In its morphology Lettic represents a later stage of development than Lithuanian, their mutual relationship being analogous to that between Old High German and Gothic. Both languages have preserved seven out of the eight Indo-European cases; Lithuanian has three numbers, but Lettic has lost the dual (except in _diwi_, "two" and _abbi_, "both"); the neuter gender, which still appears in Lithuanian pronouns, has also been entirely lost in Lettic; in Lithuanian there are four simple tenses (present, future, imperfect, preterite), but in Lettic the imperfect is wanting. In both languages the number of periphrastic verb-forms and of diminutives is large; in both there are traces of a suffix article; and both have enriched their vocabularies with many words of foreign, especially German, Russian and Polish origin. The numerous Lithuanian dialects are commonly divided into High or Southern, which changes _ty_ and _dy_ into _cz_, _dz_, and Low or Northern, which retains _ty_, _dy_. Lettic is divided into High (the eastern dialects), Low (spoken in N.W. Courland) and Middle (the literary language). Old Prussian ceased to be a spoken language in the 17th century; its literary remains, consisting chiefly of three catechisms and two brief vocabularies, date almost entirely from the period 1517-1561 and are insufficient to permit of any thorough reconstruction of the grammar. The literary history of the Lithuanians and Letts dates from the Reformation and comprises three clearly defined periods. (1) Up to 1700 the chief printed books were of a liturgical character. (2) During the 18th century a vigorous educational movement began; dictionaries, grammars and other instructive works were compiled, and written poems began to take the place of songs preserved by oral tradition. (3) The revival of national sentiment at the beginning of the 19th century resulted in the establishment of newspapers and the collection and publication of the national folk-poetry. In both literatures, works of a religious character predominate, and both are rich in popular ballads, folk-tales and fables.