Lusatia

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Germans and some 100,000 Sorbs living side by side along the Spree, between the Spreewald and the Lusatian Uplands. The Sorbs are a residue of the old Southern Slavs who from the sixth century onwards, during the great migrations, settled in the area bounded on the east by the Oder, the Queiss and the Bober, on the south by the Erzgebirge and Fichtelgebirge, on the west by the Saale and on the north by a line running from Frankfurt an der Oder by way of Jüterbog to Zerbst. From the eighth century onwards the Frankish rulers sought to incorporate the Sorbs in the German state, for example by the systematic settlement of German peasants, craftsmen and miners. Only in Lower Lusatia did the Slav population retain a greater degree of independence, which was further fostered by the Reformation, and in this area the Sorbian language and Sorbian literature began to develop. Finally in 1912 the Domowina, an organization for the promotion of Sorbian culture, was founded. After the repression of Sorbian and Slav aspirations during the Nazi period the Landtag of Saxony passed a law in 1948 granting cultural autonomy to the Sorb population. The Sorbs are now free to celebrate their own festivals, practice their own customs and wear their own traditional dress.

The landscape of Lower Lusatia (Niederlausitz) is dominated by the Lusatian Hills with their extensive moraines, tracts of sand and gravel soil, often covered with pine forests, and urstromtäler (ice-margin trenches). The highest hills, to the west of Senftenberg, rise to almost 180 m/590ft.

Lower Lusatia is a great lignite-mining area, and a major contribution is made to the economy by the production of electricity in large lignite-fired power stations and by gas production. The old open-cast lignite workings when flooded by ground-water form attractive recreation areas (Knappensee, Senftenberg lakes).

Upper Lusatia (Oberlausitz) is a region of intensively cultivated loess farming land, long hill ridges on the granite of the Lusatian Plateau, tracts of forest at the higher levels, flat-bottomed valleys and long straggling industrial villages. The highest point in the Lusatian Uplands is the Valtenberg (589 m/1,933ft).

In the past the economy of Upper Lusatia depended mainly on its cottage industry of linen-weaving. This has left its mark in the traditional type of weavers' houses, the umgebindehäuser: two-story half-timbered houses with external beams supporting the upper story.