Schneeberg is a town in

Saxony Saxony (german: Sachsen ; Upper Saxon: ''Saggsn''; hsb, Sakska), officially the Free State of Saxony (german: Freistaat Sachsen, links=no ; Upper Saxon: ''Freischdaad Saggsn''; hsb, Swobodny stat Sakska, links=no), is a landlocked state of ...

’s district of

Erzgebirgskreis Erzgebirgskreis is a district ('' Kreis'') in the Free State of Saxony, Germany. It is named after the Erzgebirge ("Ore Mountains"), a mountain range in the southern part of the district which forms part of the Germany–Czech Republic border. I ...

. It has roughly 16,400 inhabitants and belongs to the Town League of Silberberg (''Städtebund Silberberg''). It lies 4 km west of

Aue Aue may refer to: * Aue (toponymy), a frequent element in German toponymy meaning "wetland; river island; river" Places * Aue, Saxony, a mining town in Saxony, Germany * Aue (Samtgemeinde), a collective municipality in Uelzen District, Lower Sax ...

, and southeast of

Zwickau Zwickau (; is, with around 87,500 inhabitants (2020), the fourth-largest city of Saxony after Leipzig, Dresden and Chemnitz and it is the seat of the Zwickau District. The West Saxon city is situated in the valley of the Zwickau Mulde (German: ...

Geography

Location

Schneeberg lies on the Silver Road in the upper western Ore Mountains. Visible from afar is the prominent church of St. Wolfgang. The heart of the town lies on the ''Schneeberg'', which reaches 470 metres above

sea level Mean sea level (MSL, often shortened to sea level) is an average surface level of one or more among Earth's coastal bodies of water from which heights such as elevation may be measured. The global MSL is a type of vertical datuma standardised g ...

and is also the town’s namesake. Among the surrounding peaks are the ''Gleesberg'' (593 m) to the east and the ''Keilberg'' (557 m) to the north.

History

Schneeberg’s more than 500-year-long history has been shaped by

mining Mining is the extraction of valuable minerals or other geological materials from the Earth, usually from an ore body, lode, vein, seam, reef, or placer deposit. The exploitation of these deposits for raw material is based on the economic via ...

more than anything else, laying the very groundwork for the town’s founding. The original

silver Silver is a chemical element with the Symbol (chemistry), symbol Ag (from the Latin ', derived from the Proto-Indo-European wikt:Reconstruction:Proto-Indo-European/h₂erǵ-, ''h₂erǵ'': "shiny" or "white") and atomic number 47. A soft, whi ...

mining also yielded

cobalt Cobalt is a chemical element with the symbol Co and atomic number 27. As with nickel, cobalt is found in the Earth's crust only in a chemically combined form, save for small deposits found in alloys of natural meteoric iron. The free element, pr ...

and

bismuth Bismuth is a chemical element with the Symbol (chemistry), symbol Bi and atomic number 83. It is a post-transition metal and one of the pnictogens, with chemical properties resembling its lighter group 15 siblings arsenic and antimony. Elemental ...

mining by the mid 16th century. When

uranium Uranium is a chemical element with the symbol U and atomic number 92. It is a silvery-grey metal in the actinide series of the periodic table. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons. Uranium is weak ...

mining was being undertaken between 1946 and 1958, the town’s population quickly rose, leading to Schneeberg’s status as a district-free town (''kreisfreie Stadt'') between 1952 and 1958. Afterwards it once again belonged to the district of Aue. Between 1952 and 1990, Schneeberg was part of the

Bezirk Karl-Marx-Stadt The Bezirk Karl-Marx-Stadt, also known as Bezirk Chemnitz, was a district (''Bezirk'') of East Germany. The administrative seat and the main town was Karl-Marx-Stadt, renamed back to Chemnitz during the reunification of Germany. History The Chemni ...

East Germany East Germany, officially the German Democratic Republic (GDR; german: Deutsche Demokratische Republik, , DDR, ), was a country that existed from its creation on 7 October 1949 until its dissolution on 3 October 1990. In these years the state ...

Amalgamations

* 1939 Bergstadt Neustädtel, near which lies the popular outing destinations Gleesberg and Filzteich * 1952 Community of Griesbach, northwest of Schneeberg * 1999 Community of Lindenau

Population development

Development of population figures ''(as of 1960 on 31 December)'': ¹ 29 October
² 31 August

Culture and sightseeing

The ''St. Wolfgangskirche'' is one of the biggest and architecturally most mature churches built in the Late Gothic style, and is an earlier type of

Reformation The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in ...

church construction. Inside are found works by

Lucas Cranach the Elder Lucas Cranach the Elder (german: Lucas Cranach der Ältere ; – 16 October 1553) was a German Renaissance painter and printmaker in woodcut and engraving. He was court painter to the Electors of Saxony for most of his career, and is know ...

and the Crodel family of painters, whom the ''Krodel-Brunnen'' (fountain), demolished in late 2005, commemorated. Among the other sights to be seen are the

neo-Gothic Gothic Revival (also referred to as Victorian Gothic, neo-Gothic, or Gothick) is an architectural movement that began in the late 1740s in England. The movement gained momentum and expanded in the first half of the 19th century, as increasingly ...

Town Hall, newly built in the mid 19th century, various

Baroque The Baroque (, ; ) is a style of architecture, music, dance, painting, sculpture, poetry, and other arts that flourished in Europe from the early 17th century until the 1750s. In the territories of the Spanish and Portuguese empires including t ...

buildings and mining memorials.

Economy and infrastructure

Transport

In Schneeberg ends ''

Bundesstraße ''Bundesstraße'' (German for "federal highway"), abbreviated ''B'', is the denotation for German and Austrian national highways. Germany Germany's ''Bundesstraßen'' network has a total length of about 40,000 km. German ''Bundesstraßen'' ...

'' (Federal Highway) 93 from

Leipzig Leipzig ( , ; Upper Saxon: ) is the most populous city in the German state of Saxony. Leipzig's population of 605,407 inhabitants (1.1 million in the larger urban zone) as of 2021 places the city as Germany's eighth most populous, as wel ...

, which once led further, across the border, to Karlsbad (now Karlovy Vary in the

Czech Republic The Czech Republic, or simply Czechia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Historically known as Bohemia, it is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the southeast. The ...

). Furthermore, ''Bundesstraße'' 169 runs through the town from

Plauen Plauen (; Czech: ''Plavno'') is, with around 65,000 inhabitants, the fifth-largest city of Saxony, Germany after Leipzig, Dresden, Chemnitz and Zwickau, the second-largest city of the Vogtland after Gera, as well as the largest city in the S ...

to Chemnitz. From 1859 to 1952, the town had a

railway Rail transport (also known as train transport) is a means of transport that transfers passengers and goods on wheeled vehicles running on rails, which are incorporated in tracks. In contrast to road transport, where the vehicles run on a pre ...

connection afforded by a 5-km-long

spur A spur is a metal tool designed to be worn in pairs on the heels of riding boots for the purpose of directing a horse or other animal to move forward or laterally while riding. It is usually used to refine the riding aids (commands) and to ba ...

leading to Niederschlema on the

- Schwarzenberg-

Johanngeorgenstadt Johanngeorgenstadt () is a mining town in Saxony’s Ore Mountains, 17 km south of Aue, and 27 km northwest of Karlovy Vary. It lies in the district of Erzgebirgskreis, on the border with the Czech Republic, is a state-recognized heal ...

-Karlsbad railway line.

State institutions

Schneeberg was until 31 March 2008 headquarters of the

Bundeswehr The ''Bundeswehr'' (, meaning literally: ''Federal Defence'') is the armed forces of the Federal Republic of Germany. The ''Bundeswehr'' is divided into a military part (armed forces or ''Streitkräfte'') and a civil part, the military part con ...

’s ''Gebirgsjägerbataillon'' (“Mountain Rangers’ Battalion”) 571 and ''Versorgungskompanie'' (“Supply Company”) 370.

Education

Schneeberg had at its disposal a lyceum, out of which grew a Gymnasium. Moreover, the town was home to a lace tatting school, an

art school An art school is an educational institution with a primary focus on the visual arts, including fine art – especially illustration, painting, photography, sculpture, and graphic design. Art schools can offer elementary, secondary, post-seco ...

, a vocational Gymnasium and a teachers’ college. Schneeberg's ''Johann-Gottfried-Herder Gymnasium'' was chosen in 2004-2005 as “Saxony’s best Gymnasium” in the course of a study by the magazine '' Capital''. It enjoys an outstanding reputation even beyond Germany's borders.

Notable people

* Andreas Musculus (1514–1581), professor at the University of

Frankfurt an der Oder Frankfurt (Oder), also known as Frankfurt an der Oder (), is a city in the German state of Brandenburg. It has around 57,000 inhabitants, is one of the easternmost cities in Germany, the fourth-largest city in Brandenburg, and the largest German ...

and ''Generalsuperintendent'' of the

Margraviate of Brandenburg The Margraviate of Brandenburg (german: link=no, Markgrafschaft Brandenburg) was a major principality of the Holy Roman Empire from 1157 to 1806 that played a pivotal role in the history of Germany and Central Europe. Brandenburg developed out ...

Ambrosius Lobwasser Ambrosius Lobwasser (1515–1585) was a German humanist and translator, born in Saxony. He served as professor of jurisprudence at the University of Königsberg from 1563 until his retirement in 1580, but is best known for his ''Psalter des Köni ...

(1515–1585), humanistic writer and translator *

Petrus Albinus Petrus Albinus (German name: Peter von Weiße; 1543–1598) was a professor at Wittenberg in Germany and is known as the father of Saxon historiography. Life Petrus Albinus was born on 18 June 1543 in Schneeberg in the Ore Mountains of central ...

(1543–1598), vice chancellor of the

University of Wittenberg Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg (german: Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg), also referred to as MLU, is a public, research-oriented university in the cities of Halle and Wittenberg and the largest and oldest university in ...

and

Electorate of Saxony The Electorate of Saxony, also known as Electoral Saxony (German: or ), was a territory of the Holy Roman Empire from 1356–1806. It was centered around the cities of Dresden, Leipzig and Chemnitz. In the Golden Bull of 1356, Emperor Charles ...

, historian *

Veit Hanns Schnorr von Carolsfeld Veit Hanns Friedrich Schnorr von Carolsfeld (11 May 1764 – 30 April 1841) was a German portraitist. Life Schnorr was born in Schneeberg. He was a friend of the poet Johann Gottfried Seume, whom he set out to accompany in 1801 on a journey to ...

, (1764-1841), portraitist *

Heinrich Stölzel Heinrich David Stölzel (7 September 1777 – 16 February 1844) was a German horn player who developed some of the first valves for brass instruments. He developed the first valve for a brass musical instrument, the Stölzel valve, in 1818, a ...

(1777–1844), musician *

Egon Günther Egon Günther (30 March 1927 – 31 August 2017)
in:

(1927–2017), German film director *

Enrico Kern Enrico Kern (born 12 March 1979) is a German football coach and former player. He worked as manager for FC Erzgebirge Aue U19. Career Born in Schneeberg, Kern began his football career as a youth player with FC Erzgebirge Aue before moving t ...

(born 1979), German footballer with

FC Hansa Rostock FC Hansa Rostock () is a German association football club based in the city of Rostock, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. The club is also called as "the cog" because of its club crest. They have emerged as one of the most successful clubs from the forme ...

Partner towns

Schneeberg's partner towns are: * Herten in

North Rhine-Westphalia North Rhine-Westphalia (german: Nordrhein-Westfalen, ; li, Noordrien-Wesfale ; nds, Noordrhien-Westfalen; ksh, Noodrhing-Wäßßfaale), commonly shortened to NRW (), is a States of Germany, state (''Land'') in Western Germany. With more tha ...

Veresegyház Veresegyház is a town in Pest county, Hungary. Location This village first appeared as Vesereghatz in maps made by Hungarian clerk Lazarus Secretarius between 1510 and 1520. The town lies in the Gödöllő-Hills near Cserhát. The nearest ...

in Pest County *

Jáchymov Jáchymov (); german: Sankt Joachimsthal or ''Joachimsthal'') is a spa town in Karlovy Vary District in the Karlovy Vary Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 2,300 inhabitants. The historical core of the town from the 16th century is we ...

Karlovy Vary Region The Karlovy Vary Region or Carlsbad Region ( cs, Karlovarský kraj, German: ''Karlsbader Region'') is an administrative unit ( cs, kraj) of the Czech Republic, located in the westernmost part of its historical region of Bohemia. It is named after ...

References

External links

Schneeberg’s website

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Facebook {{Authority control Schneeberg, Saxony, Erzgebirgskreis