ВОСТОЧНЫЕ ГОСТИ В ЛИТВЕ: НАЧАЛО РАССЕЛЕНИЯ И ЭТНИЧЕСКИЕ ОСОБЕННОСТИ ЛИТОВСКИХ ТАТАР

Abstract

This article is about one of the national minorities of modern Lithuania – the Lithuanian Tatars and the reasons for their appearance in the territory of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania. From the beginning, Lithuania was formed as a multi-confessional and multi-ethnic state. The appearance on Lithuanian soil of natives of the Golden Horde expanded the national variety of the principality. Despite the fact that at first the Tatar settlers did not have a common faith, and some later fled their homeland due to the forced Islamization carried out by Khan Uzbek, later Tatar colonization contributed to the formation of the Muslim community of Lithuania. The article also pays close attention to the language issue of Lithuanian Tatars. While stating that unlike the Karaites, who came to the Grand Duchy of Lithuania at the same time as the Tatars, the latter failed to preserve their language as a universal identifier, the author considers different versions explaining such a phenomenon. The author emphasizes that before the beginning of the processes of adoption and introduction of Catholicism, the Lithuanian state and the Lithuanian people did not know inter-religious and inter-ethnic conflicts, peacefully coexisting with other ethnic groups within one political organism. It reflected in the mentality of the Lithuanian people and largely explains the modern policy of the Republic of Lithuania towards national minorities.