The historic town centre with the Renaissance Stříbro bridge is well preserved and is protected by law as an urban monument zone.

According to the 16th century chronicler Wenceslaus Hajek, the mining settlement in the Duchy of Bohemia was founded by the Přemyslid duke Soběslav I in 1131.

It was a mining settlement located on an important trade route (Zlatá cesta, "Golden Road") from Prague to Nuremberg.

[5] During the Hussite Wars, the town was besieged by the troops of Jan Žižka in 1421, though it was not occupied until in 1426.

Shortly afterwards, the Hussite forces under Prokop the Great could repel an attack by the Crusaders in the Battle of Tachov.

Until 1918, the town was part of Austria-Hungary and the administrative centre of a district with the same name, one of the 94 Bezirkshauptmannschaften in Bohemia.

The D5 motorway (part of the European route E50) from Plzeň to the Czech-German border in Rozvadov runs south of the town, outside the municipal territory.