Goldberg

Goldberg, a town of Germany, in the Prussian province of Silesia,1 14 m. by rail S.W. of Liegnitz, on the Katzbach, an affluent of the Oder. Pop. (1905) 6804. The principal buildings are an old church dating from the beginning of the 13th century, the Schwabe-Priesemuth institution, completed in 1876, for the board and education of orphans, and the classical school or gymnasium (founded in 1524 by Duke Frederick II. of Liegnitz), which in the 17th century enjoyed great prosperity, and numbered Wallenstein among its pupils. The chief manufactures are woollen cloth, flannel, gloves, stockings, leather and beer, and there is a considerable trade in corn and fruit. Goldberg owes its origin and name to a gold mine in the neighbourhood, which, however, has been wholly abandoned since the time of the Hussite wars. The town obtained civic rights in 1211. It suffered heavily from the Tatars in 1241, from the plague in 1334, from the Hussites in 1428, and from the Saxon, Imperial and Swedish forces during the Thirty Years’ War. On the 27th of May 1813 a battle took place near it between the French and the Russians; and on the 23rd and the 27th of August of the same year fights between the allies and the French.

See Sturm, Geschichte der Stadt Goldberg in Schlesien (1887).

* * *

1 Goldberg is also the name of a small town in the grand-duchy of Mecklenburg-Schwerin.

* * *