of the area eastwards from Łyna river and northwards from the lower reaches of Pregolya during the 18th century. Lithuanian percentage of the area was continually decreasing during the ages since the plague of 1709–1711. In 1724, King Frederick William I of Prussia prohibited Poles, Samogitians and Jews from settling in Lithuania Minor, and initiated German colonization to change the region's ethnic composition. Lithuanians constituted the majority only in about half of the Memelland area and by Tilžė and Ragainė from the last quarter of the 19th century upwards to 1914. Lithuanian percentage was marginal in the southern half of the region of Lithuania Minor at that time. There resided about 170 thousands of Lietuvininks in East Prussia till 1914. Administration The territory known as the main part of Lithuania Minor had been distinguished in administrative terms first as Nadruvia and Scalovia, later the names Lithuanian counties, Lithuanian Province, Prussian Lithuania or Lithuania (Litauische Kreise or Litt(h) auen) became predominant. The administrative Lithuanian Province (part of the administrative province of Sambia) (about 10 000 km²) comprised four districts of that time: Klaipėda (Memel), Tilžė (Tilsit, Sovetsk), Ragainė (Raganita, Ragnit, Neman) and Įsrutis (Insterburg, Cerniachovsk). Reckoning The factual Prussian Lithuanian living area was broader than the administrative Lithuanian Province. Several Lithuanian-linked areas were determined on different criteria in the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century by mostly German researchers (Lithuanians, without doing difference between the residents of Russian Empire and of Prussia, were considered by Germans in the 19th century to be the little nation facing its end. Therefore, the various researches on Lithuanian culture were made): Lithuanian inhabited area indicated by toponymic data. The language line between Old Prussian and Lithuanian languages was determined by A. Bezzenberger (linguistic, archaeological and geographical data) and M. Toeppen (historical data). A. Bezzenberger found that toponyms in the right side of Łyna and north from Pregolya after the Łyna fall were mostly Lithuanian (with -upē (upē – a river), -kiemiai, -kiemis, -kēmiai (kiemas – a village)) and in the left side – mostly Prussian (with -apē (apē – a river), -kaimis (kaimis – a village). Thus, the area (11 430 km²) was considered to be Lithuanian lived and its southern limit was roughly the same as the southern limit of Nadruvia administrative unit. Lithuania Minor is commonly understand to be this area. The area of traditional Lithuanian architecture: the original layout of