Smorgon

This ancient town stands 2 km away from river Viliya, surrounded by scenic landscape. The name of the town comes from a confluence of two words – “smor” (or “smur”, meaning “resin”) and “goni” (to distil). Residents of the ancient settlement extracted resin in nearby forests. The small town is mentioned in the Great Lithuanian Principality documents for the first time in the 16^th century as a settlement owned by the Dukes Zenovichs. In 1533 they founded a Genevan Church of defensive significance that remains intact to this day.

Many archeological findings prove that the territory of modern day Smorgon was inhabited much earlier than its official date of birth suggests. Just one kilometer form the town on the bank of the River Oksana there were found 50 barrows dating back to 1000 BC.

In the second half of the 17^th century the town passed to Dukes Radzivills. By that time the settlement already had a paper factory, a school and a hospital. The township was especially famous as the place of the GLP’s only “Smorgon Academy” – a comic name people gave to the business which specialized in catching and training bears. The “Academy” was founded by the Radzivills. Instructors form this “Bear Academy” along with their apprentices traveled in search of a job as far as Russia, Hungary and Germany.

It was in Smorgon that people started to bake barankas for the first time in the GLP. They were even first called smorgonki after their birth place. Baranka production flourished in the 18^th and in the 19^th centuries.

After the third division of Rzecz Pospolita in 1795 Smorgon was incorporated into the Russian Empire and became the center of Oshmyany Uezd of Vilno Guberniya. The famous Napoleon’s route – a road along wich the French troops retreated in 1812 – runs through the town. Napoleon himself made his last stop with the army before passing over command to Marshal I.Murat and escaping with just his personal guard to Paris.