Metadata: The Castle Court of Vilnius
Collection
- Country:
- Lithuania
- Holding institution:
- Lithuanian State Historical Archives
- Holding institution (official language):
- Lietuvos valstybės istorijos archyvas
- Postal address:
- Gerosios Vilties g. 10, 03134 Vilnius
- Phone number:
- (8 5) 213 74 82
- Web address:
- http://www.archyvai.lt/lt/lvia_naujienos.html
- Email:
- istorijos.archyvas@lvia.lt
- Reference number:
- f. 21
- Title:
- The Castle Court of Vilnius
- Title (official language):
- Vilniaus pilies teismas
- Creator/accumulator:
- Castle Court of Vilnius
- Date(s):
- 1570/1831
- Language:
- Polish
- Russian
- Latin
- German
- Extent:
- 945 files
- Type of material:
- Textual material
- Physical condition:
- good
- Scope and content:
-
The Castle Court of Vilnius was the lowest judicial instance handling criminal and civil cases involving the nobility (Szlachta) in the county (poviat) of Vilnius. Records of the cases brought before the court include a variety of data (for example, correspondence, protocols and texts of judicial decisions) on social, cultural and religious subjects and others. Many files include Jewish-related materials.
The files include documents regulating the status of the Jewish residents of Vilnius: privileges granted by the Kings of Poland (such as a privilege granted by King Wladislaw IV in 1633) and clarifications concerning the Jews' rights and obligations (such as an order from 1669 concerning the rights of Jewish tavern lessors in Vilnius). Other documents that focus on the Jews' relations with the government mention such issues as tax payments, relations between and within Jewish communities, and trade regulations.
Many of the Jewish-related documents refer to business and financial activities. Jewish merchants are occasionally mentioned in the course of arbitration of commercial disputes and as part of inquiries into complaints on dishonest trade, such as a complaint from the 1800s by a Hungarian merchant who accused Jewish women from Vilnius of stealing his money. Jewish house-owners are also mentioned in several files.
Several files refer to the relationship between the Jews of Vilnius and local non-Jewish guilds. These include complaints on illegal Jewish trade (such as a complaint issued by the guild of salters in 1673) and other documents (such as complaints against non-Jewish artisans and students, who allegedly were involved in assaults against Jews in the 1630's).
Assaults against Jews and their property, as well as violent crimes committed by Jewish individuals, are mentioned in several files. Most notably, files from the 1630s mention an investigation of assaults against the Jews of Vilnius and damage caused to the local synagogue, Jewish cemetery and Jewish private property.
Some files include data on investigations of alleged offences related to religion. For instance, files from 1680 mention an accusation of Jews suspected in desecrating a Catholic church. Papers from the 1780s document an investigation into the murder of a Jewish apostate woman in the town of Nesvizh.
Some material is in Old East Slavic.
- Archival history:
-
During the period of the court’s activity, the files of the Castle Court of Vilnius were not transferred to a general archival depository. In 1836 the archive of the court was handed over to the Provincial Board (Gubernskoe Pravlenie) of Vilnius. In 1852 it became part of the newly established Central Archive of Ancient Acts in Vilnius, which was intended to host the vast documentary heritage of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania.
In the 1920s the holdings of this archive were transferred to the Vilnius State Archive, which became a part of the Central State Archive of the Lithuanian SSR in 1940. In 1957, together with other pre-revolutionary documentation, these materials were included in the Central State Historical Archive of the Lithuanian SSR, predecessor of the current State Historical Archive.
- Administrative/biographical history:
- The documents in the archive of the Castle Court of Vilnius reflect its activity between 1570 and 1831. The Castle Courts were created in the Duchy of Lithuania as part of the judicial reforms of 1564-66. These courts, established in each county, served as the lowest judicial instance handling criminal and civil cases involving the nobility. The sessions of the court were held at the county towns on a monthly basis, and in most cases lasted for two weeks. Aside from a short period in the 1790s, the Castle Courts of Lithuania functioned until 1831. The working language of these courts was Old East Slavic before 1697 and Polish from then on.
- System of arrangement:
- The collection consists of two inventories arranged in thematic/chronological order.
- Access, restrictions:
- The collection is open for reference at LVIA.
- Finding aids:
- Basic information in Lithuanian and an inventory in Russian are available at the online catalogue of the Lithuanian Archives. An inventory in Russian is also available at the Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People in Jerusalem. Lists of Jewish related materials originating from the collection, including extracts from the relevant documents, were published by the Vilnius Commission for the Study of Ancient Documents (vols. 28 and 29, Vilnius 1901 and 1902). A volume dedicated to the documents of the Castle Court of Vilnius was also published by the Commission (vol. 8, Vilnius 1875).
- Links to finding aids:
- https://eais-pub.archyvai.lt/eais/faces/pages/forms/search/F3001.jspx?_afPfm=-7dec7f9e
- Yerusha Network member:
- Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People
- Author of the description:
- Alex Valdman, Central Archives for the History of the Jewish People, 2014
