Šumperk

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Statistics
Area:	27.9 km²
Population:	28,871 (2003)
Map

Šumperk (IPA: ['ʃʊmpɛrk], German: Mährisch Schönberg ) is a city and district in the Olomouc Region of the Czech Republic. It is called "The Gate to Jeseník mountains."

[edit] History

Šumperk was founded by German colonists in 1269. The German name Schönberg means "beautiful hill", and the name Šumperk is a Czech garbling of the original German name. The town of Šumperk became the center of the area. It was located on a trade route, and the town profited from the copper mines. Šumperk was a possession of the Moravian margrave until the 15th century. Petr ze Žerotína bought the town and built a monumental curtain wall. The town became very rich in the 16th century from the production of top-quality cloth, better than was known in western Europe. The town became able to buy itself and it became a royal city, meaning that the king was the only owner, and there was no nobility. The town was substantially damaged in the Thirty Years' War, because it was in the Protestant alliance, and Šumperk became a possession of Lichtenstein.

A later tragedy was a huge fire in 1669 in which 244 houses were destroyed.

The end of 17th century saw witch trials, in which 48 men and women were burnt as witches.

In 1930 Šumperk had about 12,000 citizens, of whom one quarter were Czechs and the rest Germans.

In 1938, after the Munich Agreement, Šumperk was occupied by the Wehrmacht and most Czech citizens had to move to the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. As the war ended the town was liberated by the Russian Red Army.

During the Prague Spring the area was occupied by the Polish army on 21 August 1968. The Polish army was replaced by the Red Army on 3rd October 1968. Jan Zajíc and Jan Palach both protested the occupation by self-immolation. The Red Army moved out in 1991 after the Velvet Revolution.