SORAU, an industrial town and railway junction in the south of Brandenburg, Prussia, is situated 54 miles to the south-east of Frankfort-on-the-Oder, and not far from the Silesian border. Said to be one of the oldest towns in Lower Lusatia, Sorau contains a number of ancient buildings, among which the most prominent are several of the churches (one dating from 1204), the town-house, built in 1260, and the old palace of 1207. The new palace was erected in 1711. The varied manufactures of the town comprise cloth, linen, wax candles, starch, bone-meal, &c. The population, 3764 in 1816, was 13,668 in 1885, upwards of 12,000 of them being Lutherans.

Sorau is said to have existed in 840 and to have belonged to the abbey of Fulda till the 12th century. It received town-rights in 1260. With the surrounding district, known as the barony of Sorau, it became the seat of successive noble families; and in 1400 it was united with the barony of Triebel. The last count of Promnitz, whose ancestor had purchased both baronies from Frederick of Bohemia in 1556, sold them to the elector of Saxony for an annuity of 12,000 thalers (£1800). In 1815 Saxony had to cede them to Prussia, after holding them for fifty years.