 The protests originated in September 1858 in the Kovno Governorate, a Catholic province of Tsarist Lithuania, where local villagers took oaths to abstain from drinking vodka, and all other hard liquors except for 'medicinal purposes'.Non-distilled alcohol, such as wine or beer, was still permitted.Supported by the local Catholic clergy, the protesters established local chapters of the Brotherhood of Sobriety (), a temperance society that originated in 1844 in Silesia and received official approval from Pope Pius IX in 1851.