The Ruthenians

LTReikšminiai žodžiai: Lietuvos Didžioji Kunigaikštystė (LDK; Grand Duchy of Lithuania; GDL); Tautos; The Grand Duchy of Lithuania; Nations.

ENThe ethnonym gudai, and the corresponding geographical name Gudija, have more than one meaning in Lithuanian. In all of their meanings, however, they refer to Eastern Slavic ethnic groups, so that we may ask to what extent they reflect the historical development of these ethnic groups. In order to answer this question, we must first clarify the exact meaning of the term gudai in Lithuanian itself. Only then can we try to establish a correspondence between this term and one of the many terms that have been in use over the years to refer to Eastern Slavic ethnic groups. If we are not careful about this, we risk getting entangled in matters of nomenclature, as many questions in this domain have not been satisfactorily settled. Even in modern Russian, the word Rus’can be a technical term referring to old Kievian Russia, but it can also be simply a poetic equivalent of the term Rossiya, which refers to modern Russia. Incidentally, alongside the geographic name Rus 'there is, in Russian, no term to refer to its inhabitants: both the inhabitants of mediaeval Äw’and modern Rossiya are referred to as russkie (singular russkiy). This a problem we have to face if we want to transfer the term Rus’to Lithuanian (in the form Rusia). We should therefore make it clear, at the outset, how we will render the ethnonyms used to refer to the Eastern Slavs at different stages of their development. [From the publication]