Dobšiná (German: Dobschau; Hungarian: Dobsina; Latin: Dobsinium) is a small town in the Slovak Ore Mountains along the Slaná River.

For 500 years it was a small but prosperous mining village populated by ethnic Germans within the Kingdom of Hungary; today it is a Slovak town of 6,000 most well known for its Ice Cave.

When the pot began to boil, a passing settler (unaware of the prior discussion) shouted "Im Topf schaue!"

[5] The earliest written reference to Dobšiná dates to 1326, when the Bebek family (who had ruled the surrounding territory since 1243) commissioned the hereditary magistrate Mikuláš to settle expert German miners there in the tradition of Krupina law.

In 1756, Mária Terézia Dobšinej confirmed the right to four annual markets, which took place on 22 February, 12 May, 1 August and 8 December.

Dobšiná's status as a German enclave endured even through the Magyarization period of 1867–1918, which saw a concerted effort to assimilate all non-Hungarian cultures within the empire.

Among the most atrocious of these was the Prerau massacre of 18 June 1945, when trains carrying returning German residents were stopped at the Moravian town of Prerov by a unit of the Czech intelligence commanded Karol Pazurndash—himself a native of Dobšiná.

[6] The German population of Dobšiná never recovered, and Slovaks from other parts of Czechoslovakia were later resettled into the vacant homes.