Seirijai

History

The lands were inhabited by the Lithuanian tribe Dainavians. Due to the frequent raids and pillaging of the Teutonic Order, the Dainavians moved to other parts of Lithuania abandoning the lands and Seirijai became a wilderness. From 1383 to 1398 Seirijai was in the State of the Teutonic Order. After the defeat of the Teutonic Order in the Battle of Grunwald and the Treaty of Melno (1422), the land became populated again and started to grow economically. Since the 16th century Serijai was known as a proprietary land of a ruler. King of Poland and Grand Duke of Lithuania Sigismund I the Old donated Seirijai to Jerzy Radziwiłł, and later it became a possession of Radziwill family. Jerzy Radziwill built a Catholic church in 1537. Already in 1564 the church was given to Calvinists, since many in the Radziwill family converted to Calvinism. The tensions between Catholics and Calvinists lasted up to 1655 and the Thirteen Years' War with Russia. Seirijai was devastated and the Calvinists retreated. From 1691 until 1793 the district was a Prussian exclave within Poland-Lithuania (). In 1793 it was ceded, along with Tauragė (Tauroggen), to Poland-Lithuania as "compensation" for the territories annexed in the Second Partition of Poland; it returned to Prussian control two years later in the Third Partition of Poland, this time as a fully contiguous part of Prussia within the New East Prussia province. In 1807 it passed by the Treaties of Tilsit to the Duchy of Warsaw, a Polish client state of the First French Empire. 1815 it became part of Congress Poland, a kingdom in a personal union with the Russian Empire; while formally separate from Russia, Congress Poland increasingly became de facto part of it, culminating in the 1867 establishment of the Vistula Land in its place. After…

Most-observed species

• Common Crane

  Grus grus (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  141
• Great Tit

  Parus major Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  135
• Mute Swan

  Cygnus olor (J.F.Gmelin, 1789) · Aves
  124
• Common Raven

  Corvus corax Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  123
• Yellowhammer

  Emberiza citrinella Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  123
• White Stork

  Ciconia ciconia (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  122
• Common Wood-Pigeon

  Columba palumbus Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  122
• Common Chaffinch

  Fringilla coelebs Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  119