Šiaulių (Alkiškių) evangelikų liuteronų parapija ir archyvas

LTReikšminiai žodžiai: Šiauliai; Regionai; Evangelikai liuteronai; Parapijos; 19 amžius; 20 amžius; Archyvai; Evangelical Lutherans; Regions; Parishes; Archives; 19th century; 20th century.

ENThe Evangelical Lutheran parish of Šiauliai province (Ger., das Kirchspiel Schawli, Schaulen; die Schaulenschen Evangelisch-Lutherischen Gemeinde) was established in the early nineteenth century; from 1832 to 1919, it was subordinate to Vilnius diocese of the consistory of Courland (Ger., Probstei Wilna, Wilnaschen Diöcese, Wilnaschen Bezirk). Its development reflects the general trends in the development of Lithuanian Lutheran churches in the nineteenth and twentieth century. From the middle of the seventeenth century onwards (especially after 1795) the Baltic Germans (Deutschbalten) of the Duchy of Courland and Semigallia began to buy manors in northern Lithuania. In this way, a number of closed Evangelical Lutheran communities were evolved as early as in the first half of the seventeenth to the nineteenth centuries on the estates owned by the Lutherans (Daunorava, Eglesiai, Vismantai, and elsewhere). There arose an opportunity and the need to establish houses of prayer primarily in the center of the county, Šiauliai (1793, 1800), and later in other towns; initially, these prayer houses were usually set up in private residences. In the nineteenth century, new Evangelical Lutheran cemeteries were also established on the outskirts of towns (Šiauliai, Joniškis, Žagarė), next to churches (Alkiškiai), or in villages (Nartaučiai, Degučiai, Juodžiai, Bileikiai, Vismantsai, and others); as many as 18 of these cemeteries were mentioned in 1841. From its foundation in 1793/1800 until its closure in 1944, the church of Šiauliai had the rights of an Evangelical Lutheran parish center and was assigned to serve the large Šiauliai district (150 square miles).As the congregation and the communities grew, the German estates also needed new stone churches: in 1848, one was built in Joniškis, in 1848–1850 in Žagarė, in 1851–1854 in Šiauliai, in 1860– 1865 in Alkiškiai, in 1908–1911 in Mažeikiai, and in 1909–1910 in Radviliškis. In 1933, after the arrival of the officer priest Gustavs Rauskiņš from Latvia, the large parish was divided into the parishes of Šiauliai (with the filial churches of Mažeikiai, Radviliškis, Kuršėnai, and Pabalvė) and Alkiškiai (with the filial churches of Joniškis, Žagarė, and the parish rectory in Saunoriai). Until 1932, the parish was served by one priest so services were usually held once or twice a month in each church, mostly in Latvian, and twice or four times a year in German, with the exception of Šiauliai and Mažeikiai: here services were held throughout the year in both languages, Latvian and German, and once to four times a year in both languages in the smaller filial churches and chapels. The management of archives of the Evangelical Lutheran churches was based on very different principles than those of the Roman Catholic churches. Conrad Schulz (1801–1842), who took office in 1824, started keeping the parish archives in an orderly manner. The inventory of the church archive compiled in 1937 shows that the Alkiškiai church had 180 files at that time, the oldest of which date back to 1824. The documents, registers of baptisms, marriages, and deaths, confirmation books, etc. in Šiauliai (Alkiškiai) parish were mainly filled in German (1834–1891, 1905–1940) and less in Russian (1892–1904). After the arrival of Gustavs Rauskiņš in 1933, the use of Latvian was introduced, and, of course, fairly large numbers of the documents sent and received from 1919 were also filled in Lithuanian.The chronicle of the Šiauliai parish, which was also written in accordance with an established procedure (in 1866, priest Alexander Diston (1812–1905) started systematising it), is an invaluable source for researching the history of the parish and of the Evangelical Lutheran communities. The German original has not been found yet. The keeping of registry records (baptisms, marriages, and deaths) and confirmation books began in 1834. The archive of the Alkiškiai church contains a rich collection of several thousand photographs covering the period from the end of the nineteenth century to 1990. A part of it (633 items) was selected and digitised at the ‘Aušra’ Museum in Šiauliai. This material should be of interest to the scholars in the history of Latvian communities and Latvian Evangelical Lutheran parishes in Lithuania. It contains numerous episodes from the life of priest Gustavs Rauskiņš (1902–1979; was a priest from 1933 to 1979) of the parish of the Alkiškiai church (Latvian, Eltišķu baznīca, Ger. Alkischek, Alkischki): from Mazsalaca elementary school 1913 to 1916, during his ministry, and during his military service in the army of the Republic of Latvia in the Ninth Infantry Regiment in Rēzekne. The collection of photographs contains valuable photo-documents for Lithuanian and Latvian heritage conservation, as well as photographs of Latvian and Lithuanian heritage sites taken by the local historian Žanis Skudra (1924–1994) during his travels in the 1950s and the 1960s. [From the publication]

• Teologija / Theology
• Istorija / History