Saturday 9 March 2013

The Statutes of Lithuania



Card no 424 –  Anastasia
 The Statutes of Lithuania
Country Card Sent From: Belarus
Place that Card Sender Lives:  Minsk
Date Received: 1st March 2013
Distance Travelled:  1,246 miles
Time Taken: 6 days 


This card shows the Statutes of Lithuania originally known as the Statutes of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania were a 16th century codification of all the legislation of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and its successor, the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth. The statutes were important as, at that time, unlike the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, most European countries were absolute monarchies that did not invest as much authority in legislative bodies or seek to codify their acts. 


The Statutes consist of three legal codes (1529, 1566, and 1588) all written in Old Chancery Slavonic language, translated into Latin and later Polish. They formed the basis of the legal system of the Grand Duchy.

Anastasia’s writing is wonderfully neat – it so puts mine to shame.  After the greeting ‘Hello John’ she wrote

I put it into Google Translate but without success.  (That’s a hint to Mish!)


There were lots of lovely stamps on this card.  Some Peonies and Petunias.

The raccoon dog (Nyctereutes procyonoides)

I recognised this species – it is the Curlew whose cry I can sometimes hear over our house at it heads towards the Dee Estuary.

4 comments:

  1. Captain Mish is ready to help! :))

    Pryvitanne (Прывiтанне) is from the Belarusian language and means "Hello" :)

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    1. P.S. I cheated and used Google translate - I hope it means 'Thank you!'.

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    2. You are absolutely right :) Unfortunately, the language is not widely used, although it is one of the two official languages. We learn it at schools, but most of people speak Russian in their daily life, and Belarusian is sometimes spoken by old people or people in the villages, small towns (it's likely to be a mixture of Belarusian and Russian or a dialect)... But young people with a strong sense of belonging to the traditional culture are also using it, as historically Belarusian is our motherlanguage and Russian is adopted. I have a friend who is participating in a knight's club, she speaks Belarusian with her clubmates, but speaks Russian in daily life. I can also write and speak Belarusian and had it as a final exam at school (most of people choose Russian), but I also use Russian as 99,99% people I contact with speak it.

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