A town in the kingdom of Saxony, situated in a hilly district, known as the Vogtland, 11 m. S.W. of Zwickau, at the junction of the main lines of railway Dresden-Leipzig-Hof. Pop. (1905) 24,915. It contains a handsome town-hall rebuilt in 1833, and a natural history museum. The industries embrace the manufacture of cloth, machinery and carriages, also dyeing and bleaching. The earliest mention of the town occurs in a document of 1212, and it acquired municipal rights in 1367. The woollen manufacture was introduced in the r5th century, and took the place of the mining industry which had been established earlier.