'Jurydyka' (plural: jurydyki; from
Latin ''iuridicus'', ''lawful'' or ''legal'') is a generic
Polish term for a village right outside (less commonly an enclave within) a royal city, that was independent from the municipal laws and rulers. Formed as a separate unit of territorial division between
14th and
16th centuries, the jurydyka-type settlements were a way in which the
Church and the
Polish gentry avoided the strict terms of the royal town charters. Most notably, the jurydyka-type villages were exempted from the specific trade laws allowing only specialized merchants and craftsmen to take part in the markets held in the cities. In many Polish cities the jurydyka villages formed a ring of suburbs and were eventually incorporated into the towns as their boroughs. This was the case of
Warsaw, that in early
18th century was surrounded by no less than 14 such towns, some of them as large as 5,000 inhabitants. All of them, including
Grzybów,
Mariensztat,
Leszno and
Solec are now neighbourhoods of Warsaw.