Vytautas Merkys (5 May 1929 in Čivai, near Kupiškis – 25 July 2012[1]) was a Lithuanian historian and a professor at Vilnius University.
Vytautas Merkys graduated from Vilnius University's department of history and philology in 1951.
In 1952 he began working at the Lithuanian SSR Institute of History, but for ideological reasons he was soon fired, along with Mečislovas Jučas.
He initiated his candidacy for a doctorate of philosophy degree in 1957 with the thesis Revoliucinis Vilniaus miesto darbininkų judėjimas 1895–1904 m. (The Revolutionary Movement of Vilnius City Workers from 1895 to 1904), and in 1969 he was awarded a doctorate (the Soviet equivalent of habilitation) for his dissertation Lietuvos pramonės augimas ir proletariato formavimasis XIX amžiuje (The Growth of Lithuanian Industry and the Formation of the Proletariat in the 19th Century).
In 1986 he left the Institute and was designated head of the Department of Economic History at the Lithuanian SSR Academy of Sciences.