German History
A short summary of the history of Germany and its earlier states.
Ancient Germany and the Roman Conquest
The region now known as Germany first received its name from ancient Roman historians. During the 1st century BCE, the ‘barbarians’ of Germania halted the Roman advance into Northern Europe led by Julius Caesar. The Rhine river marked the edges of Roman territory, defended by a line of forts called the the Germanic frontier. To the east, Roman Gaul developed the beginnings of modern French culture. To the west, the free Germanic tribes maintained their independence. Their culture is thought to have originated in Southern Scandinavia, united by a shared linguistic heritage. Over time, Germanic peoples like the Anglo-Saxons, Goths, and Normans would spread across Europe, founding their own kingdoms and dynasties as far as North Africa.
Medieval Germany and the Holy Roman Empire
After the fall of Western Rome, early medieval Germany united under the Frankish Empire and later Holy Roman Empire. Charlemagne first claimed the title of Holy Roman Emperor in 800. Otto I, of a different dynasty, became the first in a continuous line of emperors from 962 to 1806.
The Holy Roman Empire maintained a close, if sometimes contentious, relationship with the Roman Catholic Church. It came to cover territories larger than Germany today, including parts of modern Italy, France, and the Czech Republic. Despite its prestige, the empire's member states operated with relative autonomy. Local nobles, officials, tradespeople, and clergymen often wielded more real power than the emperor's laws.
Toward the end of the medieval era, the people of the Holy Roman Empire would set sweeping global changes in motion. Around 1440, Johannes Gutenberg of Mainz created the European printing press. His invention increased public literacy and access to information at an unprecedented scale. Printing fueled the Protestant Reformation sparked by his fellow German, a priest and scholar from Eisleben named Martin Luther. Luther, a devout Catholic, wrote his famous theses as a private critique of the Church rather than a public condemnation. His revolution reached farther than he ever intended and would eventually reshape Europe.
In the Holy Roman Empire, the Reformation led to massive conflicts like the Thirty Years’ War between 1618 and 1648. What began as a conflict between its Catholic southern states and Protestant north soon transformed into a Europe-wide war. Much of it was fought on German soil, killing millions in the process. The war broke the grip of the Holy Roman Empire, which limped on until its conquest by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1806. After his defeat in 1813, the German states regained their independence as Prussia, Bavaria, Saxony, and Austria.
The German Empire and the World Wars
Like Italy in the prior centuries, Germany's fragmented states entered a golden age in the arts, philosophy, literature, music, and industry. In 1871, Emperor Wilhelm I unified Prussia, Bavaria, and Saxony to form the German Empire. There followed a continued period of peace, prosperity, and cultural growth. Germany emerged as a major manufacturing and military power in Europe. In 1914, war broke out in Europe. Germany entered the conflict on the side of the Central Powers. Its eventual defeat in World War I ended the imperial monarchy and ushered in the Weimar Republic.
The Weimar government could not protect its citizens from runaway inflation, unemployment, and growing nationalism. Under Adolf Hitler, the National Socialist Party rose to power in the 1930s and set World War II in motion. The legacy of that war, and the Holocaust committed by Nazi officials, continues to influence German society and politics today.
Modern Germany
After its defeat, Germany fell under Allied occupation. Its divided capital, Berlin, became a central stage of the Cold War, though no large-scale warfare took place. West Germany, a capitalist state, kept close ties to the former Allies. East Germany, meanwhile, adopted communist policies as part of the Eastern Bloc. The nation reunified in 1990 with the fall of the Soviet Union and has since functioned as a parliamentary republic. Germany is now a global economic power and a leader in several major industries and fields of research. Regional cultures remain distinct, and German people may identify with both their larger national heritage and the history of their home states.
References
Bernstein, Eckhard. Culture and Customs of Germany. Greenwood Press. 2004.
Fullbrook, Mary. A Concise History of Germany. Cambridge University Press. 2004.
Music and German National Identity. Celia Applegate and Pamela Potter, eds. University of Chicago Press. 2002.
O'Connor, Liz, et al. “The Largest Ancestry Groups In The United States.” Business Insider, Business Insider, 13 Aug. 2013, www.businessinsider.com/largest-ethnic-groups-in-america-2013-8.
Sidgwick, Cecily Ullman. Home Life in Germany. MacMillan Company. 1912.
Simons, Gary F., and Charles D. Fennig. “Summary by Language Size.” Ethnologue, SIL International, www.ethnologue.com/statistics/size.
The Cambridge Companion to Modern German Culture. Eva Kolinsky and Wilfried van der Will, eds. Cambridge University Press. 2004.
“The World Factbook: Germany.” Central Intelligence Agency, Central Intelligence Agency, 15 May 2018, www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/gm.html.
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