In July 1807 the Tilsit Peace Treaty ended France's war against the Russian-Prussian coalition. The treaties between France and Prussia on the other hand also marked the climax of French dominance in Europe.
Hence East Europe was divided up into a French and a Russian sphere of interests, whose border was marked by the Memel. The Russian Tsar Alexander I joined the continental blockade and agreed to the founding
of the Duchy of Warsaw. Prussia only escaped being totally crushed thanks to the intercession of Russia, and lost half of its state territory. However, the alliance between Napoleon and the Tsar was to last for only five years, since as early as June 1812 the Grande Armée crossed the Memel and marched into Russia.
These events brought the region around the Memel into the focus of European history for the first time. However, this focus was quickly forgotten once again, as blow by blow further events followed on a European scale. In today's research, apart from a few episodes in
Prussian memory as well as the history of the Duchy of Warsaw, no relevant findings can be recorded. For this reason, on the occasion of the 200th anniversary of the Tilsit peace agreements, the following questions are to be asked:
- What effects did the Tilsit Peace Treaty have on the states
and regions involved and their neighbours?
- How was the Tilsit Peace Treaty perceived in other states?
- To what extent did the administrative border changes due to the Tilsit Peace Treaty have long-term effects on regional identity?
- What cultural legacies or processes of transferral in history
can be traced?
- What is still rememberable in the collective memory of the
various nations with regard to the Napoleonic occupation?
All of these questions are not to be answered in their general European aspects. The regional perspective on the Lithuanian area to the south of the Memel (the Užnemune. region) is also important. It is precisely here that considerable desiderata for research become apparent, since the peace agreements and their consequences from a long-term perspective have not yet been discussed in detail in a national context. The planned goal of the conference is to gain an overview of the international state of research on a periphery region of the early 19th century with essential international interfaces, combining various European perspectives as well as the regional one.

The conference planned will consist of two parts. The first part of the conference (on Thursday, 6 September and on Friday, 7 September until 2 p.m.) will encompass two consecutive sections. The focus will firstly be on the /events/ relating to the Tilsit Peace Treaty in a European and
regional perspective, and secondly the /remembrances /in a European and regional perspective.
The second part of the conference (Friday, 7 September from 2:30 in the afternoon with an overnight stay in Kaliningrad until Saturday, 8 September, around 6 p.m.) will consist of a group excursion to sites of remembrance of Napoleon history in the region (Klaipeda/Memel -- Kurische Nehrung -- Kaliningrad/Königsberg -- Pravdinsk/Friedland - Bagrationovsk/Prussian Eylau -- Sovetsk/Tilsit -- through the Memel country and then back to Klaipeda/Memel).

We would like to ask all academics who are interested and wish to take part in this conference with talks to send in a thesis proposal paper (of 1 side) and brief CV by 15 January 2007.