Uploaded July 2016 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago

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Tautiška giesmė (The National Hymn) is the national anthem of Lithuania, also known by its opening words "Lietuva, Tėvyne mūsų" (official translation of the lyrics: "Lithuania, Our Homeland", literally: "Lithuania, Our Fatherland") and as "Lietuvos himnas" (Hymn of Lithuania). The music and lyrics were written in 1898 by Vincas Kudirka, when Lithuania was still part of the Russian Empire. The fifty-word poem was a condensation of Kudirka's conceptions of the Lithuanian state, the Lithuanian people, and their past. Shortly before his death in 1899, the anthem was performed for Lithuanians living in Saint Petersburg, Russia.
The first public Lithuanian performance of the anthem took place in Vilnius in 1905, and it became the official national anthem in 1919, a year after Lithuania declared its independence. Following the occupation and annexation of Lithuania by the Soviet Union in 1940, the anthem was forbidden to be played or sung in public.

"Tautiška giesmė" was reinstated in 1989 shortly before the reestablishment of Lithuanian independence and confirmed in the National Anthem Act (21 October 1991). It was automatically included as the national anthem in 1992, when the new Constitution was ratified after independence from the Soviet Union was achieved. The status of "Tautiška giesmė" as the National Anthem of Lithuania was further confirmed in 1999 with the passage of a national law stating that.