The Sejm of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania in the 15th–mid-16th centuries

The Sejm of Lithuania was a result of geopolitical factors and the privileges granted to the estates by the Ruler. In the Middle Ages, Lithuania’s rulers solved the issues in a circle of relatives and the most influential noblemen (most often dukes). The historians call this circle the Council of the Grand Duke according to the name that was common in the 15^th century. True, its definition in the sources sometimes raises unnecessary associations with the present-day state institutions, so it can mislead an inexperienced reader. Peter of Dusburg, when writing about the meeting convened by Duke Vytenis in 1306, defined it by the term tractatus seu parlamentum. That was a meeting of the Ruler’s reliable advisers only rather than that of the representatives of wider society.

Levers of power in the hands of the noblemen

At the turn of the 14^th–15^th centuries, after the baptism of Lithuania, the noblemen began to play an important role in the Council of the Ruler. The privileges granted to them in 1387 gradually formed culture of the relation between the Ruler and the noblemen based on written law. The understanding of the provisions of the privileges is of interpretative nature therefore the relations based on official letters provide for the relations established more than once and for good, and a continuous dialogue between the giver and receiver of the official letter.

These efforts gradually united the nobility, beginning with the most influential, active and conscious and ending with the widest masses of the nobility. Thus, when concluding the 1401 Vilnius-Radom Agreement, which provided for the future of the throne of the Ruler of Lithuania, the meeting of the Bishop of Lithuania and the lords confirmed it with responsibility. Some historians consider it to be the first Sejm of Lithuania but it seems that those who say that it was an extended meeting of the Council of the Grand Duke are right. Until the beginning of the fourth decade of the 15^th century such meetings had an obvious Catholic shade. Though later this situation was changed by the 1432 privilege of Zygmunt Kiejstutowicz, which granted the rights of the Lithuanian noblemen to the orthodox noblemen (with the exception of the right to fill in the highest state offices), and a small informal group of Catholic noblemen became established in all most important offices, which adopted the decisions that were of extreme importance to the country. The unstable position of Lithuania’s Rulers after the death of Vytautas until Casimir Jagiellon established himself allowed this group to gain even more rights and valuable political experience. Between 1430 and 1440, they elected their rulers three times, most often disregarding the opinion of the ruling dynasty (the Jagellonians). They demanded and obtained new privileges from every new ruler.

It was in the documents of the second half of the fifth decade of the 15^th century that the first mentions of the Sejm (соимъ) was found. Do they mean any organisational change in the meetings of the Lithuanian nobility? Hardly. The contexts of the documents in which the Sejm is mentioned confirm this doubt: the Council of Lords (наша верная рада) is the acting part of the Sejm in all the documents. The composition of the Council was not defined anywhere though the individuals who were established in certain offices were always invited to take part in it: Catholic bishops, Voivodes and castellans of Vilnius and Trakai. That part of the Council was most often referred to as the senior one (maiore et seniore consilio), alongside it sometimes the wide Council gathered who consisted of the court and state officials and some dukes residing on the edges of the state. Participation of the latter in extended meetings, which were also referred to as general Sejms (conventio generalis, conventus terrarum, сеим вальныи) at the end of the 15^th century, was sometimes understood as a testimony to the representation of the noblemen in adopting decisions that were of special significance to the state. These people, however, represented only themselves though, when it was convenient to them, defended the rights of the communities of their regions too.

The noblemen take over the baton

The documents at the turn of the 15^th–16^th centuries contain hints about the participation of the noblemen in the ordinary meetings of the Sejm. However, it is not mentioned that they had authorisations granted to them by the noblemen of their region. The regional nobility of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania failed to win the right to participate in the Sejm; it received it from the Ruler. Almost constant wars with the state of Moscow that began at the beginning of the 16^th century turned into never ending problems of the Treasury. It was possible to replenish the Treasury by imposing taxes on the real property of the nobility, which constituted more than half the assets of the state. But the 1447 privilege of Casimir Jagellonian liberated the peasants of the noblemen from paying almost all the state taxes and duties. To impose taxes on the noblemen it was necessary for the Ruler to achieve that the noblemen themselves voluntarily refused the rights they had.

In the middle of the 16^th century the position of the noblemen began to change slowly in the Sejm. The voice of the noblemen, even if the Ruler and the Lords of Lithuania did not give it to them, was heard more clearly in the political life. At the end of the rule of Sigismund the Old, envoys of the regions of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania arrived at the Sejms more and more often with the requests dictated by their “brothers” (the noblemen of the district). Most often those requests reflected everyday problems of the noblemen; however, there were also political requirements: not to break the privileges granted, to establish new offices. But it was due to the campaign of political disobedience rather than due to the requests submitted to the Sejms that the nobility of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania obtained the right of full-fledged representation in the Sejm. In 1562, during the war with Moscow, the army of the noblemen of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania located near Vitebsk, declared their political will that was quite hostile to the Lithuanian nobility on the issue of the union with Poland that was of great significance to the state. After that, when the noblemen’s request to convene the Sejm had been rejected, on 13 September, the noblemen wrote a petition to the Ruler in which they asked for the common Sejm and a new union with Poland and for political rights of the Polish noblemen for themselves, that is, the right to vote in the Sejms. The Lithuania’s nobility tried to “choke” that campaign carried out by the noblemen and simply ignored it. However, the Ruler pressed by the Poles with respect to the union had already the argument in the negotiations with the nobility that the noblemen were not the whole of Lithuania. Hence, the noblemen had to yield. They approved of the Second Statute of Lithuania that came into force in 1566 and abolished the largest part of the privileges that the nobility had. The Statute finally legalised the practice of representation of the noblemen in the Sejm with the right to vote that was in force in Poland. This unification of the structures of the Sejms of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and the Kingdom of Poland was an important step taken towards the Union of Lublin.

Literature: R. Petrauskas, Lietuvos Didžiosios Kunigaikštystės seimo ištakos: Lietuvos didžiojo kunigaikščio taryba ir bajorų suvažiavimai XIV–XV a., Parlamento studijos, t. 3, 2005.

Eugenijus Saviščevas