a town in the Prussian Rhine Province, 40 m. N. of Cologne by the railway to Zevenaar. Pop. (1900), 6319. It has a monument to Thomas Kempis, who was born there. The industries are considerable, and include silk-weaving, glassmaking and the manufacture of electrical plant. Kempen belonged in the middle ages to the archbishopric of Cologne and received civic rights in 1294. It is memorable as the scene of a victory gained, on the 17th of January 1642, by the French and Hessians over the Imperialists.
See Terwelp, Die Stadt Kempen (Kempen, 1894), and Niessen, Heimatkunde des Kreises Kempen (Crefeld, 1895).