LITHUANIA – tribes

The Lithuanian nation developed from several tribes, including:

Žemaičiai: Also known as Samogitians, these people lived in the lower regions of the Nemunas River

The first settlers in Lithuania arrived around 12,000 B.C., and the Indo-European Balts came to live there between 3,000–2,500 B.C. The Balts lived in a large part of eastern Europe and began to separate into distinct tribes shortly after their formation. The Baltic tribes consolidated into their final forms in the 5th and 6th centuries.

The Lithuanian state was created from the consolidation of the Žemaičiai and Aukštaičiai tribes, which began in the early 13th century. The first significant documentation of this amalgamation is a fragment of a treaty made in 1219.