Paradyż () is a

village A village is a human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand. Although villages are often located in rural areas, the term urban v ...

Opoczno County __NOTOC__ Opoczno County () is a unit of territorial administration and local government (powiat) in Łódź Voivodeship, south-east Poland. It came into being on January 1, 1999, as a result of the Polish local government reforms passed in 1998. I ...

Łódź Voivodeship Łódź Voivodeship ( ) is a Voivodeships of Poland, voivodeship (province) of Poland. The province is named after its capital and largest city, Łódź, pronounced . Łódź Voivodeship is bordered by six other voivodeships: Masovian Voivodeship ...

, in central Poland. It is the seat of the

gmina The gmina (Polish: , plural ''gminy'' ) is the basic unit of the administrative division of Poland, similar to a municipality. , there were 2,479 gminy throughout the country, encompassing over 43,000 villages. 940 gminy include cities and tow ...

(administrative district) called

Gmina Paradyż __NOTOC__ Gmina Paradyż is a rural gmina (administrative district) in Opoczno County, Łódź Voivodeship, in central Poland. Its seat is the village of Paradyż, which lies approximately south-west of Opoczno and south-east of the regional ca ...

. It lies in northwestern corner of historic

Lesser Poland Lesser Poland, often known by its Polish name ''Małopolska'' (; ), is a historical region situated in southern and south-eastern Poland. Its capital and largest city is Kraków. Throughout centuries, Lesser Poland developed a separate cult ...

, approximately south-west of

Opoczno Opoczno () is a town in south-central Poland, seat of Opoczno County in the Łódź Voivodeship. It has a long and rich history, and in the past it used to be one of the most important urban centers of northwestern Lesser Poland. Currently, Opoczno ...

and south-east of the regional capital

Łódź Łódź is a city in central Poland and a former industrial centre. It is the capital of Łódź Voivodeship, and is located south-west of Warsaw. Łódź has a population of 655,279, making it the country's List of cities and towns in Polan ...

. The history of Paradyż dates back to the second half of the 18th century and is closely tied with a Bernardine Monastery, which was founded at that time in the nearby village of Wielka Wola. Soon afterwards, a new village named Paradyż was founded near the monastery. Its name comes from a

Latin language Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

word paradisus, which means paradise. In 1789, local nobleman Jan Saryusz Skorkowski, who owned Wielka Wola and Paradyż, and whose grandfather Kazimierz Skorkowski had invited the monks here, made plans to attract Catholic settlers to the village and to raise it to the status of a town. The plan failed, and Paradyż still remains a village, which until the

January Uprising The January Uprising was an insurrection principally in Russia's Kingdom of Poland that was aimed at putting an end to Russian occupation of part of Poland and regaining independence. It began on 22 January 1863 and continued until the last i ...

was closely tied with the monastery.

References

{{Authority control Villages in Opoczno County