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20 euros 2016 Lithuania – Coin dedicated Mykolas Kleopas Oginskis

65.00

20 euros proof coin with box.
Silver Ag 925
Diameter 38.61 mm
Weight 28.28 g
Quality proof
Mintage 3,000
Issued in 2015

Description

On 15 October 1833, Mykolas Kleopas Oginskis (Michał Kleofas Ogiński), a national and public  gure, political émigré from the former Polish-Lithuanian State — the Commonwealth — died in Florence. The remains of the former diplomat, one of the leaders of the Kościuszko Uprising, nurturer of the idea of Lithuania’s statehood, composer and musical theoretician, were laid to rest at the Basilica di Santa Croce in Florence.
“To serve one’s homeland!” — this was the life credo of an exceptional individual. Unfortunately, historical fractures at the end of the 18th– rst half of the 19th c. resulted in not national and public activities bringing M. K. Oginskis eternal fame, but rather his musical legacy. Particularly his polonaise, Farewell to the Homeland (Les Adieux à la Patrie), is a testament to the dramatic fate of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. The Commonwealth, which had already turned on the road of a modern state: in the face of the  rst partition in 1773 it began to implement a large-scale national education reform and in 1791 adopted the famous Constitution of May 3.
After the third partition (1795), the name of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth was erased from the political map of Europe. The work of M. K. Oginskis, as of many other prominent personalities of that time, went into oblivion. Only in the early 21st c., as a result of the united e› orts of Lithuanian, Belarusian and Polish promoters of cultural heritage, was this oblivion dispelled. The 250th universary of the birth of M.
K. Oginskis was included in the UNESCO list of memorable dates and the year 2015 in Europe was named the year of Mykolas Kleopas Oginskis. In this way this exceptional individual and his cultural legacy were returned to our historical memory.