Rochlitz (; , ) is a major district town (Große Kreisstadt) in the district of Mittelsachsen, in Saxony, Germany. Rochlitz is the head of the "municipal partnership Rochlitz" (Verwaltungsgemeinschaft Rochlitz) with its other members being the municipalities of Königsfeld, Seelitz and Zettlitz.
Geography
Location
The town is situated on a bend of the river Zwickauer Mulde and at the foot of Rochlitzer Berg, 26 km northwest of Chemnitz and 45 km from Leipzig or Zwickau.
Geology
Rochlitz is situated in the Natural Region Sächsisches Lössgefilde ("Saxon Loess country") and its sub-region Mulde-Lösshügelland ("Mulde Loess hill country"). Rochlitzer Berg (ca. 349 m (NHN)) is of Rotliegend volcanic origin (latest Carboniferous to Guadalupian) and consists to a large extent of so-called Rochlitzer Porphyr, a rhyolitic tuff or ignimbrite. Due to its colour and structure, this rock is used in representative buildings in the wider region like the Old Town Hall in Leipzig and is mined in deep quarries. Pleistocene sediments (sand, gravel) are excavated in the surroundings of the town.
History
Middle Ages
Slavic villages have existed in the area of the town since the 9th and 10th century, and the name of the town is derived from Old Sorbian Rochelinzi. A market settlement below Rochlitz Castle and east of St Peter's church, near today's square Mühlplatz, formed presumably in the 11th century, likely connected with a ford across the Zwickauer Mulde near the village of Zaßnitz. A farming estate which supplied the castle was built at the same time in Poppitz in the northern part of the modern town area the same time. It was later moved to Königsfeld.
Rochlitz as a town in its own right with its town church St Cunigunde's was founded around 1200 by Dedo the Fat of Lusatia or one of his sons Dietrich (1190–1207) or Konrad (1207–1210), possibly only after 1210 by margrave Dietrich the Oppressed. A characteristic feature of the town is the elongated street market which has an analogue in nearby Geithain. The approximate founding date is supported by archeological findings and preserved Romanesque architectural features of the church which originated in a short basilica without transept. Despite the central location of St. Cunigunde's church, the older St. Peter's church which was situated extra muros remained the parish church for the western parts of Rochlitz until the Protestant reformation.
A town wall was first mentioned in 1288 on the occasion of a partial collapse. It was apparently preceded by a combination of earth wall, ditch, and hedge, and was renewed and extended between 1367 and 1373. The town itself is first mentioned in writing in 1336, its council in 1360, and the first seal of the town is found on a document from 1364. The council obtained the right to execute low justice before 1379, and in 1380 the town obtained a regional monopoly for bleaching cloth. In 1430 Rochlitz suffered from an invasion of hussitic troops, but experienced a boom afterwards, marked by the awarding of the right to execute higher justice and the expansion of other rights in 1464. St. Cunigunde's church was rebuilt in late Gothic style from 1416 to 1476, and obtained a new altar, carved in wood, in 1513.
Early modern period
The Protestant Reformation was introduced in Rochlitz by Elisabeth of Rochlitz in 1537. After the so-called "old" cemetery with its ossuary had been founded in 1534 on the site of today's square Clemens-Pfau-Platz, a Latin school (demolished in 1876, now library) was built on the grounds of former St Cunigunde's cemetery. It was rebuilt in 1595 at the expense of Electress Sophie. A new hospital church (Church of the Holy Spirit, demolished in 1904) was finished in 1563. The central part of the former lower market square (east of today's town hall) was built over in the first half of the 16th century (Mittelzeile).
In the Battle of Rochlitz on 2 March 1547, Protestant troops won their most important victory during the Schmalkaldic War before their defeat in the Battle of Mühlberg. Three witch trials are documented between 1556 and 1608, ending in one case with a man being executed, while the outcome of the others is not known any more.