Wittichenau

coat of arms	Germany map
	Coordinates: 51 ° 23 '  N , 14 ° 15'  E
Basic data
State :	Saxony
County :	Bautzen
Height :	127 m above sea level NHN
Area :	61.02 km 2
Residents:	5729 (Dec. 31, 2019)
Population density :	94 inhabitants per km 2
Postal code :	02997
Area code :	035725
License plate :	BZ, BIW, HY, KM
Community key :	14 6 25 640
City structure:	12 districts
City administration address :	Markt 1 02997 Wittichenau
Website :	www.wittichenau.de
Mayor :	Markus Posch ( CDU )
Location of the city of Wittichenau in the Bautzen district

Aerial panorama

The Catholic Church in the city center

Wittichenau , Upper Sorbian Kulow ^{? / i} , is a small Saxon town in the Bautzen district in Upper Lusatia . The population is partly Sorbian, partly German mother tongue; therefore Wittichenau is part of the official Sorbian settlement area .

geography

location

Wittichenau is about five kilometers south of the city of Hoyerswerda on the Black Elster . The Black Water and the Monastery Water , which flow into the Black Elster here, flow through the urban area as further small rivers . The Wudra flood protection canal built by the Reich Labor Service runs as one of its branches near the city . The surroundings are flat, rich in water and partly densely forested.

City structure

The city consists of the following twelve districts:

Brischko (Brěžki) , 166 inhabitants Dubring (Dubrjenk) , 87 Ew. Hoske (Hózk) , 151 Ew. Keula (Kulowc) , 206 Ew. Kotten (Koćina) , 204 Ew. Maukendorf (Mučow) , 441 Ew.

Neudorf Klösterlich (Nowa Wjes) , 82 Ew. Rachlau (Rachlow) , 200 Ew. Saalau (Salow) , 174 Ew. Sollschwitz (Sulšecy) , 296 Ew. Spohla (Spale) , 395 Ew. Wittichenau (Kulow) , 3.423 Ew.

history

Wittichenau was first mentioned in 1248 as Witigenow in the deed of foundation of the St. Marienstern monastery by the Lords of Kamenz . In 1286 , the place was first referred to as a city, civitatem Witigenhaw . Witego I. von Kamenz named in the document , to whom the name Witigenow goes back, can be accepted as the founder of the place . The origin of the Sorbian name comes from the name of the neighboring town Keula ( Kulowc ). That means "small round village". In the context of the siege of the six towns of Kamenz by the Hussites on October 7, 1429, the unprotected country town and its rule, the Cistercian monastery of St. Marienstern , were plundered and plundered because they did not want to pay the ransom demanded.

Up until the 18th century, the city belonged to the "Netherlands" of the St. Marienstern monastery, together with many other Sorbian settlements .

After the resolutions of the Congress of Vienna, Lower Lusatia and parts of Upper Lusatia came from Saxony to Prussia, and so Wittichenau and the nearby villages belonged to the Kingdom of Prussia Province of Silesia between 1815 and 1945 .

Incorporations

On January 1, 1957, Brischko was incorporated. Keula followed on January 1, 1978. After the fall of the Wall , Wittichenau expanded on January 1, 1994 to include Dubring, Hoske (with the Rachlau incorporated on July 1, 1950), Kotten (with the Saalau incorporated on July 1, 1950), Maukendorf and Sollschwitz. On January 1, 1995, Spohla was incorporated.

coat of arms

The gold coat of arms shows the Virgin Mary clad in blue and red and decorated with a silver halo. In her left hand she holds the baby Jesus with a silver halo and in her right hand a staff on which a stylized silver dove sits. Mary stands on a silver crescent moon , the ends of which are each decorated with three stylized silver flowers. The coat of arms is based on the only known coat of arms of the city from the 17th century, which in turn originated from the coat of arms of the monastery of the Cistercian Sisters St. Marienstern.

Population and language

For his statistics on the Sorbian population in Upper Lusatia, Arnošt Muka determined a population of 2500 in the 1880s, half of them Sorbian-speaking and the other half German-speaking. In 1956 Ernst Tschernik still had a Sorbian-speaking share of 32.4% of the population in the town of Wittichenau (with Neudorf-Klösterlich). To this day, Sorbian is also spoken in Wittichenau and especially its districts.

According to a survey of 12,700 readers of the Sächsische Zeitung , the happiest people in Saxony live in Wittichenau.

Denomination statistics

According to the 2011 census, out of 5,879 inhabitants, 3,397 were Roman Catholic (57.8%), 467 were Protestant (7.9%) and 2,015 belonged to another or no religious community (34.3%). In 2018, 56% of the population were Catholic, another 8% Protestant.

politics

Local elections 2019

Turnout: 70.7%

 %

60

50

40

30th

20th

10

0

41.9%
(-12.8  % p )

31.7%
(+ 0.4  % p )

5.2%
(-0.8  % p )

4.6%
(-3.4  % p )

10.5%
( n.k. )

6.2%
( n.k. )

CDU

ABV

WVM

AFSL

AfD

SPD

2014



2019



City council

After the local elections in Saxony in 2019 , 15 city councilors sit in the city council of Wittichenau. There were seven seats on the CDU (2014: 9), six on the General Citizens' Representation (5), one on the AfD (0) and one on the SPD (0). The electoral association Maukendorf and the alternative for city and country, which were previously represented with a seat, could not move into the city council again. One seat remains vacant because the AfD, which arithmetically had two seats, only ran with one candidate.

mayor

Markus Posch was elected as the new mayor of Udo Popella in June 2014 in the second ballot with 63% of the vote.

Town twinning

Partnerships exist with Tanvald (Czech Republic), Bad Honnef (Germany) and Lubomierz (German: Liebenthal) (Poland).

Culture and sights

The Krabat pillar in the market square

Attractions

→ Main article : List of cultural monuments in Wittichenau

One of the most important architectural monuments is the Catholic parish church of St. Mary of the Assumption in the city center, which was rebuilt in the following years up to 1440 after being destroyed by the Hussites in 1429. The three-aisled stepped hall was extended to the east in 1527 and completed with a vault. The main altar made of stucco marble was designed in 1722/23 by Mathias Wenzel Jäckel (Prague, born in Wittichenau). The interior of the church is largely baroque.

In Wittichenau there are also several historical mills, including the Schowtschickmühle - until 1560 Kubitzmühle - the last of three watermills on the edge of the Dubringer Moor . The Pasternakmühle and the Mittelmühle were demolished around 1900. The Kober-Mühle (formerly Koßlickmühle) was a paper mill until the 1920s and is now used as a grain mill. The town mill was first mentioned around 1650.

On the market square of the town there is a reconstructed Saxon post mile column from 1732, the original block of which is in the Hoyerswerda Castle Museum , and the Krabat column , which is reminiscent of the Croatian colonel Johann Schadowitz , to whom the Sorbian saga of the Krabat goes back. A plaque commemorates him on his grave in the Catholic Church. Nowadays, the cycle path "In the footsteps of Krabat" also runs through Wittichenau.

Regular events

The cultural highlights include the Easter riding and the carnival time (Wittichenauer Karnevalsverein eV). The Wittichenau carnival has existed since 1706.

education

The city of Wittichenau has the Krabat elementary school and the “ Korla Awgust Kocor ” high school .

economy

The largest employer in Wittichenau is the Maja-Möbel furniture factory with 630 employees (as of April 2016).

Personalities

• Georg August Swotlick (1650–1729), translated the Bible into Sorbian and created the first printed Sorbian dictionary.
• Mathias Wenzel Jäckel (1655–1738), was an important baroque sculptor, works can be seen in the Wittichenau parish church and on the Charles Bridge in Prague .
• Xaver Jakub Ticin (1656–1693), who wrote the first Upper Sorbian grammar, died as a field chaplain in the Turkish war outside Belgrade.
• Franz Georg Lock (1751–1831), bishop, was an important representative of the Catholic Enlightenment in Upper Lusatia.
• Herta Nikovich (1923–1994) left $ 102,000 as the founder of the "Wittichenauer Children - Mrs. Nikovich Foundation" for the promotion of education, public and vocational training, youth care and childcare for all children in the city of Wittichenau. She was from the city and lived her life in the United States .
• Günter Särchen (1927–2004), Catholic social worker, journalist and pioneer of German-Polish reconciliation, is an honorary citizen of Wittichenau.
• Hubertus Zomack (1941–2019), Catholic theologian and priest, vicar general and provost of the diocese of Görlitz.
• Waltraut Skoddow (1942–2014), writer.
• Peter Schowtka (* 1945), politician (CDU), member of the Saxon state parliament 1991–2014 and from 1990 to 1994 mayor of Wittichenau.
• Ulrich Pogoda (* 1954) is a Sorbian composer of classical music.
• Thomas Sauer (* 1954), church musician, cathedral organist at St. Hedwig's Cathedral in Berlin, born in Wittichenau.

literature

• Groeger: From Wittichenau's past. in: Scholz: Heimatbuch des Kreis Hoyerswerda. Verlag Ziehlke, Bad Liebenwerda 1925, pp. 245-252 ( digitized version )
• Arnold Spruck : Wittichenau and the countries of the Bohemian crown. History of a neighborhood over 760 years (= studies by the Königstein family, volume 1). Gerhard Hess Verlag, Bad Schussenried 2010, ISBN 978-3-87336-928-3 .

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Population of the Free State of Saxony by municipalities on December 31, 2019  ( help on this ).
2. ↑ Annex (to Section 3, Paragraph 2) of the Saxon Sorbs Act
3. ↑ information from the city administration; As of December 31, 2016
4. ↑ Federal Statistical Office (Ed.): Municipalities 1994 and their changes since 01.01.1948 in the new federal states. Metzler-Poeschel publishing house, Stuttgart 1995, ISBN 3-8246-0321-7 .
5. ↑ StBA: Changes in the municipalities of Germany, see 1995
6. ↑ Ernst Tschernik: The development of the Sorbian population . Akademie-Verlag, Berlin 1954.
7. ^ Ludwig Elle: Language policy in the Lausitz . Domowina-Verlag, Bautzen 1995, p. 250 .
8. ↑ Elke Görlitz, Sebastian Böttler: Where happiness is at home . In: Saxon newspaper . October 11, 2014, ZDB -ID 2448502-0 , p. 2 .
9. ↑ census database on zensus2011.de
10. ^ City of Wittichenau data facts information
11. ↑ [1]
12. ↑ https://www.lr-online.de/lausitz/hoyerswerda/posch-wird-wittichenaus-buergermeister_aid-2651721
13. ↑ Christine Scharrenbroch: Saxony produce for Ikea. Furniture manufacturer Maja has it manufactured in a highly automated factory near Hoyerswerda for its largest customer. In: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, April 26, 2016, p. 18.

Web links

Commons : Wittichenau  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Wikisource: Wittichenau  - Sources and full texts

Wiktionary: Wittichenau  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

• Link catalog on Wittichenau at curlie.org (formerly DMOZ )
• Wittichenau in the Digital Historical Directory of Saxony