Lithuanian nationalism and the question of the prospective capital (end of the 19th – beginning of the 20th century)

In this article, I try to reveal the reasons for this choice of Vilnius as a capital of modern Lithuania in late imperial period, and then identify the problems that Lithuanian nationalists faced in seeking to implement this goal. Then the problem of how the leaders of the Lithuanian National Movement hoped to implement this goal will be analyzed. This article argues that Lithuanian nationalism proclaimed Vilnius to be the capital of ethnographic Lithuania because in this way ties with historic Lithuania (the Grand Duchy of Lithuania) were declared; it was the most important religious centre; it was also the official centre of the Northwest Region, so the greatest resources were accumulated in the city; only after an entrenchment in Vilnius would it be possible to influence the Lithuanians of the Vilnius province. The implementation of this political objective ran up against several obstacles: the very unfavourable ethnodemographic situation of Lithuanians in the city and its area, and the disapproval among foreigners of the political autonomy (or even an independent nation-state) of ethnographic Lithuania, which would also include Vilnius. Despite these problems, most Lithuanian nationalist leaders consistently supported the idea. For the Lithuanian Social Democrats, linguistic and other similar ethno-cultural differences were not a very important factor; therefore, from their point of view, no problems should arise in inserting Vilnius into modern Lithuania. Other political forces tried to find allies among the movements that opposed the Russian Empire, but their searches did not produce results. Some of the Lithuanian leaders, firstly from the right, hoped for the support of the Imperial government, but it was not ready to agree to the territorialisation of ethnicity, and thus to the autonomy of ethnographic Lithuania. Hence, already in the late 19th and early 20th century, it could be seen clearly that the aspiration of Lithuanian nationalism to become established in ethnographic Lithuania with the Vilnius area could hardly be implemented