4,511. It
is the capital of the comitat (county) of the same name, also known as
Burzenland, a fertile country inhabited by an industrious population of
Germans, Magyars and Rumanians. Brasso is beautifully situated on the
slopes of the Transylvanian Alps, in a narrow valley, shut in by
mountains, and presenting only one opening on the north-west towards the
Burzen plain. The town is entirely dominated by the Zinne of
Kapellenberg, a mountain rising 1276 ft. above the town (total altitude
3153 ft.), from which a beautiful view is obtained of the lofty
mountains around and of the carefully cultivated plain of the
Burzenland, dotted with tastefully built and well-kept villages. On the
summit of the mountain is one of the numerous monuments erected in 1896
in different parts of the country to commemorate the thousandth
anniversary of the foundation of the Hungarian state. It is known as
Arpad's Monument, and consists of a Doric column erected on a circular
pedestal, which supports the bronze figure of a warrior from the time of
Arpad.

Brasso consists of the inner town, which is the commercial centre, and
the suburbs of Blumenau, Altstadt and Obere Vorstadt or Bolgarszeg,
inhabited respectively by Germans, Magyars and Rumanians. To the east of
the inner town rises the Schlossberg, crowned by the citadel, which was
erected in 1553, and constitutes the principal remaining fragment of the
old fortifications with which Brasso was encircled. The most interesting
building in the town is the Protestant church, popularly called the
Black Church, owing to its smoke-stained walls, caused by the great fire
of 1689. This church, the finest in Transylvania, is a Gothic edifice
with traces of Romanesque influence, and was built in 1385-1425. In the
square in front of it is the statue of Johannes Honterus (1498-1549),
"the apostle of Transylvania," who was born in Brasso, and established
here the first printing-press in Transylvania. In the principal square
of the inner town stands the town hall, built in 1420 and restored in
the 18th century, with a tower 190 ft. high. Brasso is the most
important commercial and manufacturing town of Transylvania. Lying near
the frontier of Rumania, with easy access through the Tomos pass, it
developed from the earliest time an active trade with that country and
with the whole of the Balkan states. Its chief industries are iron and
copper works, wool-spinning, turkey-red dyeing, leather goods, paper,
c