Berga, Thuringia

Berga/Elster is a town in the district of Greiz, in Thuringia, Germany. It is situated on the White Elster river, 14 km southeast of Gera.

History

Within the German Empire (1871-1918), Berga/Elster was part of the Grand Duchy of Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach.

Berga Concentration Camp

During World War II, a slave labor camp called "Berga an der Elster" was operated here to dig 17 tunnels for an underground ammunition factory. Workers were supplied by Buchenwald concentration camp and from a POW camp, Stalag IX-B; the latter contravened the provisions of the Third Geneva Convention and of the Hague Treaties. Many prisoners died as a result of malnutrition, sickness (including pulmonary disease due to dust inhalation from tunnelling with explosives), and beatings, including 73 American POWs. The labor camp formed part of Germany's secret plan to transform, via hydrogenation, brown coal into usable fuel for tanks, planes, and other military machinery. However, the camp's additional purpose was Vernichtung durch Arbeit (or "annihilation through labor"), and prisoners were intentionally worked to death with inhumane working and living conditions, and starvation. This secondary purpose of extermination was carried out until the war's end, when the prisoners were subjected to a forced death march to keep ahead of the advancing allied forces.

Berga

Berga (Catalan pronunciation: [ˈbeɾɣə]) is the capital of the comarca (county) of Berguedà, in Catalonia, northeast Spain.

History

Berga derives its name from the Bergistani, an Iberian tribe which lived in the area before the Roman conquest. The Bergistani were first subdued by Hannibal in 218 BC. They rebelled twice against the Romans and were twice defeated; after their second uprising, much of the tribe was sold into slavery. Livy mentions their principal town, Castrum Bergium, which was probably the precursor of the present-day town of Berga.

Berga was ruled by viscounts in the Early Middle Ages and had its own counts from 988.

Berga was sold to king Peter II of Aragon in 1199.

In May, 2012, the town council passed a motion declaring King Juan Carlos 'persona non grata' following a series of scandals involving the royal family, most notably the king's recent elephant hunting trip to Africa in the middle of Spain's deepening recession.

La Patum

Berga is perhaps most famous for its traditional festival of "La Patum", a celebration which occurs every Corpus Christi, lasting for five days.

Berge (Bisaltia)

Berge or Berga (Greek: Βέργη or Βέργα) was a Greek settlement in what is now the Serres regional unit in northern Greece.

The town was located in the region of Bisaltia, north-west of Amphipolis, and was founded by Thasians as a dependent colony and emporion sometime in the 5th century BC. The town was a member of the Delian League, and according to N. G. L. Hammond was colonized by 1000 Athenians. Later sources call it a polis, but according to Strabo it was a village of the Bisaltae and Ptolemy writes that it was in the territory of the Odomanti.

Berge was a rich city and that minted her own currencies from 476 to 356 BC the currencies they depicted Silenus with a nymph or Silenus or a fish carp or square crisscross in form of swastikas and had the following words inscribed, (Greek: ΒΕΡΓ) or (Greek: ΒΕΡΓΑΙ) or (Greek: ΒΕΡΓΑΙΟΥ). Berge began to lose its importance after the foundation of Amphipolis, it continued however being a self-sufficient city in Hellenistic and Roman times.

Berga, Saxony-Anhalt

Berga is a municipality in the Mansfeld-Südharz district, Saxony-Anhalt, Germany.

The municipality consists of three villages:

References