Josepha Krzyżanowska was born on 19 April 1865 on the Załucze estate in Nowogrodek west of Minsk, into a Polish landowning and clergy family in Belarus.

Her parents, Erazm Krzyżanowski and Zofia Kozielska, had become impoverished as a result of the confiscation of their property after the unsuccessful November and January uprisings of 1863/1864 against the Russian Empire.

In Zurich, she found herself in the circle of students gathered around the Walka Klas [pl] magazine published in Geneva by Stanisław Mendelson.

[1] The circle was called "Olympus" and was formed by young people with socialist views: Zofia Poznańska, Feliks Daszyński [pl], Stanisława Popławska and her husband, Maria Kozłowska, Aleksander Tupalski, Gabriel Narutowicz, Joanna Billewicz, Teodor Kodis, Aleksander Dębski [pl] and Barbora Burbaitė.

As a result of a visit by Anna Mahr, who is described as extremely fascinating and intellectually stimulating, Carl ultimately commits suicide.

[2][3] In 1889, Josepha Krzyżanowska married Teodor Kodis (1861-1917) who was a doctor from Lithuania and studied medicine in Leipzig, Strasbourg and Zurich.