1.
Lands of the Bohemian Crown
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Under the rule of Ferdinand I from 1526, the lands of the Boheman Crown became a constituent part of the Habsburg Monarchy. Later they passed to the Austrian Empire and the Cisleithanian half of Austria-Hungary, by the Czechoslovak declaration of independence in 1918, the remaining Czech lands became part of the First Czechoslovak Republic. The Bohemian Crown was neither a personal union nor a federation of equal members, rather, the Kingdom of Bohemia had a higher status than the other incorporated constituent countries. There were only some common institutions of the Bohemian Crown. The most important of them was the Bohemian Court Chancellery which was united with the Austrian Chancellery in 1749, the Lands of the Bohemian Crown are called země Koruny české or simply Koruna česká and České země in Czech language, the adjective český referring to both Bohemian and Czech. The German term Länder der Böhmischen Krone is likewise shortened to Böhmische Krone or Böhmische Kronländer, native names include Silesian, Korana Czeskigo Krůlestwa, Lower Sorbian, zemje Českeje krony, and Upper Sorbian, kraje Čěskeje Króny. The denotation lands of the Crown of Saint Wenceslas refers to the Crown of Saint Wenceslas, in the 10th and 11th century the Duchy of Bohemia, together with Moravia and Kłodzko Land were consolidated under the ruling Přemyslid dynasty. Duke Ottokar I gained the royal title in 1198 from the German king Philip of Swabia for his support. The regality was ultimately confirmed by Philips nephew King Frederick II in the Golden Bull of Sicily issued in 1212 and he also achieved the enfeoffment with the Upper Lusatian lands of Bautzen and Görlitz by the German king Louis IV. King Johns eldest son Charles IV was elected King of the Romans in 1346, Charles IV created the Bohemian Crown, together with the incorporated provinces in 1348. The Luxembourg dynasty reached its point, when Charles was crowned Holy Roman Emperor in 1355. By his Imperial authority he decreed that the united Bohemian lands should endure regardless of dynastic developments, in 1367 he purchased Lower Lusatia from his stepson Margrave Otto V of Brandenburg. With King Wenceslaus, the decline of the Luxembourg dynasty began, nevertheless, the joint rule of the Bohemian Lands outlived the Hussite Wars and the extinction of the Luxembourg male line upon the death of Emperor Sigismund in 1437. In 1479 both kings signed the Treaty of Olomouc, whereby the unity of the Bohemian crown lands was officially retained unchanged, upon the death of King Matthias in 1490, Vladislas ruled the Bohemian crown lands and the Kingdom of Hungary in personal union. Attempts by the Bohemian Protestant estates to build up an autonomous confederation dashed at the 1620 Battle of White Mountain, whereafter the administration was centralised at Vienna. In the modern era, the crown lands of Bohemia, Moravia and Austrian Silesia became constituent parts of the Austrian Empire in 1804. After World War I and the dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy, Austrian Silesia with the Hlučín Region is today known as Czech Silesia, with the exception of eastern Cieszyn Silesia which passed to the Second Polish Republic in 1920. The Brandenburg Electorate, acquired by Charles IV from Margrave Otto V in 1373, Charles son Sigismund lost Brandenburg in 1415 to Frederick I, Elector of Brandenburg
2.
Holy Roman Empire
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The Holy Roman Empire was a multi-ethnic complex of territories in central Europe that developed during the Early Middle Ages and continued until its dissolution in 1806. On 25 December 800, Pope Leo III crowned the Frankish king Charlemagne as Emperor, reviving the title in Western Europe, more than three centuries after the fall of the Western Roman Empire. The title was revived in 962 when Otto I was crowned emperor, fashioning himself as the successor of Charlemagne, some historians refer to the coronation of Charlemagne as the origin of the empire, while others prefer the coronation of Otto I as its beginning. Scholars generally concur, however, in relating an evolution of the institutions and principles constituting the empire, the office of Holy Roman Emperor was traditionally elective, although frequently controlled by dynasties. Emperor Francis II dissolved the empire on 6 August 1806, after the creation of the Confederation of the Rhine by Napoleon, before 1157, the realm was merely referred to as the Roman Empire. In a decree following the 1512 Diet of Cologne, the name was changed to Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation, by the end of the 18th century, the term Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation had fallen out of official use. As Roman power in Gaul declined during the 5th century, local Germanic tribes assumed control, by the middle of the 8th century, however, the Merovingians had been reduced to figureheads, and the Carolingians, led by Charles Martel, had become the de facto rulers. In 751, Martel’s son Pepin became King of the Franks, the Carolingians would maintain a close alliance with the Papacy. In 768 Pepin’s son Charlemagne became King of the Franks and began an expansion of the realm. He eventually incorporated the territories of present-day France, Germany, northern Italy, on Christmas Day of 800, Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne emperor, restoring the title in the west for the first time in over three centuries. After the death of Charles the Fat in 888, however, the Carolingian Empire broke apart, according to Regino of Prüm, the parts of the realm spewed forth kinglets, and each part elected a kinglet from its own bowels. After the death of Charles the Fat, those crowned emperor by the pope controlled only territories in Italy, the last such emperor was Berengar I of Italy, who died in 924. Around 900, autonomous stem duchies reemerged in East Francia, on his deathbed, Conrad yielded the crown to his main rival, Henry the Fowler of Saxony, who was elected king at the Diet of Fritzlar in 919. Henry reached a truce with the raiding Magyars, and in 933 he won a first victory against them in the Battle of Riade, Henry died in 936, but his descendants, the Liudolfing dynasty, would continue to rule the Eastern kingdom for roughly a century. Upon Henry the Fowlers death, Otto, his son and designated successor, was elected King in Aachen in 936 and he overcame a series of revolts from an elder brother and from several dukes. After that, the managed to control the appointment of dukes. In 951, Otto came to the aid of Adelaide, the queen of Italy, defeating her enemies, marrying her. In 955, Otto won a victory over the Magyars in the Battle of Lechfeld
3.
German language
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German is a West Germanic language that is mainly spoken in Central Europe. It is the most widely spoken and official language in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, South Tyrol, the German-speaking Community of Belgium and it is also one of the three official languages of Luxembourg. Major languages which are most similar to German include other members of the West Germanic language branch, such as Afrikaans, Dutch, English, Luxembourgish and it is the second most widely spoken Germanic language, after English. One of the languages of the world, German is the first language of about 95 million people worldwide. The German speaking countries are ranked fifth in terms of publication of new books. German derives most of its vocabulary from the Germanic branch of the Indo-European language family, a portion of German words are derived from Latin and Greek, and fewer are borrowed from French and English. With slightly different standardized variants, German is a pluricentric language, like English, German is also notable for its broad spectrum of dialects, with many unique varieties existing in Europe and also other parts of the world. The history of the German language begins with the High German consonant shift during the migration period, when Martin Luther translated the Bible, he based his translation primarily on the standard bureaucratic language used in Saxony, also known as Meißner Deutsch. Copies of Luthers Bible featured a long list of glosses for each region that translated words which were unknown in the region into the regional dialect. Roman Catholics initially rejected Luthers translation, and tried to create their own Catholic standard of the German language – the difference in relation to Protestant German was minimal. It was not until the middle of the 18th century that a widely accepted standard was created, until about 1800, standard German was mainly a written language, in urban northern Germany, the local Low German dialects were spoken. Standard German, which was different, was often learned as a foreign language with uncertain pronunciation. Northern German pronunciation was considered the standard in prescriptive pronunciation guides though, however, German was the language of commerce and government in the Habsburg Empire, which encompassed a large area of Central and Eastern Europe. Until the mid-19th century, it was essentially the language of townspeople throughout most of the Empire and its use indicated that the speaker was a merchant or someone from an urban area, regardless of nationality. Some cities, such as Prague and Budapest, were gradually Germanized in the years after their incorporation into the Habsburg domain, others, such as Pozsony, were originally settled during the Habsburg period, and were primarily German at that time. Prague, Budapest and Bratislava as well as cities like Zagreb, the most comprehensive guide to the vocabulary of the German language is found within the Deutsches Wörterbuch. This dictionary was created by the Brothers Grimm and is composed of 16 parts which were issued between 1852 and 1860, in 1872, grammatical and orthographic rules first appeared in the Duden Handbook. In 1901, the 2nd Orthographical Conference ended with a standardization of the German language in its written form
4.
Upper Sorbian language
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Upper Sorbian is a minority language spoken by Sorbs in Germany in the historical province of Upper Lusatia, which is today part of Saxony. It is grouped in the West Slavic language branch, together with Lower Sorbian, Czech, Polish, Slovak, the history of the Upper Sorbian language in Germany began with the Slavic migrations during the 6th century AD. Beginning in the 12th century, there was an influx of rural Germanic settlers from Flanders, Saxony. The succeeding devastation of the country by military actions began the slow decrease of the Upper Sorbian language, in addition, in the Saxony region, the Sorbian language was legally subordinated to the German language. Further, there was the condition in many guilds of the cities of the area to only members of German-language origin. However, the areas of the Milzener and Lusitzer, in the area of the todays Lausitz, were relatively unaffected by the new German language settlements. By the 17th century, the number of Upper Sorbian speakers in that area grew to over 300,000, the oldest evidence of written Upper Sorbian is the Burger Eydt Wendisch monument, which was discovered in the city of Bautzen and dated to the year 1532. There are estimated to be 40,000 speakers of Upper Sorbian, the vowel inventory of Upper Sorbian is exactly the same as that of Lower Sorbian. It is also similar to the vowel inventory of Slovene. /i/ is mid-centralized to after hard consonants, /e, o/ are diphthongized to in slow speech. The /e–ɛ/ and /o–ɔ/ distinctions are weakened or lost in unstressed syllables, /v, d͡z, t͡sʲ, zʲ/ are very rare. /β/ is a somewhat velarized bilabial approximant, whereas /ɥ/ is a strongly palatalized bilabial approximant, in most dialects, /t͡ʃ, d͡ʒ, ʃ, ʒ/ are palato-alveolar. This is unlike Lower Sorbian, where these consonants are laminal retroflex, laminal retroflex realizations of /ʃ, ʒ/ also occur in Upper Sorbian dialects spoken in some villages north of Hoyerswerda. An aspirated is an allophone of /x/ in some cases. Article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in Upper Sorbian, Wšitcy čłowjekojo su wot naroda swobodni a su jenacy po dostojnosći a prawach. Woni su z rozumom a swědomjom wobdarjeni a maja mjezsobu w duchu bratrowstwa wobchadźeć. de at slovnik. vancl. eu at sibz. whyi. org at Boehmak. de at Boehmak. de at sibz. whyi. org
5.
Lower Sorbian language
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Lower Sorbian is a Slavic minority language spoken in eastern Germany in the historical province of Lower Lusatia, today part of Brandenburg. It is one of the two literary Sorbian languages, the other being Upper Sorbian, Lower Sorbian is spoken in and around the city of Cottbus in Brandenburg. Signs in this region are bilingual, and Cottbus has a Gymnasium where one language of instruction is Lower Sorbian. It is a endangered language. Most native speakers are in the oldest generation today, the phonology of Lower Sorbian has been greatly influenced by contact with German, especially in Cottbus and larger towns. For example, German-influenced pronunciation tends to have a voiced uvular fricative instead of the alveolar trill, in villages and rural areas German influence is less marked, and the pronunciation is more typically Slavic. /m, mʲ, p, pʲ, b, bʲ, w, wʲ/ are bilabial, whereas /f, /n, nʲ, l, r, rʲ/ are alveolar, whereas /t, d, t͡s, s, z/ are dental. /t͡ʂ, ʂ, ʐ/ are laminal retroflex in all of the Lower Sorbian–speaking area and this is unlike in standard Upper Sorbian, where these are palato-alveolar. /h/ is voiceless, unlike Upper Sorbian, where it is voiced and it is also very similar to the vowel inventory of Slovene. /i/ is retracted to after hard consonants, /e, o/ are diphthongized to in slow speech. The /e–ɛ/ and /o–ɔ/ distinctions are weakened or lost in unstressed syllables, article 1 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in Lower Sorbian, Wšykne luźe su lichotne roźone a jadnake po dostojnosći a pšawach. Woni maju rozym a wědobnosć a maju ze sobu w duchu bratšojstwa wobchadaś, Upper Sorbian language Dolnoserbski radio program Lower Sorbian Vocabulary List at slovnik. vancl. eu/dls at dolnoserbski. de at Korpus GENIE at dolnoserbski. de Lexikalische Übungen und Terminologie
6.
Polish language
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Polish is a West Slavic language spoken primarily in Poland and is the native language of the Poles. It belongs to the Lechitic subgroup of the West Slavic languages, Polish is the official language of Poland, but it is also used throughout the world by Polish minorities in other countries. It is one of the languages of the European Union. Its written standard is the Polish alphabet, which has 9 additions to the letters of the basic Latin script, Polish is closely related to Kashubian, Silesian, Upper Sorbian, Lower Sorbian, Czech and Slovak. It is also the second most widely spoken Slavic language, after Russian, in history, Polish is known to be an important language, both diplomatically and academically in Central and Eastern Europe. Today, Polish is spoken by over 38.5 million people as their first language in Poland. It is also spoken as a language in western parts of Belarus and Ukraine, west and central Lithuania, as well as the northern parts of the Czech Republic. There are 55 million Polish language speakers around the world, Polish began to emerge as a distinct language around the 10th century, the process largely triggered by the establishment and development of the Polish state. With Christianity, Poland also adopted the Latin alphabet, which made it possible to write down Polish, the precursor to modern Polish is the Old Polish language. Ultimately, Polish is thought to descend from the unattested Proto-Slavic language, Poland is the most linguistically homogeneous European country, nearly 97% of Polands citizens declare Polish as their first language. Elsewhere, Poles constitute large minorities in Lithuania, Belarus, Polish is the most widely used minority language in Lithuanias Vilnius County and is found elsewhere in southeastern Lithuania. There are significant numbers of Polish speakers among Polish emigrants and their descendants in many other countries, in the United States, Polish Americans number more than 11 million but most of them cannot speak Polish fluently. The largest concentrations of Polish speakers reported in the census were found in three states, Illinois, New York, and New Jersey. Enough people in these areas speak Polish that PNC Financial Services offer services available in Polish at all of their machines in addition to English and Spanish. According to the 2011 census there are now over 500,000 people in England, in Canada, there is a significant Polish Canadian population, There are 242,885 speakers of Polish according to the 2006 census, with a particular concentration in Toronto and Montreal. The geographical distribution of the Polish language was affected by the territorial changes of Poland immediately after World War II. Poles settled in the Recovered Territories in the west and north and this tendency toward a homogeneity also stems from the vertically integrated nature of the authoritarian Polish Peoples Republic. The inhabitants of different regions of Poland still speak standard Polish somewhat differently, first-language speakers of Polish have no trouble understanding each other, and non-native speakers may have difficulty distinguishing regional variations
7.
Czech language
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Czech, historically also Bohemian, is a West Slavic language of the Czech–Slovak group. It is spoken by over 10 million people and is the language of the Czech Republic. Czech is closely related to Slovak, to the point of being intelligible to a very high degree. In the later 18th to mid-19th century, the written standard was codified in the context of the Czech National Revival. The main vernacular, known as Common Czech, is based on the vernacular of Prague, the Moravian dialects spoken in the eastern part of the country are mostly also counted as Czech, although some of their eastern variants are closer to Slovak. The Czech phoneme inventory is moderate in size, comprising five vowels, words may contain uncommon consonant clusters, including one consonant represented by the grapheme ř, or lack vowels altogether. Czech orthography is simple, and has used as a model by phonologists. Czech is classified as a member of the West Slavic sub-branch of the Slavic branch of the Indo-European language family and this branch includes Polish, Kashubian, Upper and Lower Sorbian and Slovak. Slovak is by far the closest genetic neighbor of Czech, the West Slavic languages are spoken in an area classified as part of Central Europe. Around the 7th century, the Slavic expansion reached Central Europe, the West Slavic polity of Great Moravia formed by the 9th century. The Christianization of Bohemia took place during the 9th and 10th centuries, the Bohemian language is first recorded in writing in glosses and short notes during the 12th to 13th centuries. Literary works written in Czech appear in the early 14th century, the first complete Bible translation also dates to this period. Old Czech texts, including poetry and cookbooks, were produced outside the university as well, literary activity becomes widespread in the early 15th century in the context of the Bohemian Reformation. There was no standardization distinguishing between Czech and Slovak prior to the 15th century, the publication of the Kralice Bible between 1579 and 1593 became very important for standardization of the Czech language in the following centuries. In 1615, the Bohemian diet tried to declare Czech to be the official language of the kingdom. After the Bohemian Revolt which was defeated by the Habsburgs in 1620 and this emigration together with other consequences of the Thirty Years War had a negative impact on the further use of the Czech language. In 1627, Czech and German became official languages of the Kingdom of Bohemia and in the 18th century German became dominant in Bohemia and Moravia, the modern standard Czech language originates in standardization efforts of the 18th century. Changes include the shift of í to ej and é to í and the merging of í
8.
Germany
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Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a federal parliamentary republic in central-western Europe. It includes 16 constituent states, covers an area of 357,021 square kilometres, with about 82 million inhabitants, Germany is the most populous member state of the European Union. After the United States, it is the second most popular destination in the world. Germanys capital and largest metropolis is Berlin, while its largest conurbation is the Ruhr, other major cities include Hamburg, Munich, Cologne, Frankfurt, Stuttgart, Düsseldorf and Leipzig. Various Germanic tribes have inhabited the northern parts of modern Germany since classical antiquity, a region named Germania was documented before 100 AD. During the Migration Period the Germanic tribes expanded southward, beginning in the 10th century, German territories formed a central part of the Holy Roman Empire. During the 16th century, northern German regions became the centre of the Protestant Reformation, in 1871, Germany became a nation state when most of the German states unified into the Prussian-dominated German Empire. After World War I and the German Revolution of 1918–1919, the Empire was replaced by the parliamentary Weimar Republic, the establishment of the national socialist dictatorship in 1933 led to World War II and the Holocaust. After a period of Allied occupation, two German states were founded, the Federal Republic of Germany and the German Democratic Republic, in 1990, the country was reunified. In the 21st century, Germany is a power and has the worlds fourth-largest economy by nominal GDP. As a global leader in industrial and technological sectors, it is both the worlds third-largest exporter and importer of goods. Germany is a country with a very high standard of living sustained by a skilled. It upholds a social security and universal health system, environmental protection. Germany was a member of the European Economic Community in 1957. It is part of the Schengen Area, and became a co-founder of the Eurozone in 1999, Germany is a member of the United Nations, NATO, the G8, the G20, and the OECD. The national military expenditure is the 9th highest in the world, the English word Germany derives from the Latin Germania, which came into use after Julius Caesar adopted it for the peoples east of the Rhine. This in turn descends from Proto-Germanic *þiudiskaz popular, derived from *þeudō, descended from Proto-Indo-European *tewtéh₂- people, the discovery of the Mauer 1 mandible shows that ancient humans were present in Germany at least 600,000 years ago. The oldest complete hunting weapons found anywhere in the world were discovered in a mine in Schöningen where three 380, 000-year-old wooden javelins were unearthed
9.
Poland
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Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe, situated between the Baltic Sea in the north and two mountain ranges in the south. Bordered by Germany to the west, the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south, Ukraine and Belarus to the east, the total area of Poland is 312,679 square kilometres, making it the 69th largest country in the world and the 9th largest in Europe. With a population of over 38.5 million people, Poland is the 34th most populous country in the world, the 8th most populous country in Europe, Poland is a unitary state divided into 16 administrative subdivisions, and its capital and largest city is Warsaw. Other metropolises include Kraków, Wrocław, Poznań, Gdańsk and Szczecin, the establishment of a Polish state can be traced back to 966, when Mieszko I, ruler of a territory roughly coextensive with that of present-day Poland, converted to Christianity. The Kingdom of Poland was founded in 1025, and in 1569 it cemented a political association with the Grand Duchy of Lithuania by signing the Union of Lublin. This union formed the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, one of the largest and most populous countries of 16th and 17th century Europe, Poland regained its independence in 1918 at the end of World War I, reconstituting much of its historical territory as the Second Polish Republic. In September 1939, World War II started with the invasion of Poland by Nazi Germany, followed thereafter by invasion by the Soviet Union. More than six million Polish citizens died in the war, after the war, Polands borders were shifted westwards under the terms of the Potsdam Conference. With the backing of the Soviet Union, a communist puppet government was formed, and after a referendum in 1946. During the Revolutions of 1989 Polands Communist government was overthrown and Poland adopted a new constitution establishing itself as a democracy, informally called the Third Polish Republic. Since the early 1990s, when the transition to a primarily market-based economy began, Poland has achieved a high ranking on the Human Development Index. Poland is a country, which was categorised by the World Bank as having a high-income economy. Furthermore, it is visited by approximately 16 million tourists every year, Poland is the eighth largest economy in the European Union and was the 6th fastest growing economy on the continent between 2010 and 2015. According to the Global Peace Index for 2014, Poland is ranked 19th in the list of the safest countries in the world to live in. The origin of the name Poland derives from a West Slavic tribe of Polans that inhabited the Warta River basin of the historic Greater Poland region in the 8th century, the origin of the name Polanie itself derives from the western Slavic word pole. In some foreign languages such as Hungarian, Lithuanian, Persian and Turkish the exonym for Poland is Lechites, historians have postulated that throughout Late Antiquity, many distinct ethnic groups populated the regions of what is now Poland. The most famous archaeological find from the prehistory and protohistory of Poland is the Biskupin fortified settlement, dating from the Lusatian culture of the early Iron Age, the Slavic groups who would form Poland migrated to these areas in the second half of the 5th century AD. With the Baptism of Poland the Polish rulers accepted Christianity and the authority of the Roman Church
10.
Lower Lusatia
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Lower Lusatia is a historical region in Central Europe, stretching from the southeast of the German state of Brandenburg to the southwest of Lubusz Voivodeship in Poland. Like adjacent Upper Lusatia in the south, Lower Lusatia is a settlement area of the West Slavic Sorbs whose endangered Lower Sorbian language is related to Upper Sorbian, the sparsely inhabited area within the North European Plain is characterised by extended pine forests, heathlands and meadows. In the north it is confined by the middle Spree River with Lake Schwielochsee, in the glacial valley between Lübben and Cottbus, the Spree River branches out into the Spreewald riparian forest. Other rivers include the Berste and Oelse tributaries as well as the Schlaube, in the east, the Bóbr River from Łagoda via Krzystkowice down to the historic town of Żary forms the border with the lands of Lower Silesia. In the west the course of the upper Dahme River down to Golßen separates it from the former Electoral Saxon lands of Saxe-Wittenberg, between Lower and Upper Lusatia is a hill region called the Grenzwall, the eastern continuation of the Fläming Heath. In the Middle Ages this area had forests, so it represented a major obstacle to civilian. Today it is roughly congruent of the border between Brandenburg and the state of Saxony, today the area comprises the Brandenburg districts of Oberspreewald-Lausitz and Spree-Neiße with the unitary authority of Cottbus, as well as parts of Elbe-Elster, Dahme-Spreewald, and Oder-Spree. Since 1945, when a part of Lusatia east of the Oder-Neisse Line was incorporated into Poland. Emperor Conrad II reconquered the territories in 1031, in 1136 Conrad the Great of the mighty House of Wettin, margrave of Meissen since 1123, also received the March of Lusatia. This remained under the rule of the Wettin dynasty until in 1303 it was acquired by the Ascanian margraves of Brandenburg, Charles father King John of Bohemia had already acquired the adjacent territory to the south around Bautzen and Görlitz, which became known as Upper Lusatia. The former Lordship of Cottbus was acquired by Brandenburg in 1455, both Lusatias formed separate Bohemian crown lands under the rule of the Luxembourg, Jagiellon and—from 1526—Habsburg dynasties. In the course of the Reformation the vast majority of the population turned Protestant, as the Kingdom of Saxony had sided with Napoleon it had to cede Lower Lusatia to Prussia in the 1815 Congress of Vienna, whereafter the territory became part of the Province of Brandenburg. With the implementation of the Oder-Neisse line by the 1945 Potsdam Conference, the Lower Lusatian bull is first documented in 1363, upon the death of Emperor Charles IV in 1378 it appeared in gules on a field argent, similar to the coat of arms of Luckau. Spreewald biosphere reserve Lusatian Lake District Lower Lusatian Heath Nature Park Lower Lusatian Ridge Nature Park List of regions of Saxony
11.
Lusatia
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Lusatia is a region in Central Europe. The region is the home of the group of Lusatian Sorbs. Historically, Lusatia belonged to different countries. Being part of the Lands of the Bohemian Crown for three hundred years, alongside them it passed to the Habsburg Monarchy and from it to the Electorate of Saxony, the greater part passed to the Kingdom of Prussia in 1815 and the whole region merged into Germany in 1871. In the Polish part today Polish is spoken, and in the German part German, Upper-, the biggest Lusatian town is Cottbus. The name derives from the Sorbian word łužicy meaning swamps or water-hole, Lusatia is the Latinised form which spread in the English and Romance languages area. Lusatia comprises two both scenically and historically different parts, a hilly southern section and a lower region. Neighbouring regions were Silesia in the east, Bohemia in the south, the Margraviate of Meissen and the Duchy of Saxe-Wittenberg in the west as well as the Margraviate of Brandenburg in the north. Upper Lusatia is today part of the German state of Saxony, except for a part east of the Neisse River around Lubań. Among those villages are Niedercunnersdorf, Obercunnersdorf, Wehrsdorf, Jonsdorf, Sohland an der Spree with Taubenheim, Oppach, most of the area belonging to the German state of Brandenburg today is called Lower Lusatia and is characterised by forests and meadows. In the course of much of the 19th and the entire 20th century, it was shaped by the lignite industry, important towns include Cottbus, Eisenhüttenstadt, Lübben, Lübbenau, Spremberg, Finsterwalde, Senftenberg, and Żary, which is now considered the capital of Polish Lusatia. Between Upper and Lower Lusatia is a called the Grenzwall, literally meaning border dyke. In the Middle Ages this area had forests, so it represented a major obstacle to civilian. Some of the villages were damaged or destroyed by the open-pit lignite mining industry during the DDR era. The Lusatian Lake District will become Europes largest artificial lake district, some of the biggest lakes are Lake Senftenberg and Bluno Southern Lake. The Upper Lusatian Heath and Pond Landscape is the region richest in ponds in Germany, as Lusatia is not, and never has been, a single administrative unit, Upper and Lower Lusatia have different, but in some aspects similar, histories. The city of Cottbus is the largest in the region, and though it is recognized as the capital of Lower Lusatia. Historically, the centres of Lower Lusatia were at Luckau and Lübben
12.
Polabian Slavs
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Polabian Slavs is a collective term applied to a number of Lechite tribes who lived along the Elbe river in what is today Eastern Germany. The approximate territory stretched from the Baltic Sea in the north, the Saale and the Limes Saxoniae in the west, the Ore Mountains and the Western Sudetes in the south and they have also been known as Elbe Slavs or Wends. Their name derives from the Slavic po, meaning by/next to/along, the Polabian Slavs started settling in the territory of modern Germany in the 6th century. They were largely conquered by Saxons and Danes since the 9th century, the tribes were gradually Germanized and assimilated in the following centuries, the Sorbs are the only descendants of the Polabian Slavs to have retained their identity and culture. The Polabian language is now extinct, however, both Sorbian languages are spoken by approximately 60,000 inhabitants of the region and the languages are regarded by the government of Germany as official languages of the region. The Bavarian Geographer anonymous medieval document compiled in Regensburg in 830 contains a list of the tribes in Central-Eastern Europe to the east of the Elbe. Among other tribes it lists the Uuilci - with 95 civitates, the Nortabtrezi -53 civitates, the Milzane -30 civitates, the Great Soviet Encyclopedia classifies the Polabian Slavs in three main tribes, the Obotrites, the Veleti, and the Lusatian Sorbs. The main tribes of the Obotritic confederation were the Obotrites proper, the Wagrians, the Warnabi, other tribes associated with the confederation include the Linones near Lenzen, the Travnjane near the Trave, and the Drevani in the Hanoverian Wendland and the northern Altmark. The Redarier were the most important of the Veleti tribes, the Rani of Rügen, not to be confused with the older Germanic Rugians, are sometimes considered to be part of the Veleti. South of the Rani were the Ucri along the Ucker and the Morici along the Müritz, smaller tribes included the Došane along the Dosse, the Zamzizi in the Ruppin Land, and the Rěčanen on the upper Havel. Along the lower Havel and near the confluence of the Elbe and the Havel lived the Nelětici, the Liezizi, the Zemzizi, the Smeldingi, the middle Havel region and the Havelland were settled by the Hevelli, a tribe loosely connected to the Veleti. East of the Hevelli lived the Sprevane of the lower Dahme, small tribes on the middle Elbe included the Moriciani, the Zerwisti, the Serimunt, and the Nicici. South of the Hevelli lived the ancestors of the modern Sorbs, the Lusici of Lower Lusatia, near these tribes were the Selpoli and the Besunzanen. The Colodici, Siusler, and Glomaci lived along the upper Elbe, while the Chutici, Nisanen, Plisni, Gera, Puonzowa, Tucharin, Weta, on the middle Oder lived the Leubuzzi, who were associated with medieval Poland. Small groups of West Slavs also lived on the Main and the Regnitz near Bamberg, a Polabian prince was known as a knes. His power was greater in Slavic society than those of Danish or Swedish kings in their kingdoms. He was the leader of his tribe and was foremost among its nobles, holding much of the forested hinterland. However, his authority extended only to the territory controlled by his governor, or voivot
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Sorbs
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Sorbs, known also by their former autonyms Lusatians and Wends, are a West Slavic ethnic group predominantly inhabiting their homeland in Lusatia, a region divided between Germany and Poland. They traditionally speak the Sorbian languages, closely related to Polish, Kashubian, Czech, Sorbian is an officially recognized minority language of Germany. The Sorbs are linguistically and genetically closest to the Czechs and Poles, the community is divided religiously between Roman Catholicism and Lutheranism. An indicator of the degree of assimilation is the fact that the Prime Minister of Saxony is at present a Sorb, the ethnonym Sorbs derives from the medieval tribe, Sorbs. The original ethnonym, Srbi, was retained by the Sorbs and Serbs in the Balkans, by the 6th century, Slavs occupied the area west of the Oder formerly inhabited by Germanic peoples. The Sorbs are first mentioned in the 7th century, in the 19th century the autonym of the Slavic population of Lusatia was Lusatians. According to a study published in May 2011, Sorbs show the greatest genetic similarity to Poles, followed by Czechs. They show subtle evidence of genetic isolation but less than Sardinians, demographic history of the Sorb population since 1700, Sorbs are divided into two ethnographical groups, Upper Sorbs, who speak Upper Sorbian. Lower Sorbs, who speak Lower Sorbian, the dialects spoken vary in intelligibility in different areas. Sorbs arrived in the area extending between the Bober, Kwisa, and Oder rivers to the East and the Saale and Elbe rivers to the West during the 6th century, in the north, the area of their settlement reached Berlin. The earliest surviving mention of the tribe was in 631 A. D. when Fredegars Chronicle described them as Surbi and as under the rule of a Dervan, an ally of Samo. The Annales Regni Francorum state that in 806 A. D. Sorbian Duke Miliduch fought against the Franks and was killed, in 840, Sorbian Duke Czimislav was killed. In 932, Henry I conquered Lusatia and Milsko, gero II, Margrave of the Saxon Ostmark, reconquered Lusatia the following year and, in 939, murdered 30 Sorbian princes during a feast. As a result, there were many Sorbian uprisings against German rule, a reconstructed castle, at Raddusch in Lower Lusatia, is the sole physical remnant from this early period. Lusatian tribes are noted in the work of the Bavarian Geographer, the document contains a list of the tribes in Central-Eastern Europe east of the Elbe and north of the Danube to the Volga rivers to the Black and Caspian Sea most of them of Slavic origin. Having settled by the Elbe, Spree and Neisse in the 6th century, Sorbs living on the swampy broads of the Lower Spree have taken their name from the word marsh. The Milceni settled on fertile soil around Upper Spree, the name derives from the word měl’, the two groups were separated from each other by a wide and uninhabited forest range. The rest of the tribes settled themselves between the Elbe and Saale, among the many Slavic tribes, the Bavarian Geographer also noted a few Lusatian tribes, Glomacze - Dolomici, Milceni, Chutizi and Sitice
14.
Saxony
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Its capital is Dresden, and its largest city is Leipzig. Saxony is the tenth largest of Germanys sixteen states, with an area of 18,413 square kilometres, located in the middle of a large, formerly all German-speaking part of Europe, the history of the state of Saxony spans more than a millennium. It has been a medieval duchy, an electorate of the Holy Roman Empire, a kingdom, the area of the modern state of Saxony should not be confused with Old Saxony, the area inhabited by Saxons. Old Saxony corresponds approximately to the modern German states of Lower Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, Saxony is divided into 10 districts,1. After a reform in 2008, these regions - with some alterations of their respective areas - were called Direktionsbezirke, in 2012, the authorities of these regions were merged into one central authority, the Landesdirektion Sachsen. The Erzgebirgskreis district includes the Ore Mountains, and the Schweiz-Osterzgebirge district includes Saxon Switzerland, the largest cities in Saxony according to the 31 December 2015 estimate. To this can be added that Leipzig forms a metropolitan region with Halle. The latter city is located just across the border to Saxony-Anhalt, Leipzig shares for instance an S-train system and an airport with Halle. Saxony has, after Saxony Anhalt, the most vibrant economy of the states of the former East Germany and its economy grew by 1. 9% in 2010. Nonetheless, unemployment remains above the German average, the eastern part of Germany, excluding Berlin, qualifies as an Objective 1 development-region within the European Union, and is eligible to receive investment subsidies of up to 30% until 2013. FutureSAX, a business competition and entrepreneurial support organisation, has been in operation since 2002. Microchip makers near Dresden have given the region the nickname Silicon Saxony, the publishing and porcelain industries of the region are well known, although their contributions to the regional economy are no longer significant. Today the automobile industry, machinery production and services contribute to the development of the region. Saxony is also one of the most renowned tourist destinations in Germany - especially the cities of Leipzig and Dresden, new tourist destinations are developing, notably in the lake district of Lausitz. Saxony reported an unemployment of 8. 8% in 2014. By comparison the average in the former GDR was 9. 8% and 6. 7% for Germany overall, the unemployment rate reached 8. 2% in May 2015. The Leipzig area, which recently was among the regions with the highest unemployment rate, could benefit greatly from investments by Porsche. With the VW Phaeton factory in Dresden, and many part suppliers, zwickau is another major Volkswagen location
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Bautzen (district)
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The district of Bautzen is a district in the state of Saxony in Germany. Its largest towns are Bautzen, Bischofswerda, Kamenz, Hoyerswerda and it is the biggest district in Saxony in area, and is a member of the Neisse Euroregion. It is bordered to the south by the Czech Republic, after the end of the Thirty Years War it became a part of Saxony. Only the small town of Schirgiswalde remained Bohemian until 1809, the district was established in 1994 by merging the former districts of Bautzen and Bischofswerda. The district of Kamenz and the city of Hoyerswerda were merged into the district in August 2008. The district of Bautzen is part of the region of Upper Lusatia, the south of the district is occupied by the Lusatian Mountains, and the countryside slopes away to the north. The Spree river enters the district from the southeast and runs through Schirgiswalde, north of Bautzen, the river is dammed by a reservoir. At its widest, the district is 65 km east-west, and 63 km north-south, media related to Landkreis Bautzen at Wikimedia Commons Official website
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Oberspreewald-Lausitz
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Oberspreewald-Lausitz is a Kreis in the southern part of Brandenburg, Germany. Neighboring districts are Dahme-Spreewald, Spree-Neiße, the districts Kamenz and Riesa-Großenhain in Saxony, the Spree river runs through the district, along its banks there is the Spreewald, a wooded area and habitat of several rare animals. The district is part of the region of Lusatia. The district was formed in 1993 by merging the previous districts Calau and Senftenberg, media related to Oberspreewald-Lausitz at Wikimedia Commons Official website
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Brandenburg
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Brandenburg is one of the sixteen federated states of Germany. It lies in the northeast of the country covering an area of 29,478 square kilometers and has 2.48 million inhabitants, the capital and largest city is Potsdam. Brandenburg surrounds but does not include the capital and city-state Berlin forming a metropolitan area. Brandenburg is one of the states that was re-created in 1990 upon the reunification of the former East Germany. Governed by the Hohenzollern dynasty from 1415, it contained the future German capital Berlin, after 1618 the Margraviate of Brandenburg and the Duchy of Prussia were combined to form Brandenburg-Prussia, which was ruled by the same branch of the House of Hohenzollern. In 1701 the state was elevated as the Kingdom of Prussia, Brandenburg is situated in territory known in antiquity as Magna Germania, which reached to the Vistula river. By the 7th century, Slavic peoples are believed to have settled in the Brandenburg area, the Slavs expanded from the east, possibly driven from their homelands in present-day Ukraine and perhaps Belarus by the invasions of the Huns and Avars. They relied heavily on river transport, the two principal Slavic groups in the present-day area of Brandenburg were the Hevelli in the west and the Sprevane in the east. Beginning in the early 10th century, Henry the Fowler and his successors conquered territory up to the Oder River, Slavic settlements such as Brenna, Budusin, and Chośebuz came under imperial control through the installation of margraves. Their main function was to defend and protect the eastern marches, in 948 Emperor Otto I established margraves to exert imperial control over the pagan Slavs west of the Oder River. Otto founded the Bishoprics of Brandenburg and Havelberg, the Northern March was founded as a northeastern border territory of the Holy Roman Empire. However, an uprising of Wends drove imperial forces from the territory of present-day Brandenburg in 983. The region returned to the control of Slavic leaders, the Roman Catholic Church brought bishoprics which, with their walled towns, afforded protection from attacks for the townspeople. With the monks and bishops, the history of the town of Brandenburg an der Havel, in 1134, in the wake of a German crusade against the Wends, the German magnate, Albert the Bear, was granted the Northern March by the Emperor Lothar III. He formally inherited the town of Brandenburg and the lands of the Hevelli from their last Wendish ruler, Pribislav, after crushing a force of Sprevane who occupied the town of Brandenburg in the 1150s, Albert proclaimed himself ruler of the new Margraviate of Brandenburg. Albert, and his descendants the Ascanians, then made progress in conquering, colonizing, Christianizing. Within this region, Slavic and German residents intermarried, during the 13th century, the Ascanians began acquiring territory east of the Oder, later known as the Neumark. In 1320, the Brandenburg Ascanian line came to an end, under the Luxembourgs, the Margrave of Brandenburg gained the status of a prince-elector of the Holy Roman Empire
18.
Lower Silesian Voivodeship
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Lower Silesian Voivodeship, or Lower Silesia Province, in southwestern Poland, is one of the 16 voivodeships into which Poland is divided. Historically the area had ties to both German and Polish culture, with additional Czech influence in the southern mountainous region. Silesia was once divided into many small duchies reigned by dukes and princes of the Piast dynasty, during this time, cultural and ethnic Germanic influence prospered due to immigrants from the German-speaking areas of the mighty Holy Roman Empire. This also impacted on the architecture as well as traditions. Throughout the upcoming centuries, Lower Silesia experienced several key events such as the Protestant Reformation, Lower Silesia is one of the richest provinces in Poland as it has valuable natural resources such as copper, brown coal and rock materials, which are exploited by the biggest enterprises. Its well developed and varied industries attract both domestic and foreign investors and its capital and largest city is Wrocław, situated on the Odra River. Furthermore, the voivodeship is famous for its castles and palaces and is one of Polands most visited regions by tourists. The voivodeship was created on 1 January 1999 out of the former Wrocław, Legnica, Wałbrzych and Jelenia Góra Voivodeships and it covers an area of 19,946 square kilometres, and as of 2013 has a total population of 2914362. Although much of the region is relatively low-lying it also includes Sudeten Foreland, popular ski resorts in Lower Silesian Voivodeship include Karpacz and Szklarska Poręba in the Karkonosze mountains. Other important tourist destinations in the include the chief city, Wrocław, as well as the towns of Jelenia Góra. The town of Boleslawiec is famed for its pottery, an international airport is located in Wrocław–Copernicus Airport. The main railway station is Wrocław Główny, the A4 motorway, A8 motorway and A18 motorway run through the voivodship. Lower Silesian Voivodeship is one of the most visited voivodeships in Poland and it is famous for a large number of castles and palaces, inter alia, Książ Castle, Czocha Castle, Chojnik Castle, Grodziec castle, Gorzanów Castle, Kliczków Castle. There is also a lot in the Jelenia Góra valley, the voivodships most widely visited city is Wrocław with many sights and attractions, inter alia open all year round Aquapark, Wrocław SPA Center and famous Wrocławs dwarfs. The Festival of Good Beer is held every year, on the weekend of June. Śnieżka is one of the first European peaks visited by tourists, it is also the highest peak of the Lower Silesian Voivodeship, Lower Silesia is one of the richest regions in Poland. GDP per capita in 2007 accounted for 108. 7% of the average for the country, since 2005, the voivodeship recorded the highest in the country economic growth rate. The voivodeship contains 91 cities and towns and these are listed below in descending order of population, Lower Silesian Voivodeship is divided into 30 counties, four of which are city counties
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Lubusz Voivodeship
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Lubusz Voivodeship, or Lubuskie Province, is a voivodeship in western Poland. It was created on January 1,1999, out of the former Gorzów Wielkopolski and Zielona Góra Voivodeships, the provinces name recalls the historic Lubusz Land, although parts of the voivodeship belong to the historic regions of Silesia, Greater Poland and Lusatia. Until 1945, it formed the Neumark within the Prussian Province of Brandenburg. The functions of capital are shared between two cities, Gorzów Wielkopolski and Zielona Góra. The region is flat, with many lakes and woodlands. In the south, around Zielona Góra, grapes are cultivated, Lubusz Voivodeship borders West Pomeranian Voivodeship to the north, Greater Poland Voivodeship to the east, Lower Silesian Voivodeship to the south, and Germany to the west. Part of the province was located on the western bank of the Oder River. In 1226 Lebus Land came under jurisdiction of the Holy Roman Empire. After World War II it was sometimes referred to as the first Polish province to fall to German expansionism. In 1945, the conquest of eastern Germany by the Soviet Red Army was followed by the redrawing of Polands borders, the east part of the Lubusz region was transferred to Poland, where in communist propaganda it was referred to as part of the Regained or Recovered Territories. That part of the population which had not fled west of the Oder or been killed was rapidly expelled, however, as a result of popular protests, these proposals were eventually amended to increase the number of voivodeships to 16, leading to the creation of Lubusz Voivodeship. The voivodeship contains 42 cities and towns and these are listed below in descending order of population, Lubusz Voivodeship is divided into 14 counties,2 city counties and 12 land counties. These are further divided into 83 gminas, the counties are listed in the following table. Protected areas in Lubusz Voivodeship include two National Parks and eight Landscape Parks
20.
Bautzen
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Bautzen is a hill-top town in eastern Saxony, Germany, and administrative centre of the eponymous district. It is located on the Spree River, as of 2013, its population is 39,607. Asteroid 11580 Bautzen is named in honour of the city, Bautzen is often regarded as the unofficial, but historical capital of Upper Lusatia, and it is the most important cultural centre of the Sorbs, a Slavic people. The town on the River Spree is situated about 50 km east of Dresden between the Lusatian highland and the lowlands in the north, amidst the region of Upper Lusatia, to the north stretches the Bautzen Reservoir, which was flooded in 1974. This is the location of the villages of Malsitz and Nimschütz. The old part of Bautzen is located on the plateau above the Spree and it is bordered by the city walls. The later-built more recent quarters in the east were enclosed by the city ramparts, after their removal, the city expanded further east and to the left bank of the river. However, there has only been an urban area west of the Spree until today. In the 1970s, the development areas of Gesundbrunnen and Allendeviertel were erected, after 1990, several neighbouring villages were incorporated. The city is bordered by Radibor, Großdubrau and Malschwitz in the North, Kubschütz in the East, Großpostwitz, Obergurig and Doberschau-Gaußig in the South, all of these belong to the Bautzen district. The 15 city districts are, Innenstadt,5278 inh, in the 3rd century AD an eastern Germanic settlement existed here, but excavations have proved that the region was already inhabited as early as the late Stone Age. Sorbs arrived in the area during the Migration period in the sixth century AD, the first written evidence of the existence of the city was in 1002. In 1015 the Polish Army led by Bolesław I Chrobry defeated, in 1018 the Peace of Bautzen was signed between the German king Henry II and the Polish prince Boleslaus I. The Treaty left Bautzen under Polish rule, in 1032 the city passed to the Holy Roman Empire, in 1319 to Czech Crown lands and in 1635 to Saxony. During the Middle Ages it was a member of the Six Cities Alliance of the Upper Lusatian cities of Görlitz, Zittau, Löbau, Kamenz, Lauban and it was the site of one of the battlefields of the Napoleonic War Battle of Bautzen in 1813. In 1839 the Sorbian student organization Societas Slavica Budissenensis was founded in the city, the Sorbian House, a Sorbian cultural centre, was opened in the city in 1904. During World War II and the Nazi era, there was a subcamp of the Groß-Rosen concentration camp in Bautzen, ernst Thälmann was imprisoned there before being deported to Buchenwald. Between 21 April and 30 April 1945, the Battle of Bautzen was fought, furthermore, Bautzen was infamous throughout East Germany for its penitentiaries
21.
Zgorzelec
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Zgorzelec is a town in south-western Poland with 32,322 inhabitants. It lies in Lower Silesian Voivodeship and it is the seat of Zgorzelec County, and also of the smaller district of Gmina Zgorzelec. Zgorzelec is located on the Lusatian Neisse river, on the post-1945 Polish-German Neisse border adjoining the German town of Görlitz, up until 1945, the modern-day towns of Zgorzelec and Görlitz were a single entity, their history up to that point is shared. The date of the foundation is unknown. It was first mentioned in 1071, at that time Görlitz was a small village named Gorelic in the region of Lusatia, which soon after became a part of Bohemia. In the 13th century the village turned into a town. It became rich due to its location on the Via Regia, in the following centuries it was a wealthy member of the Six-City League of Upper Lusatia, consisting of the six Lusatian cities Bautzen, Görlitz, Kamenz, Lauban, Löbau and Zittau. The town of Gorlice in southern Poland was founded during the reign of Casimir the Great in 1354 by ethnic German colonists from Görlitz, after suffering for years in the Thirty Years War, the region of Upper Lusatia passed to Saxony. In 1815, after the Napoleonic Wars, the Congress of Vienna awarded Görlitz to Prussia, thus the city was a part of the Prussian province of Silesia from 1815 until 1945. The Treaty of Zgorzelec, between Poland and East Germany, was signed in the community center in 1950. The establishment of the Oder-Neisse line as the Polish-East German border, the German part retained the name Görlitz, while the Polish part became Zgorzelec. The German and Sorbian population was expelled from Zgorzelec and replaced with Poles, starting in 1948, some 10,000 Greek Refugees of the Greek Civil War, mainly communist partisans, were allowed into Poland and settled mainly in Zgorzelec. There were Greek schools, a Greek retirement home and even a factory reserved for Greek employees, the majority of those refugees later returned to Greece, but a part remains to this day. The Greek community of Zgorzelec was instrumental in the building of Ss, constantine and Helen Orthodox Church in 2002. Since 1999, an annual international Greek Song Festival has been held in Zgorzelec, since the fall of communism in 1989, Zgorzelec and Görlitz have developed a close political relationship. Two of the bridges over the Neisse river that had been blown up by retreating German forces in World War II have been rebuilt. There is also common urban management and annual common sessions of both town councils, in 2006 the towns jointly applied to be the European Capital of Culture in 2010. It was hoped that the jury would be convinced by the concept of Polish-German cooperation, Turów Zgorzelec mens basketball team currently plays in the Tauron Basket Liga
22.
March of Lusatia
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The March or Margraviate of Lusatia was as an eastern border march of the Holy Roman Empire in the lands settled by Polabian Slavs. It arose in 965 in the course of the partition of the vast Marca Geronis, ruled by several Saxon margravial dynasties, among them the House of Wettin, the lordship was contested by the Polish kings as well as by the Ascanian margraves of Brandenburg. The remaining territory was incorporated into the Lands of the Bohemian Crown in 1367. The territory of the margraviate roughly corresponded with the region of Lower Lusatia. It originally stretched from the border of the Saxon stem duchy along the Saale River in the west to the border with Poland on the Bober River in the east, from about 1138, the adjacent Polish territory beyond the river was part of the Duchy of Silesia. Over the centuries, the margravial territory diminished in favour of the Ascanian County of Anhalt, further territories in the west were split off by means of distribution, like the Osterland ruled by the Margraves of Landsberg or the County of Brehna. The area east of the former limes Sorabicus of East Francia, settled by the Slavic Veleti and he added the territory between the Saale and Bober rivers to his Marca Geronis, which the Saxon duke and German King Otto I had established in 937. After Geros death in 965 and the loss of the Northern March in the course of the 983 Slavic uprising, the division between Lower Lusatia and the adjacent Milceni lands around Bautzen and Görlitz, then part of Meissen, was also apparent even that early. Henrys successor Conrad II waged two campaigns, in 1031 and 1032, which reconquered both Lower and Upper Lusatia from Mieszko II of Poland. By the reign of King Henry IV from 1056, Lusatia had been reincorporated into the Holy Roman Empire and it formed one of the four divisions of Upper Saxony along with Meissen, the Ostmark, and Zeitz. These regions were not always ruled by separate margraves, but were mainly administrative divisions, Lusatia and the Ostmark were ruled together and eventually the Ostmark was reduced to little more than Lower Lusatia. Under Henry IV, Upper Lusatia was detached from the Lusatian march, the first Margrave of Lusatia is only known from 1046. Under Emperor Lothair III, Upper and Lower Lusatia were once again reunited in 1136, from 1210 on Lower Lusatia was held by the Margraves of Meissen from the House of Wettin. When the last Lusatian margrave Henry IV died in 1288, the Lusatian lands fell to his grandson Margrave Frederick Tuta of Landsberg and his successor Dietrich sold it to Otto IV, Margrave of Brandenburg in 1303. It was finally acquired by Emperor Charles IV in 1367 and incorporated into the Lands of the Bohemian Crown, the Lower Lusatian lands later passed to the Electorate of Saxony by the 1635 Peace of Prague. Dedi I, 1046–1075 Dedi II, fl, germany in the Early Middle Ages 800–1056. New York, Frederick Ungar Publishing Co.1928
23.
Milceni
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The Milceni or Milzeni were a West Slavic tribe, who settled in the present-day Upper Lusatia region. They were first mentioned in the middle of the 9th century AD by the Bavarian Geographer and they were gradually conquered by Germans during the 10th century. Modern descendents of the Milceni are the Sorbs of the Free State of Saxony, Germany, the Milceni travelled to Upper Lusatia in the 7th century during the Migration Period. The exact borders of their settlement area are disputed and it is generally accepted that their fielded land had fruitful loess soil and had dimensions of approximately 50 km from east to west and 20 km from north to south. The northern border was in swampy and partially unfertile terrain, while the border formed part of the Lausitzer Bergland. The hills of Burkau near Kamenz formed a boundary for the Milceni in the west. The boundaries of the tribe have also given as the Pulsnitz River in the west. The Ortenburg castle of Bautzen is built around fortifications originally constructed by the Milceni, charles the Younger, son of Charlemagne, defeated the Milceni and burnt their fortress in 806. Henry the Fowler, King of the Germans, defeated the Slavic tribe in 932 and demanded conversion to Christianity, emperor Otto I defeated the Lusatians in 963 and placed them under the rule of Margrave Gero. The Milceni were finally subjugated by Margrave Ekkehard I of Meissen ca.990 and had their territory incorporated into the Holy Roman Empire, the Milceni were then gradually Germanized or merged with the Lusatians of Lower Lusatia into the Sorbian ethnic group. During the 10th–12th centuries, the region of Bautzen was known in sources as Gau Milsca. In Polish, Upper Lusatia was known as Milsko until the 15th century, the Milceni are also mentioned in the 12th century Song of Roland. Sorbs Lusatia Margraviate of Meissen List of Medieval Slavic tribes Die Milzener e. V
24.
Steinigtwolmsdorf
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Steinigtwolmsdorf is a municipality of about 3419 inhabitants. It is situated in eastern Germany in the district of Bautzen in Saxony near the border to the Czech Republic, the community covers a surface of about 18.03 square kilometers and has a density of population of about 190 inhabitants per km^2. Steinigtwolmsdorf is in the part of the district of Bautzen. It is about 16 km apart from the city of Bischofswerda and it is near the federal highway B98, that is between Bischofswerda, Oppach and Zittau. The next railway-station can be found in Neukirch at the railway-connection between Dresden and Liberec, the community consists out of three parts, Steinigtwolmsdorf, Ringenhain and Weifa. The central village of the community has founded in 1250. The most important sight is the church from 1861 and some Umgebindehäuser, in one part of the community called Ringenhain there can be found the smallest Umgebindehaus of the whole upper Lusatia. The small village of Weifa, the highest of all villages in whole upper Lusatia and also unique as being a free village since hundreds of years
25.
Geomorphology
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Geomorphology is the scientific study of the origin and evolution of topographic and bathymetric features created by physical, chemical or biological processes operating at or near the Earths surface. Geomorphologists work within disciplines such as geography, geology, geodesy, engineering geology, archaeology. This broad base of interests contributes to many styles and interests within the field. Earths surface is modified by a combination of processes that sculpt landscapes, and geologic processes that cause tectonic uplift and subsidence. Many of these factors are strongly mediated by climate, the broad-scale topographies of the Earth illustrate this intersection of surface and subsurface action. Mountain belts are uplifted due to geologic processes, denudation of these high uplifted regions produces sediment that is transported and deposited elsewhere within the landscape or off the coast. On progressively smaller scales, similar ideas apply, where individual landforms evolve in response to the balance of additive processes, often, these processes directly affect each other, ice sheets, water, and sediment are all loads that change topography through flexural isostasy. Topography can modify the climate, for example through orographic precipitation. Many geomorphologists are particularly interested in the potential for feedbacks between climate and tectonics, mediated by geomorphic processes, in addition to these broad-scale questions, geomorphologists address issues that are more specific and/or more local. Fluvial geomorphologists focus on rivers, how they transport sediment, migrate across the landscape, cut into bedrock, respond to environmental and tectonic changes, and interact with humans. Soils geomorphologists investigate soil profiles and chemistry to learn about the history of a landscape and understand how climate, biota. Other geomorphologists study how hillslopes form and change, still others investigate the relationships between ecology and geomorphology. Because geomorphology is defined to comprise everything related to the surface of the Earth and its modification, geomorphologists use a wide range of techniques in their work. These may include fieldwork and field data collection, the interpretation of remotely sensed data, geochemical analyses, geomorphologists may rely on geochronology, using dating methods to measure the rate of changes to the surface. Practical applications of geomorphology include hazard assessment, river control and stream restoration, planetary geomorphology studies landforms on other terrestrial planets such as Mars. Indications of effects of wind, fluvial, glacial, mass wasting, meteor impact, tectonics and this effort not only helps better understand the geologic and atmospheric history of those planets but also extends geomorphological study of the Earth. Planetary geomorphologists often use Earth analogues to aid in their study of surfaces of other planets, other than some notable exceptions in antiquity, geomorphology is a relatively young science, growing along with interest in other aspects of the earth sciences in the mid-19th century. This section provides a brief outline of some of the major figures
26.
UNESCO
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The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations based in Paris. It is the heir of the League of Nations International Committee on Intellectual Cooperation, UNESCO has 195 member states and nine associate members. Most of its offices are cluster offices covering three or more countries, national and regional offices also exist. UNESCO pursues its objectives through five major programs, education, natural sciences, social/human sciences, culture and it is also a member of the United Nations Development Group. UNESCO and its mandate for international cooperation can be traced back to a League of Nations resolution on 21 September 1921, on 18 December 1925, the International Bureau of Education began work as a non-governmental organization in the service of international educational development. However, the work of predecessor organizations was largely interrupted by the onset of World War II. On 30 October 1943, the necessity for an organization was expressed in the Moscow Declaration, agreed upon by China, the United Kingdom, the United States. This was followed by the Dumbarton Oaks Conference proposals of 9 October 1944, a prominent figure in the initiative for UNESCO was Rab Butler, the Minister of Education for the United Kingdom. At the ECO/CONF, the Constitution of UNESCO was introduced and signed by 37 countries, the Preparatory Commission operated between 16 November 1945, and 4 November 1946—the date when UNESCOs Constitution came into force with the deposit of the twentieth ratification by a member state. The first General Conference took place between 19 November to 10 December 1946, and elected Dr. Julian Huxley to Director-General and this change in governance distinguished UNESCO from its predecessor, the CICI, in how member states would work together in the organizations fields of competence. In 1956, the Republic of South Africa withdrew from UNESCO claiming that some of the organizations publications amounted to interference in the racial problems. South Africa rejoined the organization in 1994 under the leadership of Nelson Mandela, UNESCOs early work in the field of education included the pilot project on fundamental education in the Marbial Valley, Haiti, started in 1947. This project was followed by missions to other countries, including, for example. In 1948, UNESCO recommended that Member States should make free primary education compulsory, in 1990, the World Conference on Education for All, in Jomtien, Thailand, launched a global movement to provide basic education for all children, youths and adults. Ten years later, the 2000 World Education Forum held in Dakar, Senegal, UNESCOs early activities in culture included, for example, the Nubia Campaign, launched in 1960. The purpose of the campaign was to move the Great Temple of Abu Simbel to keep it from being swamped by the Nile after construction of the Aswan Dam, during the 20-year campaign,22 monuments and architectural complexes were relocated. This was the first and largest in a series of campaigns including Mohenjo-daro, Fes, Kathmandu, Borobudur, the organizations work on heritage led to the adoption, in 1972, of the Convention concerning the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage. The World Heritage Committee was established in 1976 and the first sites inscribed on the World Heritage List in 1978, since then important legal instruments on cultural heritage and diversity have been adopted by UNESCO member states in 2003 and 2005
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Man and the Biosphere Programme
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As of March 2016,669 biosphere reserves in 120 countries, including 16 transboundary sites, have been included in the World Network of Biosphere Reserves. Biosphere reserves are areas comprising terrestrial, marine and coastal ecosystems, each reserve promotes solutions reconciling the conservation of biodiversity with its sustainable use. Biosphere reserves are nominated by governments and remain under the sovereign jurisdiction of the states where they are located. Their status is internationally recognized. The buffer zone surrounds or adjoins the core areas, and is used for activities compatible with sound ecological practices that can reinforce scientific research, monitoring, training and education. The transition area is the part of the reserve where the greatest activity is allowed, fostering economic, participating countries establish MAB National Committees that ensure maximum national participation in the international programme, defining and implementing each country’s activities. MAB currently operates through 158 National Committees established among the 195 Members States, the agenda of the MAB Programme is defined by its main governing body, the International Coordinating Council. The MAB Council consists of 34 member states elected by UNESCO’s General Conference, the council elects a chair and five vice-chairpersons from each of UNESCO’s geopolitical regions, one of which functions as a rapporteur. Its staff members draw on expertise in many and varied disciplines, the programme can grant seed funding to assist countries in developing projects and/or to secure appropriate partnership contributions. The latest World Congress of Biosphere Reserves took place in Lima, Peru and this will be the 4th World Congress of Biosphere Reserves and it shall develop a new vision for the decade 2016–2025. The World Network of Biosphere Reserves is supported by different regional, sub-regional or thematic networks and these are as follows, The African Biosphere Reserves Network was created in 1996 and comprises 33 African countries. The ArabMAB Network was officially launched in 1997 and represents 18 Arab countries, the East Asian Biosphere Reserve Network was launched in 1994. Today, it consists of China, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Japan, Kazakhstan, Mongolia, the Republic of Korea, euroMAB is the network of biosphere reserves in Europe and North America. Created in 1987, it is the largest MAB Regional Network with 53 countries, the Ibero-American MAB Network was created in 1992. It comprises 22 countries from Latin American and the Caribbean, Spain, the Pacific Man and the Biosphere Network was created in 2006 and comprises the Federated States of Micronesia, Kiribati, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Samoa and Tonga. The South and Central Asia MAB Network was created in 2002 and comprises Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Iran, Kazakhstan, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, the Southeast Asian Biosphere Reserve Network was created in 1998. Today, it comprises Cambodia, China, Indonesia, Japan, Lao PDR, Malaysia, Myanmar, Philippines, Thailand, the East Atlantic Biosphere Reserve Network was created in 1994. It comprises the Canary Islands, Cape Verde, Guinea Bissau, Madeira and Azores, Mauritania, Morocco, Sao Tomé and Principe, the World Network of Island and Coastal Biosphere Reserves was established in 2012 and comprises 22 countries. Agenda 21 Searchable list of UNESCO World Network of Biosphere Reserves Frequently Asked Questions on Biosphere Reserve A-Z of Areas of Biodiverity Importance, Biosphere Reserves
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Otter
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Otters are carnivorous mammals in the subfamily Lutrinae. The 13 extant otter species are all semiaquatic, aquatic or marine, with diets based on fish, Lutrinae is a branch of the weasel family Mustelidae, which also includes badgers, honey badgers, martens, minks, polecats, and wolverines. The word otter derives from the Old English word otor or oter and this, and cognate words in other Indo-European languages, ultimately stem from the Proto-Indo-European language root *wódr̥, which also gave rise to the English word water. An otters den is called a holt or couch, male otters are called dogs or boars, females are called bitches or sows, and their offspring are called pups. The collective nouns for otters are bevy, family, lodge, romp or, the feces of otters are typically identified by their distinctive aroma, the smell of which has been described as ranging from freshly mown hay to putrefied fish, these are known as spraints. The gestation period in otters is about 60 to 86 days, the newborn pup is cared for by the bitch, dog and older offspring. Bitch otters reach sexual maturity at two years of age and males at approximately three years. The holt is built under tree roots or a rocky cairn and it is lined with moss and grass. After one month, the pup can leave the holt and after two months, it is able to swim, the pup lives with its family for approximately one year. Otters live up to 16 years, they are by nature playful and its usual source of food is fish, and further downriver, eels, but it may sample frogs and birds. Otters have long, slim bodies and relatively short limbs and their most striking anatomical features are the powerful webbed feet used to swim, and their seal-like abilities holding breath underwater. Most have sharp claws on their feet and all except the sea otter have long, the 13 species range in adult size from 0.6 to 1.8 m in length and 1 to 45 kg in weight. The Oriental small-clawed otter is the smallest otter species and the giant otter and they have very soft, insulated underfur, which is protected by an outer layer of long guard hairs. This traps a layer of air which keeps them dry, warm, several otter species live in cold waters and have high metabolic rates to help keep them warm. European otters must eat 15% of their weight each day. In water as warm as 10 °C, an otter needs to catch 100 g of fish per hour to survive, most species hunt for three to five hours each day and nursing mothers up to eight hours each day. For most otters, fish is the staple of their diet and this is often supplemented by frogs, crayfish and crabs. Some otters are expert at opening shellfish, and others feed on available small mammals or birds
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Lusatian Mountains
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The Lusatian Mountains are a mountain range of the Western Sudetes on the southeastern border of Germany with the Czech Republic. They are a continuation of the Ore Mountains range west of the Elbe valley, the mountains of the northern, German, part are called the Zittau Mountains. The northwestern foothills of the Lusatian Mountains are called the Lusatian Highlands, the range is largely made up of sandstone sedimentary rocks leaning on a Precambrian crystalline basement. The northern ridge is marked by the Lusatian Fault, a geological disturbance zone separating the Bohemian sandstones from the Lusatian granodiorite, during the Tertiary volcanic magma streams broke through the sandstone layer and solidified into basalt and phonolite. Several sandstone contact areas were also hardened to columns and distinct rock formations, both the German and the Czech parts nowadays are protected areas according to IUCN guidelines. The highest peak is the Lausche, other notable peaks include the Pěnkavčí vrch, Jedlová, Klíč, Hochwald and Studenec
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Sudetes
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The Sudetes /suːˈdiːtiːz/ are a mountain range in Central Europe, also known in English as the Sudeten or Sudety mountains. The range stretches from eastern Germany along the border of the Czech Republic to south-western Poland. The highest peak of the range is Sněžka in the Krkonoše mountains on the Czech Republic–Poland border, the current geomorphological unit in the Czech part of the mountain range is Krkonošsko-jesenická subprovincie. It is separated from the Carpathian Mountains by the Moravian Gate, the Krkonoše Mountains have experienced growing tourism for winter sports during the past ten years. Their skiing resorts are becoming an alternative to the Alps. The name Sudetes is derived from Sudeti montes, a Latinization of the name Soudeta ore used in the Geographia by the Greco-Roman writer Ptolemy c, AD150 for a range of mountains in Germania in the general region of the modern Czech republic. The modern Sudetes are probably Ptolemys Askiburgion mountains, Ptolemy wrote Σούδητα in Greek, which is a neuter plural. Latin mons, however, is a masculine, hence Sudeti, the Latin version, and the modern geographical identification, is likely to be a scholastic innovation, as it is not attested in classical Latin literature. The meaning of the name is not known, in one hypothetical derivation, it means Mountains of Wild Boars, relying on Indo-European *su-, pig. A better etymology perhaps is from Latin sudis, plural sudes, spines, the Sudetes also comprise larger basins like the Jelenia Góra and the Kłodzko Valley. The exact location of the Sudetes has varied over the centuries, the ancient Sudeti meant at least the northwest frontier of todays Czech Republic, probably extending to the north. By implication, it was part of the vast Hercynian Forest belt mentioned by authors of the antiquity. After World War I the name Sudetenland came into use to areas of the First Czechoslovak Republic with large ethnic German populations. In 1918 the short-lived rump state of German-Austria proclaimed a Province of the Sudetenland in northern Moravia, in total the German minority population of pre-World War II Czechoslovakia numbered around 20% of the total national population. After being annexed by Nazi Germany, much of the region was redesignated as the Reichsgau Sudetenland, after World War II, most of the German population within the Polish and Czechoslovak Sudetes was forcibly expelled on the basis of the Potsdam Agreement and the Beneš decrees. A considerable proportion of the Czechoslovak populace thereafter strongly objected to the use of the term Sudety, the nearest international airport is in Wrocław - Copernicus Airport Wrocław
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Bohemia
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Bohemia is the westernmost and largest historical region of the Czech lands in the present-day Czech Republic. Bohemia was a duchy of Great Moravia, later an independent principality, a kingdom in the Holy Roman Empire, and subsequently a part of the Habsburg Monarchy, after World War I and the establishment of an independent Czechoslovak state, Bohemia became a part of Czechoslovakia. Between 1938 and 1945, border regions with sizeable German-speaking minorities of all three Czech lands were joined to Nazi Germany as the Sudetenland, in 1990, the name was changed to the Czech Republic, which become a separate state in 1993 with the dissolution of Czechoslovakia. Until 1948, Bohemia was a unit of Czechoslovakia as one of its lands. Bohemia was bordered in the south by Upper and Lower Austria, in the west by Bavaria and in the north by Saxony and Lusatia, in the northeast by Silesia, and in the east by Moravia. In the 2nd century BC, the Romans were competing for dominance in northern Italy, the Romans defeated the Boii at the Battle of Placentia and the Battle of Mutina. After this, many of the Boii retreated north across the Alps, much later Roman authors refer to the area they had once occupied as Boiohaemum. The earliest mention was by Tacitus Germania 28, and later mentions of the name are in Strabo. The name appears to include the tribal name Boi- plus the Germanic element *haimaz home and this Boiohaemum was apparently isolated to the area where King Marobods kingdom was centred, within the Hercynian forest. The Czech name Čechy is derived from the name of the Slavic ethnic group, the Czechs, Bohemia, like neighbouring Bavaria, is named after the Boii, who were a large Celtic nation known to the Romans for their migrations and settlement in northern Italy and other places. Another part of the nation moved west with the Helvetii into southern France, to the south, over the Danube, the Romans extended their empire, and to the southeast in Hungaria, were Sarmatian peoples. In the area of modern Bohemia the Marcomanni and other Suebic groups were led by their king Marobodus and he took advantage of the natural defenses provided by its mountains and forests. In late classical times and the early Middle Ages, two new Suebic groupings appeared to the west of Bohemia in southern Germany, the Alemanni, many Suebic tribes from the Bohemian region took part in such movements westwards, even settling as far away as Spain and Portugal. With them were also tribes who had pushed from the east, such as the Vandals, other groups pushed southwards towards Pannonia. These are precursors of todays Czechs, though the amount of Slavic immigration is a subject of debate. The Slavic influx was divided into two or three waves, the first wave came from the southeast and east, when the Germanic Lombards left Bohemia. Soon after, from the 630s to 660s, the territory was taken by Samos tribal confederation and his death marked the end of the old Slavonic confederation, the second attempt to establish such a Slavonic union after Carantania in Carinthia. Other sources divide the population of Bohemia at this time into the Merehani, Marharaii, Beheimare, Christianity first appeared in the early 9th century, but only became dominant much later, in the 10th or 11th century
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Czech Republic
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The Czech Republic, also known as Czechia, is a nation state in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west, Austria to the south, Slovakia to the east and Poland to the northeast. The Czech Republic covers an area of 78,866 square kilometres with mostly temperate continental climate and it is a unitary parliamentary republic, has 10.5 million inhabitants and the capital and largest city is Prague, with over 1.2 million residents. The Czech Republic includes the territories of Bohemia, Moravia. The Czech state was formed in the late 9th century as the Duchy of Bohemia under the Great Moravian Empire, after the fall of the Empire in 907, the centre of power transferred from Moravia to Bohemia under the Přemyslid dynasty. In 1002, the duchy was formally recognized as part of the Holy Roman Empire, becoming the Kingdom of Bohemia in 1198 and reaching its greatest territorial extent in the 14th century. Following the Battle of Mohács in 1526, the whole Crown of Bohemia was gradually integrated into the Habsburg Monarchy alongside the Archduchy of Austria, the Protestant Bohemian Revolt against the Catholic Habsburgs led to the Thirty Years War. After the Battle of the White Mountain, the Habsburgs consolidated their rule, reimposed Roman Catholicism, the Czech part of Czechoslovakia was occupied by Germany in World War II, and was liberated in 1945 by the armies of the Soviet Union and the United States. The Czech country lost the majority of its German-speaking inhabitants after they were expelled following the war, the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia won the 1946 elections. Following the 1948 coup détat, Czechoslovakia became a one-party communist state under Soviet influence, in 1968, increasing dissatisfaction with the regime culminated in a reform movement known as the Prague Spring, which ended in a Soviet-led invasion. Czechoslovakia remained occupied until the 1989 Velvet Revolution, when the communist regime collapsed, on 6 March 1990, the Czech Socialistic Republic was renamed to the Czech Republic. On 1 January 1993, Czechoslovakia peacefully dissolved, with its constituent states becoming the independent states of the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic. The Czech Republic joined NATO in 1999 and the European Union in 2004, it is a member of the United Nations, the OECD, the OSCE, and it is a developed country with an advanced, high income economy and high living standards. The UNDP ranks the country 14th in inequality-adjusted human development, the Czech Republic also ranks as the 6th most peaceful country, while achieving strong performance in democratic governance. It has the lowest unemployment rate in the European Union, the traditional English name Bohemia derives from Latin Boiohaemum, which means home of the Boii. The current name comes from the endonym Čech, spelled Cžech until the reform in 1842. The name comes from the Slavic tribe and, according to legend, their leader Čech, the etymology of the word Čech can be traced back to the Proto-Slavic root *čel-, meaning member of the people, kinsman, thus making it cognate to the Czech word člověk. The country has traditionally divided into three lands, namely Bohemia in the west, Moravia in the southeast, and Czech Silesia in the northeast. Following the dissolution of Czechoslovakia at the end of 1992, the Czech part of the former nation found itself without a common single-word geographical name in English, the name Czechia /ˈtʃɛkiə/ was recommended by the Czech Ministry of Foreign Affairs
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Hochwald (Zittau Mountains)
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Hochwald is a mountain on the border of Saxony in southeastern Germany and Bohemia in the Czech Republic. It is at 749.5 meters above sea level, one of the highest in the Lusatian/Zittau ranges and it has two peaks, the southern main summit, which lies 743.8 meters above sea level, and the north summit, which is 370 meters away. Due to the visually appealing views from the mountain, it has earned the nickname Aussichtsturm des Zittauer Gebirges, in 1853, on the Czech side of the mountain, a cottage was built, it burned completely down in 1877. The next year, another was erected in the style, and a year after that, the 10-meter wooden lookout tower, Carola. Because of the quantity of visitors, the German side of the mountain saw a restaurant created that still stands today. A 25-meter stone tower was built due to the wooden tower being in a state of disrepair. A short time later, a ticket sales house was created and it was ultimately turned into a restaurant, in which New Years Day festivities are held today. From the upper terrace of the mountain, there is a field of view east, south. A plethora of other mountains can be seen
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Lusatian Highlands
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The Lusatian Highlands or Lusatian Hills form a hilly region in Germany and the Czech Republic. A western extension of the Sudetes range, it is located on the border of the German state of Saxony with the Czech Bohemian region and it is one of the eight natural landscapes of Upper Lusatia. The Lusatian Highlands are named after the region of Upper Lusatia. The hills are situated between the Elbe Sandstone Mountains to the west and the somewhat higher Lusatian Mountains and the Zittau Mountains to the east, the source of the river Spree, which runs through central Berlin, is located near the small town of Ebersbach. The Lusatian Highlands are a famous tourist region shown in several movies and they are known for the beauty of the landscape and their picturesque towns with Baroque churches and wooden houses. Popular tourist towns in the region are Schirgiswalde, also known as the capital of carnival in Upper Lusatia, Šluknov with its famous arboretum, other notable towns include Ebersbach, Velký Šenov, Neukirch/Lausitz, Sohland an der Spree and Kirschau. List of regions of Saxony Lusatian Mountains
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