Wave of Protestantism

In Lithuania people were mostly Catholic or Orthodox during the 15th and 16th century. However in the last two decades of the 16th century a lot of Protestant refugees from France, South Germany and Italy arrived. These cultural elite brought fresh ideas to the Duchy of Lithuania, pressed between her Catholic and Orthodox neighbors. The Radziwill family had strong power and had opened the country for influences from abroad. Cities were much more important than in the aristocratic system of Poland, and thus the people of the cities quickly became a cultural and religious melting-pot spreading Protestantism to the rural lands around them. When whole provinces slowly became Protestant, the king started to support the Protestant Faith. First personally and later as a State-religion looking to Prussia and Sweden as ideals. This also meant that Lithuania could take an independent stance between Russia and Poland. However, the many different religions in Lithuania made the government adhere to a very tolerant religious policy at least until the 1640s.