Just a Kievan Rus. Seriously. That's all you'd need.
Looks like the lituanian part of the Commonwealth to me.
Already a significant part of the nobility was white Russian or Ruthenian.
Maybe a different partition of Poland ends up with a slavic state left as a buffer?
More successful Bohdan Khmelnytsky?I say "White Russia" for lack of a better name. Anyway, is there a way to get an east Slavic state, distinct from Great Russia/Muscovy, with something like these terribly drawn (dinky replacement laptop has no mouse, only a track pad) borders?
View attachment 315656
To get the Baltic bit cut off we might need a partition between the Lithuanian 'Old Country' and the Slavic lands where the nobility Goes Native properly.Get Lithuania to adopt a "Belarusian" identity. Since Lithuania used Old Ruthenian as their language of government, and the majority of the population spoke East Slavic dialects ancestral to modern Belarusian and Ukrainian, it doesn't seem impossible for Lithuania to end up a Slavic state. I guess have Russia and Poland kick it around a bit to get those precise borders, and some other state (a Swedish empire or something).
If this wiggle-land had Lietuva Land in it, then I would be willing to accept, but a Lithuania that reaches to the Black Sea without it's core territory, Russified or not, is hardly achievable.Get Lithuania to adopt a "Belarusian" identity. Since Lithuania used Old Ruthenian as their language of government, and the majority of the population spoke East Slavic dialects ancestral to modern Belarusian and Ukrainian, it doesn't seem impossible for Lithuania to end up a Slavic state. I guess have Russia and Poland kick it around a bit to get those precise borders, and some other state (a Swedish empire or something).
For once, dispute about Vilnus/Vilno nonwithstanding, I'm going to agree. The north-western border of this... thing is nonsence and I think this is the main element of why this is a challenge.If this wiggle-land had Lietuva Land in it, then I would be willing to accept, but a Lithuania that reaches to the Black Sea without it's core territory, Russified or not, is hardly achievable.
If this wiggle-land had Lietuva Land in it, then I would be willing to accept, but a Lithuania that reaches to the Black Sea without it's core territory, Russified or not, is hardly achievable.
The difference between this and the partition between Algirdas and Kęstutis is that in OTL, the latter swore allegiance to the former, and the country was a diarchy rather than two separate states.Vilnius lying almost exactly on the border suggests a partition of Lithuanian territory among the sons of Gedimin, with Vilnius held in common. [There was one, but these weren't the borders]. The Eastern divisions later combine.
The difference between this and the partition between Algirdas and Kęstutis is that in OTL, the latter swore allegiance to the former, and the country was a diarchy rather than two separate states.
If the border were to go a *little* bit to the west, such as only Samogitia falls outside of the squiggles, then one could make the argument that this is a Lithuania which gifted Samogitia to the Knights for one reason or another (happened twice IOTL), and somehow never got it back. Extremely unlikely, but it's at least something.
I'm well aware of that, we learn things like this in school.True, of course; I'm just suggesting that things are divided differently than in OTL.
Note that the Algirdas/Kestutis arrangement didn't come about immediately after Gedymin died. Gedymin had seven sons who all received some territory. I think that it was on a basis that everybody received something in Lituania proper and some outside lands. I don't remember who got what, except that Vilnius itself went to middle son Jaunutis. He was squeezed out by Algirdas and Kestutis after 5 years, only returning decades later to some consolation territory.