#throughtful

he constitution’s 41 clausesencapsulate the essence of Užupis’ ideals of free thought, with points such as ‘Everyone has the right to die, but this is not an obligation’ and ‘Everyone has the right to understand’, as well as, confusingly, ‘Everyone has the right to understand nothing’. Even the republic’s pets are mentioned, with clauses such as ‘a dog has a right to be a dog’, and ‘a cat is not obliged to love its owner, but must help in times of need’.

“I wrote about the cats, because I am a cat man. [Lileikis] wrote about the dogs, because he is a dog man,” Čepaitis explained. It is a poetic balance.

The charter, printed on large mirrored rectangles, hangs along the road known locally as the Avenue of Constitutions. More than 30 of these metal plates now line the wall, with Latin being the latest language to be hung – it was blessed by the Pope himself during his visit to the Baltics in September. The Avenue of Constitutions leads to the centre of the republic, where a statue of Archangel Gabriel, ‘The Angel of Užupis’, was erected in 2002 as a symbol of growth and rebirth, his trumpet heralding a new free-thinking age for the nation.