Green Mountain; German: Grünberg in Schlesien; Silesian: Zielōno Gōra) is the largest city in Lubusz Voivodeship, located in western Poland, with 140,403 inhabitants (2021[update]).

[4][5] The first settlement in the area of Zielona Góra was built in the valley near the Złota Łącza stream during the reign of the Polish ruler Mieszko I.

[10] In 1477 the town defeated a 5,000-strong army from neighbouring Brandenburg which attempted to seize it during the succession war to the Duchy of Głogów.

[10] The deposition of Duke John II of Żagań in 1488 marked the end of the long rule of the Piast dynasty in the Duchy of Głogów and the city of Zielona Góra.

It was integrated with the Kingdom of Bohemia in 1506,[11] although Polish king Sigismund I the Old still claimed his rights to the city in 1508.

In 1505 Sigismund issued a privilege allowing the sale of cloth products from Zielona Góra throughout Poland.

[14] The city converted to Lutheranism during the Protestant Reformation through the efforts of Paul Lemberg, Abbot of Sagan.

[15] In 1651 during the Counter Reformation, the Habsburg monarchy of Austria reintroduced Roman Catholicism and suppressed Protestantism.

[10] The city was subjected to heavy Germanisation and German craftsmen banned Poles from attending any practice allowing them to work as members of guilds.

[12] As a result, in 1669 the local court was deprived of the right to impose the death penalty on women accused of witchcraft.

The Prussians introduced religious toleration,[15] leading to the construction of the Protestant parish church Zum Garten Christ from 1746 to 1747.

The Polish population was pushed by Germanisation to rural villages,[6] although some remained in the town contributed to the economic revival of the city.

[12] During World War II the Germans operated 42 forced labour camps in armaments production in the city, intended initially for Polish men and women, and later also Russians, Ukrainians, Britons, French and Italians.

[18] There were also three subcamps of the Gross-Rosen concentration camp within the modern city limits for Jewish men and women.

[18] On February 11, 1945, the authorities of Zielona Góra, then still Grünberg, received a report about Russians in the vicinity of Nowa Sól.

On February 12 the most important German offices and management boards of larger enterprises were evacuated beyond Nysa Łużycka.

One of the previously sent transports was hit by an English air attack in Dresden and, according to some, about 900 inhabitants of Zielona Góra died at the local railway station.

[19] The Soviet Red Army occupied Grünberg with little fighting on February 14, 1945, during World War II.

Some of them, following an arc, ended up in Racula, others in Stary Kisielin and even in Jany, and still others took over Jędrzychów (Zielona Góra) [pl].

Soon, small groups of Red Army soldiers began to appear from the side of Kożuchowska Street.

The remaining German inhabitants who had not fled their homes from the Eastern Front were expelled in accordance with the Potsdam Agreement.

[15] The town was partly resettled with Poles transferred from Polish areas annexed by the Soviet Union.

The city was briefly renamed Zielonogóra in 1945,[21] before the historic Polish[22] name Zielona Góra was restored.

The city's first post-war mayor was Tomasz Sobkowiak,[12] a former prisoner of the Auschwitz concentration camp during the German occupation of Poland.

Zielona Góra features several tourist attractions and important historical sites including the preserved medieval Old Town, 13th-century Market Square, tenements, palaces, parks and the famous Palm House on Wine Hill.

Its strong connection to vineyards and grape-picking earned Zielona Góra the nickname "The City of Wine".

[28] The climate is oceanic (Köppen: Cfb) with some humid continental characteristics (Dfb) in normals previous to 1981–2010.