ABSTRACT
Unlike the topic of ethnic and religious relations within the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, about which there is plenty of work, the question of the Grand Duchy's imperial territorial structure remains an under-researched area. After Vytautas' death, this foreign policy exhibited increasingly fewer characteristics that international relations theories attribute to imperialism and empires. The Grand Duchy by this stage was not attacking but defending itself from "revisionist" Muscovy in the inter-polity system where it was no longer the hegemonic power. This chapter deals with the presentation of the view that the Grand Duchy was a typical empire according to its territorial structure. Domination of the "state principle" in the Grand Duchy was due to two causes. The first cause had the strongest effects in ethnographic Lithuania, which lived under a perennial state of war. The second cause had the strongest effects in the sphere of relations between the Grand Duchy's ruler and the Ruthenian lands subordinate to him.
