Upytė

Upytė was a northern stronghold of Lithuania, first mentioned in 1254 in a Livonian chronicle. Its wooden castle stood on an island in Lake Vešeta and guarded the region against the Livonian Order; between 1353 and 1379 it repelled ten attacks. The castle was strengthened in the fifteenth century and served as the seat of the grand duchy's local appointed elder.

As the frontier changed, the old fortress lost its military importance and the growing town of Panevėžys eclipsed Upytė as a regional centre. The castle was abandoned and its remains survived into the eighteenth century. One elder, Władysław Siciński, became notorious for interrupting the Sejm of 1652 by exercising the liberum veto, a right later associated with the paralysis of the Commonwealth's assemblies.