Home > Baltic languages

Before the first conquest attempts a thousand years ago, the Balts lived protected at the Baltic Sea. Therefore the Baltic languages remained some of the oldest and least changed Indo-European languages. They did have trade connections for thousands of years along the ancient amber roads.

Today the Latvian language is considered younger than East Lithuanian, although that greatly changed from its first recording in the 16th century. The old Prussian language retained the most archaic features. It was written down in the 14th century in the Elbing Prussian Vocabulary.

The Baltic languages have for a long time been oral languages, the Balts did not use writing until fairly recently. (The first books were published in 1547 in Lithuanian and 1585 in Latvian. However, writing in those languages was not widespread until the middle of the 19th century, partly due to the fact that Latvia was not independent until 1918, while Lithuania was part of the Lithuanian-Polish Commonwealth (until 1795) where Polish was the more commonly used official language of the two.

• West Baltic languages †
  • Galindan language †
  • Old Prussian language † (see Prussians, PrussiaThe word Prussia ( German: Preussen (Preussen Polish: Prusy Lithuanian: Prusai Latin: Borussia has had various (often contradictory) meanings: The land of the Baltic Prussians (in what is now parts of southern Lithuania, the Kaliningrad exclave of Russia)
  • Sudovian (Yotvingian) languageSudovian (otherwise known as Jatvingian or Yotvingian is an extinct western Baltic language of north-eastern Europe. Closely related to the Old Prussian language, it was formerly spoken in Galindia and Sudovia in Prussia. Sudovia and Galindia were two of † (see YotvingiansYotvingians (Jotvingiai, Polish Jacwingowie) is one of the extinct Baltic tribes. Yotvingian culture and language (called Yotvingian or Sudovian is closest to Prussian. They lived in the areas of Sudovia and Jacwiez (in Polish language; Suduva, Jotva in L, SudoviaSudovia or Suvalkija is the name of a historical region inhabited by Sudovians. It is also known as Sudova''. Today Sudovia is split between southern Lithuania, close to the Polish border, and the northeastern Poland: town of Suwalki and its county. The c)
• East Baltic languages (4.7 M)
  • Curonian language † (see CuroniansThe Curonians is one of the extinct Baltic tribes that later formed the Latvian nation. They lived in Courland, actually the Latvian province of Kurzeme. In ancient and medieval times, the Curonians were named of kursi, and were known as fierce warriors,, CourlandCourland Kurland Couronia or Curonia a former Baltic province of the Teutonic Order state in Livonia (ca. 1200 1560), Polish Lithuanian Commonwealth ( 1560 1795) and Imperial Russia ( 1795- 1918), lying between 55° 45′ and 57° 45′ North and 21)
  • Lithuanian language (3.3 M) (see Lithuanians, Lithuania)
  • Latvian language (1.4 M) (see Latvians, Latvia)
  • Selonian language † (see Selonians)
  • Semigallian language † (see Semigallians, Semigallia )