10 - On the Gods of the Samogitians, of the Other Sarmatians, and of the False Christians

Summary

The size of the Polish kingdom

Samogitia borders on the Baltic Sea; its shape is triangular. Rivers separate it, a length of seventy German miles: the Nemunas separates it from Prussia; the Šventoji from the Courland region of Livonia. These provinces, and others up to the River Dnieper (which flows into the Black Sea), acknowledge the rule of the king of Poland. It is well known to many that the University of Königsberg was inaugurated on August 17, 1544 in a forested part of the region. Here are the Old Prussians—distinct in language and customs from the Germans, who today live mixed with the Poles.

The origin of the Samogitians

The old authors report that the ancestors of the Samogitians (who call themselves Žemaičiai) were Italians. The Emperor Nero, contemplating a warlike expedition, wanted to call into military service those Roman exiles who were living on a certain barren island of Gyaros. Embarking on account of fear of the emperor's cruelty, they were summoned with two or three ships; but when the same had been broken up [by a storm], they came ashore on the Black Sea.

The Varangian Sea

From there, by a leap they penetrated [the interior], when one day there was a Roman hunt; they are today to a great degree cut off from one another and now have the names of Rus’ians, Podolians, and Lithuanians, right up to the Baltic Sea. This the Rus’ians call the Varangian Sea from the Varangians whom the Livonian people were then obeying. In this matter—idolatry, and the cleverness of the people—the people are similar to the Romans. An indication of this is a speech derived in some way from Latin and conflated with a barbarous language.

Ploteli arx Samagitica.

Michalo fragmine quinto de moribus Tartarorum, et suorum Lituanorum, paulo haec aliter refert. Ait enim, classis Iulii Caesaris ex Gallia in Britanniam navigantis partem, coortis tempestatibus, ad littus Samagiticum, ubi nunc est arx Ploteli, pervenisse, saepeque etiam hodie in illud ipsum littus, naves navigantium, vi ventorum eiici solere. Ubi Lituanorum progenitores, periculorum maris pertaesi, et praedis onusti, in tabernaculis ad focos, more militari, et adhuc in eadem Samagitia recepto, habitarint. unde ulterius progressi, Iaczvingos atque Roxolanos subegerint. Haud absurda coniectura.