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Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Western-Central Europe. It is bordered on the north by the North Sea, Denmark, and the Baltic Sea, on the east by Poland and the Czech Republic, on the south by Austria and Switzerland, the west by France, Luxembourg, Belgium and the Netherlands. Germany is a parliamentary federal republic of sixteen states. The capital city and seat of government is Berlin. The country was first unified as a nation-state amidst the Franco-Prussian War in 1871. After World War II, Germany was divided and became reunified in 1990. It is a founding member of the European Union and with over 82 million people it has the largest population among the EU member states. The Federal Republic of Germany is a modern great power, and a member state of the United Nations, NATO, the G8 and the G4 nations. Germany is the world's third largest economy by nominal GDP, the world's largest exporter of goods, and the world's second largest importer of goods. In 2007 it holds the rotating presidencies of both the European council and the G8 summits.
How places in Germany are organizedGermany was unified as a nation in 1871. From 1871-1918 it was known as the German Empire, with Preußen being (by far) its largest state. We call the subdivisions of Germany during this time "former states", with Preußen being further subdivided into provinces. Currently Germany is divided into 16 states. We call these states "modern states". The Family History Library Catalog (FHLC) lists places in Germany according to their German Empire state with one exception: Thüringen is a modern state that was formed in 1919 from eight German Empire states, and some places are listed in the FHLC under Thuringen instead of being listed under their German Empire state. The standard at WeRelate is to title German places according to their former (German Empire) state when it is known, with also-located-in links to the modern state when it is known. All places in GermanyFurther information on historical place organization in Germany
History
The state now known as Germany was unified as a modern nation-state only in 1871, when the German Empire was forged, with the Kingdom of Prussia as its largest constituent. This began the German Reich, usually translated as empire, but also meaning kingdom, domain or realm. Early history of the Germanic tribes (100 BC – AD 300)The ethnogenesis of the Germanic tribes is assumed to have occurred during the Nordic Bronze Age, or at the latest, during the Pre-Roman Iron Age. From southern Scandinavia and northern Germany, the tribes began expanding south, east and west in the first century BC, coming into contact with the Celtic tribes of Gaul and Iranian, Baltic, and Slavic tribes in Eastern Europe. Little is known about early Germanic history, except through their interactions with the Roman Empire and archaeological finds.
The Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation (843–1806)The medieval empire stemmed from a division of the Carolingian Empire in 843, which was founded by Charlemagne on December 25 800, and existed in varying forms until 1806, its territory stretching from the Eider River in the north to the Mediterranean coast in the south. Often referred to as the Holy Roman Empire (or the Old Empire), it was officially called the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation ("Sacrum Romanum Imperium Nationis Germanicæ") starting in 1448, to adjust the title to its then reduced territory. Under the reign of the Ottonian emperors (919–1024), the duchies of Lorraine, Saxony, Franconia, Swabia, Thuringia, and Bavaria were consolidated, and the German king was crowned Holy Roman Emperor of these regions in 962. Under the reign of the Salian emperors (1024–1125), the Holy Roman Empire absorbed northern Italy and Burgundy, although the emperors lost power through the Investiture Controversy. Under the Hohenstaufen emperors (1138–1254), the German princes increased their influence further south and east into territories inhabited by Slavs. Northern German towns grew prosperous as members of the Hanseatic League. The edict of the Golden Bull in 1356 provided the basic constitution of the empire that lasted until its dissolution. It codified the election of the emperor by seven prince-electors who ruled some of the most powerful principalities and archbishoprics. Beginning in the fifteenth century, the emperors were elected nearly exclusively from the Habsburg dynasty of Austria. The monk Martin Luther wrote his 95 Theses questioning the Roman Catholic Church in 1517, thereby sparking the Protestant Reformation. A separate Lutheran church was acknowledged as the new sanctioned religion in many states of Germany in 1530. Religious conflict led to the Thirty Years' War (1618–1648), which devastated German lands. The Peace of Westphalia (1648) ended religious warfare in Germany, but the empire was de facto divided into numerous independent principalities. From 1740 onwards, the dualism between the Austrian Habsburg Monarchy and the Kingdom of Prussia dominated German history. In 1806, the Imperium was overrun and dissolved as a result of the Napoleonic Wars.
Restoration and revolution (1814–71)Following the fall of Napoleon Bonaparte, the Congress of Vienna convened in 1814 and founded the German Confederation, a loose league of 39 sovereign states. Disagreement with restoration politics partly led to the rise of liberal movements, demanding unity and freedom. These, however, were followed by new measures of repression on the part of the Austrian statesman Metternich. The Zollverein, a tariff union, profoundly furthered economic unity in the German states. During this era, many Germans had been stirred by the ideals of the French Revolution and nationalism became a more significant force, especially among young intellectuals. For the first time, the colours of black, red and gold were chosen to represent the movement, which later became the national colours. In light of a series of revolutionary movements in Europe, which successfully established a republic in France, intellectuals and commoners started the Revolutions of 1848 in the German states. The monarchs initially yielded to the revolutionaries' liberal demands. King Frederick William IV of Prussia was offered the title of Emperor, but with a loss of power; he rejected the crown and the proposed constitution, leading to a temporary setback for the movement. Conflict between King William I of Prussia and the increasingly liberal parliament erupted over military reforms in 1862 and the king appointed Otto von Bismarck the new Prime Minister of Prussia. Bismark successfully waged war on Denmark in 1864. Prussian victory in the Austro-Prussian War of 1866 enabled him to create the North German Confederation and to exclude Austria, formerly the leading German state, from the affairs of the remaining German states. Second German Empire (1871–1918)After the French defeat in the Franco-Prussian War, the German Empire (Deutsches Kaiserreich) was proclaimed in Versailles on January 18 1871. The Hohenzollern dynasty of Prussia ruled the new empire, whose capital was Berlin. The empire was a unification of all the scattered parts of Germany except Austria (Kleindeutschland, or "Lesser Germany"). Beginning in 1884, Germany began establishing several colonies outside of Europe. In the Gründerzeit period following the unification of Germany, Emperor William I's foreign policy secured Germany's position as a great nation by forging alliances, isolating France by diplomatic means, and avoiding war. Under William II, however, Germany, like other European powers, took an imperialistic course leading to friction with neighbouring countries. Most alliances in which Germany had been previously involved were not renewed, and new alliances excluded the country. Specifically, France established new relationships by signing the Entente Cordiale with the United Kingdom and securing ties with the Russian Empire. Aside from its contacts with Austria-Hungary, Germany became increasingly isolated.
The assassination of Austria's crown prince on July 28 1914 triggered World War I. Germany, as part of the unsuccessful Central Powers, suffered defeat against the Allied Powers in one of the bloodiest conflicts of all time. The German Revolution broke out in November 1918, and Emperor William II and all German ruling princes abdicated. An armistice putting an end to the war was signed on November 11 and Germany was forced to sign the Treaty of Versailles in June 1919. Its negotiation, contrary to traditional post-war diplomacy, excluded the defeated Central Powers. The treaty was perceived in Germany as a humiliating continuation of the war by other means and its harshness is often cited as having facilitated the later rise of Nazism in the country. Weimar Republic (1919–33)After the success of the German Revolution in November 1918, a republic was proclaimed. The Weimar Constitution came into effect with its signing by President Friedrich Ebert on August 11, 1919. The German Communist Party was established by Rosa Luxemburg and Karl Liebknecht in 1918, and the German Workers Party, later known as the National Socialist German Workers Party or Nazi Party, was founded in January 1919. Suffering from the Great Depression, the harsh peace conditions dictated by the Treaty of Versailles, and a long succession of more or less unstable governments, the political masses in Germany increasingly lacked identification with their political system of parliamentary democracy. This was exacerbated by a wide-spread right-wing (monarchist, völkisch, and Nazi) Dolchstoßlegende, a political myth which claimed that Germany lost World War I because of the German Revolution, not because of military defeat. On the other hand, radical left-wing communists, such as the Spartacist League, had wanted to abolish what they perceived as "capitalist rule" in favour of a Räterepublik. Paramilitary troops were set up by several parties and there were thousands of politically motivated murders. The paramilitary intimidated voters and seeded violence and anger among the public, which suffered from high unemployment and poverty. After a succession of unsuccessful cabinets, President Paul von Hindenburg, seeing little alternative and pushed by right-wing advisors, appointed Adolf Hitler Chancellor of Germany on January 30, 1933. Third Reich (1933–45)On 27 February 1933, the Reichstag was set on fire. Some basic democratic rights were quickly abrogated afterwards under an emergency decree. An Enabling Act gave Hitler's government full legislative power. Only the Social Democratic Party of Germany voted against it; the Communists were not able to present a viable opposition, as many of their deputies had already been murdered or imprisoned. A centralized totalitarian state was established by a series of moves and decrees making Germany a single-party state. Industry was closely regulated with quotas and requirements in order to shift the economy towards a war production base. In 1936, German troops entered the demilitarized Rhineland and British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain's appeasement policies proved inadequate. Emboldened, Hitler followed from 1938 onwards a policy of expansionism to establish Greater Germany. To avoid a two-front war, Hitler concluded the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact with the Soviet Union, a pact which was later broken by Germany. In 1939, the growing tensions from nationalism, militarism, and territorial issues led to the Germans launching a blitzkrieg on September 1 against Poland, followed two days later by declarations of war by Britain and France, marking the beginning of World War II. Germany quickly gained direct or indirect control of the majority of Europe. On June 22, 1941, Hitler broke the pact with the Soviet Union by opening the Eastern Front and invading the Soviet Union. Shortly after Japan attacked the American base at Pearl Harbor, Germany declared war on the United States. Although initially the German army rapidly advanced into the surprised Soviet Union, the Battle of Stalingrad marked a major turning point in the war. Subsequently, the German army commenced retreating on the Eastern front, followed by the eventual defeat of Germany. On 8 May 1945, Germany surrendered after the Red Army occupied Berlin. In what later became known as The Holocaust, the Third Reich regime enacted governmental policies directly subjugating many parts of society: Jews, Slavs, Communists, Roma, homosexuals, freemasons, political dissidents, priests, preachers, religious opponents, and the disabled, amongst others. During the Nazi era, about eleven million people were murdered in the Holocaust, including between four million and six million Jews. World War II and the Nazi genocide were responsible for about 35 million dead in Europe.
Division and reunification (1945-90)The war resulted in the death of several million German soldiers and civilians, in total nearly ten million; large territorial losses; the expulsion of about 15 million Germans from other countries; and the destruction of multiple major cities. Germany and Berlin were partitioned by the Allies into four military occupation zones. The sectors controlled by France, the United Kingdom, and the United States were merged on May 23 1949, to form the democratic nation of the Federal Republic of Germany; on October 7 1949, the Soviet Zone established the German Democratic Republic. In English, the two states were known informally as "West Germany" and "East Germany". West Germany, established as a liberal parliamentary republic with a "social market economy", was allied with the United States, the UK and France. The country eventually came to enjoy prolonged economic growth beginning in the early 1950s (Wirtschaftswunder). West Germany joined NATO in 1955 and was a founding member of the European Economic Community in 1958. Across the border, East Germany was at first occupied by, and later (May 1955) allied with, the USSR. An authoritarian country with a Soviet-style command economy, East Germany soon became the richest, most advanced country in the Warsaw Pact, but many of its citizens looked to the West for political freedoms and economic prosperity. The Berlin Wall, built in 1961 to stop East Germans from escaping to West Germany, became a symbol of the Cold War. However, tensions between East and West Germany were somewhat reduced in the early 1970s by Chancellor Willy Brandt's Ostpolitik, which included the de facto acceptance of Germany's territorial losses in World War II.
Since reunification, Germany has taken a leading role in the European Union and NATO. Germany sent a peacekeeping force to secure stability in the Balkans and sent a force of Bundeswehr troops to Afghanistan as part of a NATO effort to provide security in that country after the ousting of the Taliban. Research TipsWhen researching in Germany you will come across FHLC abbreviations: AG = Adelgodser Güterdistrikt (Nobility Lands Estate District) AH. = Amtsgericht (Local District Court) am = on a-d = an der (on the) Erzgeb. = Erzgebirgskreis (is a Kreis in the Free State of Saxony) KD =Klosterdistrikt (cloister [estate] district) KR =Kreis (District) KS =Købstæd ([independent] city) OA = Oberamtsgerich (political division) Other common words to know: Amtsgericht = Local District Court Bezirksamt(das) = municipality, city or district with its own government; city council Erzbistum = Archbishopric Erzgebirgskreis = is a district (Kreis) in the Free State of Saxony, Germany. named after Erzgebirge. Furstentum = Principality Herrschaft/Herrlichkeit = Territory, Fiefdom Furstentum = Principality Landschaft = Countryside, Landscape; Terretorial estate Regierungsbezirke = Administrative Regions Stadtkreis = City Districts
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