Cottbus

Until the beginning of the 20th century, the spelling of the city's name was disputed. In Berlin, the spelling "Kottbus" was preferred, and it is still used for the capital's Kottbusser Tor ("Cottbus Gate"), but locally the traditional spelling "Cottbus" (which defies standard German-language rules) was preferred, and it is now used in most circumstances. Because the official spelling used locally before the spelling reforms of 1996 had contravened even the standardized spelling rules already in place, the Standing Committee for Geographical Names (German: Ständiger Ausschuss für geographische Namen) stress their urgent recommendation that geographical names should respect the national spelling standards. A citizen of the city may be identified as either a "Cottbuser" or a "Cottbusser".

Names in different languages:

• Czech: Chotěbuz
• German: Cottbus
• Latin: Cotbusium
• Polish: Chociebuż
• Lower Sorbian: Chóśebuz
• Upper Sorbian: Choćebuz
• Yiddish: קוטבוס, romanized: Kotbus

Gothic Franciscan church and later Sorbian Protestant Church

The settlement was established in the tenth century, when Sorbs erected a castle on a sandy island in the River Spree. It was captured by the March of Lusatia in 965, then it passed to Poland under Bolesław I the Brave in 1002, and back to the March of Lusatia in 1032. The first recorded mention of the town's name was in 1156. In the 13th century German settlers came to the town and thereafter lived side by side with the Sorbs.

In the Middle Ages Cottbus was known for wool, and the town's drapery was exported throughout Brandenburg, Bohemia and Saxony. It was also located on an important trade route, called the "Salt Road", which was used to transport salt from Halle to Lusatia and further east to Poland.[3] It was part of the Margraviate of Lusatia and later Lower Lusatia, which was held by the House of Wettin until it became a Bohemian Crown Land in 1367.

In 1445 Cottbus was acquired by the Margraviate of Brandenburg from Bohemia. It was an exclave almost completely surrounded by Bohemian Lower Lusatia (with a short border with the Electorate of Saxony to the south-west). In 1514 Jan Rak founded the Universitas Serborum, a Sorbian gymnasium, in the city. In 1635 Lower Lusatia was ceded by Bohemia to Saxony, thereby making Cottbus an enclave of Saxony. In 1701 Brandenburg-Prussia became the Kingdom of Prussia.

First issue of the Bramborski Serbski Casnik Sorbian newspaper, 1848

In 1807, following the War of the Fourth Coalition, Cottbus was ceded by Prussia to the Kingdom of Saxony by the Treaty of Tilsit, reuniting it with Lower Lusatia. Cottbus was returned to Prussia by the Congress of Vienna in 1815 after the Napoleonic wars. Lower Lusatia was also ceded to Prussia and both became part of the Prussian Province of Brandenburg (and Regierungsbezirk Frankfurt), where they remained until 1947. In the 19th century, the Bramborski Serbski Casnik Sorbian newspaper was published in the city, and in 1880, the first Lower Lusatian department of the Maćica Serbska organization was established there.[4]

In 1871 Prussia, and therefore Cottbus, became part of the German Empire. According to the Prussian census of 1905, the city of Cottbus had a population of 46,270, of which 97% were Germans, 2% were Sorbs and 1% were Poles.[5]

In interwar Germany, the town was the site of a concentration camp for unwanted Jewish immigrants from Eastern Europe.[6]

During World War II, a Nazi prison for women was operated in the city with multiple forced labour subcamps located both in the city and other places in the region.[7] Polish actor Władysław Hańcza was imprisoned in a forced labour camp in the city in 1944–1945.[8] In the final weeks of the war, Cottbus was taken by the Red Army on 22 April 1945. In January 1946, Cottbus issued 34 semi-postal postage stamps to help finance rebuilding the city. From 1949 until German reunification in 1990, Cottbus was part of the German Democratic Republic (East Germany). From 1952 to 1990, Cottbus was the administrative seat of Bezirk Cottbus.

• 
  Development of population since 1875 within the current boundaries (Blue Line: Population; Dotted Line: Comparison to Population development in Brandenburg state; Grey Background: Time of Nazi Germany; Red Background: Time of communist East Germany)
• 
  Recent Population Development and Projections (Population Development before Census 2011 (blue line); Recent Population Development according to the Census in Germany in 2011 (blue bordered line); Official projections for 2005-2030 (yellow line); for 2017-2030 (scarlet line); for 2020-2030 (green line)

The Lower Sorbian Gymnasium Cottbus

The Brandenburg University of Technology Library

Cottbus is the cultural centre of the Lower Sorbian minority. Many signs in the town are bilingual, and there is a Lower Sorbian-medium Gymnasium and a Sorbian Quarter, but Sorbian is rarely spoken on the streets.

Next to Cottbus is the famous Branitz Park, created by Prince Hermann von Pückler-Muskau after 1845. Schloss Branitz (Branitz Castle) was rebuilt by Gottfried Semper in a late Baroque style between 1846 and 1852, and the gardens Prince Hermann laid feature two pyramids. One of these, the Seepyramide, is in the middle of an artificial lake and serves as his mausoleum.[12]

Cottbus is also home to the Brandenburg University of Technology (BTU) and the maths/science-oriented Max-Steenbeck-Gymnasium, named after the physicist Max Steenbeck.

Every year Cottbus hosts the East Europe International Film Festival.

Cottbus has a football team, Energie Cottbus, that plays in the Regionalliga Nordost as of the 2021–2022 season. Their home matches are played at the city's Stadion der Freundschaft.

Cottbus is twinned with:[13]

Carl Blechen - Self-Portrait

• Janice Behrendt (born 1983), beauty queen and model
• Carl Blechen (1798–1840), landscape painter
• Kurt Demmler (1943–2009), songwriter; accused of sexual abuse, he hanged himself in his jail cell.
• Rudi Fink (born 1958), amateur boxer and boxing coach
• Gustav Theodor Fritsch (1838–1927), anatomist, anthropologist and physiologist
• Marco Geisler (born 1974), rower
• Otto Hugo Paul Grottkau (1846–1898), socialist and trade unionist and American journalist
• Robert Harting (born 1984), discus thrower
• Martha Israel (1905–c. 1967), politician
• Tony Martin (born 1985), cyclist
• Jens Melzig (born 1965), footballer
• Daniel Musiol (born 1983), cyclist
• Reinhold Platz (1886–1966), aircraft designer and manufacturer at Fokker
• Gabriele Reinsch (born 1963), world record holder discus throwing
• Viktoria Schmidt-Linsenhoff (1944–2013), art historian and professor
• Heiko Schwarz (born 1989), footballer

• Cottbus Air Base
• Klinge

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Cottbus.

• Cottbus travel guide from Wikivoyage
• Official website (in German, English, Polish, and Lower Sorbian)
• Homepage of Brandenburg Technical University
• "Cottbus" . Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). 1911.