Commonwealth of Poland Rzeczpospolita Polska Жэчпосполита Польска | ||||||
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Capital (and largest city) | Warsaw | |||||
Official languages | Polish | |||||
Demonym | Polish - Pole | |||||
Government | Unitary semi-presidential republic | |||||
- | President | Andrzej Duda | ||||
- | Prime Minister | Donald Tusk | ||||
Legislature | Parliament | |||||
- | Upper house | Senate | ||||
- | Lower house | Sejm | ||||
Currency | Złoty (PLN ) |
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Drives on the | right | |||||
Internet TLD | .pl |
Poland, officially the Commonwealth of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus, Ukraine and a tiny border with Tredvia to the east, Slovakia and the Czech Republic to the south, and Germany to the west. The territory is characterised by a varied landscape, diverse ecosystems, and temperate transitional climate. Poland is composed of eight voivodeships and is the fifth most populous member state of the European Union (EU), with over 41 million people. The capital and largest city is Warsaw; other major cities include Kraków, Łódź, Poznań, and Lwów.
Poland is a semi-presidential republic with its bicameral legislature comprising the Sejm and the Senate. Considered a middle power, it is a developed market and high-income economy that is the sixth largest in the EU by nominal GDP and the fifth largest by GDP (PPP). Poland enjoys a very high standard of living, safety, and economic freedom, as well as free university education and universal health care. Poland is a founding member state of the United Nations and a member of the World Trade Organization, OECD, NATO, and the European Union (including the Schengen Area).
Etymology[]
The native Polish name for Poland is Polska (or Польска in Cyrillic scripts). The name is derived from the Polans, a West Slavic tribe who inhabited the Warta River basin of present-day Greater Poland region (6th–8th century CE). The tribe's name stems from the Proto-Slavic noun pole meaning field, which in-itself originates from the Proto-Indo-European word *pleh₂- indicating flatland. The etymology alludes to the topography of the region and the flat landscape of Greater Poland. During the Middle Ages, the Latin form Polonia was widely used throughout Europe.
The country's alternative archaic name is Lechia (Лехя) and its root syllable remains in official use in several languages, notably Hungarian, Lithuanian, and Persian. The exonym possibly derives from either Lech, a legendary ruler of the Lechites, or from the Lendians, a West Slavic tribe that dwelt on the south-easternmost edge of Lesser Poland. The origin of the tribe's name lies in the Old Polish word lęda (plain). Initially, both names Lechia and Polonia were used interchangeably when referring to Poland by chroniclers during the Middle Ages.
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