Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • The capital and largest city of Lithuania, in the southeast part of the country. Founded in 1323, Vilnius developed into a center of Jewish learning in the 1700s and 1800s. The city was occupied by Soviet troops in 1939, becoming the capital of the Lithuanian Soviet Socialist Republic in 1940. After a period of occupation by Germany (1941–1944) during which most of the city's Jewish community was exterminated, Vilnius reverted to Soviet rule, eventually becoming the capital of independent Lithuania (1991).

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • proper noun The capital of Lithuania.

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun the capital and largest city of Lithuania; located in southeastern Lithuania

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From Lithuanian, after the Vilnia River, from vilnis ("wave").

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