Panemunė

Panemunė
City
Panemunė between 1900-1906
Panemunė Location of Panemunė
Coordinates: 55°6′0″N 21°54′0″E / 55.10000°N 21.90000°E / 55.10000; 21.90000Coordinates: 55°6′0″N 21°54′0″E / 55.10000°N 21.90000°E / 55.10000; 21.90000
Country	Lithuania
Ethnographic region	Lithuania Minor
County	Tauragė County
Municipality	Pagėgiai municipality
Eldership	Pagėgiai eldership
Granted city rights	1837
Population (2007)
• Total	319
Time zone	EET (UTC+2)
• Summer (DST)	EEST (UTC+3)

Panemunė ( pronunciation ; German: Übermemel) is the smallest city in Lithuania. It is situated on the banks of the Neman (Memel) River opposite Sovetsk, 8 km (5.0 mi) south from Pagėgiai, in Tauragė County. It is a border checkpoint to Russia (Kaliningrad Oblast).

The magnificent Queen Louise Bridge (which still exists, built in 1907, though now badly scarred by World War II and rebuilt in 1946) links Panemunė to the larger town of Sovetsk (Tilsit until 1946) just south across the river.

The area comprising today's Panemunė used to be the northern trans-Memel (Neman) suburb of Tilsit, then a Prussian and later also German town (as of 1871). Then Tilsit sat close to the border between Germany and Russia.

After Germany's defeat in World War I, the trans-Memel suburb was disentangled from Tilsit (with the rest of the Memelland/Klaipėda Region detached from the Province of East Prussia) in 1920. The suburb was given the name Übermemel, which means over the Memel river in German.