Banknotes of Lithuania 1 Litas banknote 1994
Bank of Lithuania - Lietuvos Bankas
Obverse: Portrait of Julija Zemaite (1845 – 1921) was a Lithuanian / Samogitian writer.
Reverse: Juozapas wooden church in Palūšė (built 1747-1757), today in the Aukštaitija National Park, Eastern Lithuania.
Banknotes of the Lithuanian litas
Bank of Lithuania - Lietuvos Bankas
1991 Issue
10 Litu 20 Litu 50 Litu 100 Litu
1993-1994 Issue
1997-2000 Issue
2001-2007 Issue
Žemaitė (literally female Samogitian) – a pen name of Julija Beniuševičiūtė-Žymantienė; 4 June [O.S. 23 May] 1845 in Bukantė near Plungė – 7 December 1921 in Marijampolė) was a Lithuanian / Samogitian writer. Born to impoverished gentry, she became one of the major participants in the Lithuanian National Revival. She wrote about peasant life in the style best described as realism.
Žemaitė was born in the distant manor house in the Kovno Governorate of the Russian Empire. As a child, she was forbidden by her parents to play with the children of serfs or learn the Lithuanian language. Like many of the Lithuanian gentry, her parents had become Polonized, and were of the belief that speaking Lithuanian was a step backward socially. Nevertheless, she did learn the language and gained a deep affection for the common people. She understood the burden of serfdom, and the resulting misery that came from poverty. This perspective would later form the basis for much of her creative work. Žemaitė did not receive a formal education and was largely self-taught from the many books she read.
She strongly supported the uprising of 1863, and few years later married an active participant of the uprising, Laurynas Žymantas. They met on the Džiuginėnai estate, where they were both employed. For the next twenty years, Žemaitė worked on their farm, raised their children, and battled poverty. In 1883, the family moved to a village near Užventis. She came in contact with Povilas Višinskis who gave her various Lithuanian periodicals (Aušra, Varpas, Apžvalga), and encouraged her to write and participate in the national awakening of Lithuania. Her first work, Autumn Evening (Lithuanian: Rudens vakaras), was published in a calendar in 1895. Višinskis and Jonas Jablonskis helped her and edited her works and gave her advice, and thus a talent was awakened.
In 1912, she moved to Vilnius where she worked as administrator and on the editorial staff of several publications. During World War I, she first emigrated to Russia and subsequently to the United States, where her son Antanas had been living for several years. There she gave lectures to various Lithuanian-American organizations, collected funds for the victims of the war, and wrote articles for the local press. In 1921, she returned to Lithuania, and died the same year.
Aukštaitija National Park
Aukštaitija National Park is a national park in north-eastern Lithuania, about 100 km north of Vilnius. Established in 1974, it is the oldest of the five national parks in Lithuania. At first it was named Lithuanian SSR National Park to emphasize that it was the first such park in the republic. In 1991 four other parks were established and were named after ethnographic regions of Lithuania. The park was renamed after Aukštaitija.
The park covers 405.7 km². Ignalina district municipality controls about 50% of the area. Utena and Švenčionys district municipalities control 25%. Strictly protected areas occupy 2.1%. One can enter this territory only accompanied by a park employee. More than 70 percent of its area is covered by woods. 80 percent of woods are pine stands, some reaching 200 years old.
Sixty-four species of plant, eight species of fungus and 48 species of bird found in the park are included in Lithuania's Red book. The park is famous for its biodiversity: 59% of all plant species in Lithuania can be found in the park, which covers less than 1% of Lithuania.
There are 116 villages in the park with about 2300 residents. The first villages are mentioned in the 14th century (Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania, was first mentioned in written sources in 1323). The most famous of the villages is Palūšė where the park administration is based. The church, built in 1750, is thought to be the oldest surviving wooden church in Lithuania and was featured on 1 litas banknote. Stripeikiai is the oldest village in the park, now known for its unique Lithuanian Museum of Ancient Beekeeping. Ginučiai is another famous village and tourists are attracted by its 19th-century watermill. Being one of the few mills that still has the original mechanisms, it has been declared an engineering monument. Two hillforts of national importance are nearby. Kaltanėnai, with 300 inhabitants, is the largest village.