorded the area of dominance of Belarusian dialects.

Павялічыць

Map of Belarusian dialects, compiled by Academician Yaukhim Karski. Photo: Wikimedia Commons

The line ran from Daugavpils and Zarasai (formerly Novoaleksandrovsk) through Švenčionys, encompassing Širvintos and Kernavė. Settlements such as Vilnius, Nemenčinė, and Maišiagala remained within the Belarusian-speaking area. Further south, the border circled Trakai, passed through Vievis and Merkinė, descending to Druskininkai and Suwałki.

These same data were later confirmed by the Moscow Dialectological Commission in 1915.

It was Karski's scientific authority and Mitrofan Dovnar-Zapolsky's research that formed the basis for creating the well-known map of the Belarusian National Republic of 1918.

It was drawn in Berlin for the Paris Peace Conference and laid claim to all lands where the Belarusian language was spoken, including not only the Vilnius region but also Suwałki and Białystok.

Interwar paradoxes

After the First World War and the Polish-Lithuanian conflict, the region was divided. In the Vilnius region, which became part of interwar Poland, intensive Polonization processes took place.

Polish researcher Halina Turska, studying the local language in the late 1930s, concluded that southeastern Lithuania was historically Baltic, then partially Belarusified, and later began to switch to Polish.

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Linguistic situation in the Vilnius region at the beginning of the XX century according to research by Aloyzas Vidugiris. A complex zone of contact between Belarusian (pink), Lithuanian (green) and Polish (yellow) dialects is recorded. Photo: Wikimedia Commons

The state administration, school, and church did their work: the Catholic population, even speaking Belarusian, began to identify themselves as Poles.

A completely different situation developed on the other side of the border, in the interwar Republic of Lithuania (with its center in Kaunas). According to the Russian census of 1897, more than seventy thousand Belarusians lived in these lands, mostly in villages near Trakai.

But already the Lithuanian census of 1923 showed a catastrophic, sixteen-fold drop in the number of Belarusians in Lithuania. Belarusians there turned into small linguistic islands, scattered even in areas far from the modern border — near Šiauliai, Telšiai, and Raseiniai.

Soviet maps and the phenomenon of "simple language"

In the post-war period, interest in the region revived thanks to work on the multi-volume "Dictionary of Belarusian Dialects of North-Western Belarus and Its Borderlands."

In the 1960s and 70s, Soviet linguists recorded Belarusian speech in dozens of villages in the Trakai, Varėna, Šalčininkai, Vilnius, and Ignalina districts of the Lithuanian SSR.

Researchers confirmed that east of the Buivydžiai — Rudamina — Rūdiškės line, the Belarusian language remained the predominant means of communication for the older generation.

Павялічыць

Belarusian song festival in Šalčininkai. Photo: Facebook group of the Belarusian Cultural Center "Ranitsa".

The baton was taken over by Professor Valery Chekman of Vilnius University, who researched the multilingualism of the region until the early 2000s.

Already then, scientists encountered an interesting sociolinguistic phenomenon: local residents called their language not Belarusian, but "simple" or "local," while identifying themselves as Poles.

The sphere of use of this language was constantly narrowing, giving way to official Polish (which remained the language of the church and local intelligentsia), as well as Russian and Lithuanian.

Reality of the XXI century

In modern linguistics, optimistic assessments are sometimes found. For example, Belarusian researcher from Vilnius Lilia Plyhavka asserted ten years ago that Belarusian dialects are concentrated in a continuous massif along the border and firmly serve as a means of communication alongside the Polish language.

However, one hundred thirty hours of audio recordings made by Mirosław Jankowiak over the past sixteen years paint a much more dramatic picture: Belarusian is systematically being displaced.

Павялічыць

Ethnolinguistic situation in the region according to the 2021 census. Green and light green colors indicate territories where the number of Lithuanian speakers is 0-25% and 25-50% respectively. Orange and red — 50-75% and 75-100% respectively. Photo: Center for Geolinguistics of the Institute of the Lithuanian Language

The geography of this fading is uneven. In the Varėna district, the Belarusian language is pressed right up to the border: forests separated Slavic settlements from Baltic ones. The dialect can still be heard here in the villages of Kotra, Rudnia, Raky, or Paramok, but it is used exclusively by the oldest generation, which means its rapid disappearance.

Павялічыць

Territories where Mirosław Jankowiak conducted research in 2008-2025.

In the section from Kalesninkai to Šalčininkai, previously described as confidently bilingual, finding a Belarusian-speaking interlocutor today is a great stroke of luck. The Polish language has definitively triumphed here.

The researcher managed to record remnants of the dialect only in Daugedai, Gerviškės, and Kaniūkai.

The so-called Dieveniškės salient — a territory deeply cutting into Belarus — remains a unique linguistic open-air museum. Historically, it was Baltic, but after the war, it experienced an influx of Slavic population. There, the Belarusian language is still recorded in Dailidės, Milkunai, Krakunai, and Norviliškės.

Павялічыць

Villages like Šumskas near Vilnius remain a strong stronghold of Belarusian dialects in Lithuania. Photo: Wikimedia Commons

The Vilnius district remains the most enduring stronghold of Belarusian dialects, especially villages to the east and southeast of the capital: Lavoriškės, Šumskas, Mastiškės, Slabada. This is the only area where the Belarusian dialect can still be recorded in almost every settlement.

At the same time, in the north, in the Švenčionys and Ignalina districts, rapid assimilation towards the Lithuanian language is occurring.

For example, in the Slavic triangle of Rimšė — Gaidė — Vidzy, even in 2014, out of twenty-three surveyed villages, the Belarusian dialect was found in only three. All generations there have switched to Polish or Russian, and the old Belarusian islands around Kaunas have been definitively lost.

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