Otto the Great
In 936, Otto I the Great was crowned as king at Aachen; his coronation as emperor by the Pope at Rome in 962 inaugurated what became later known as the Holy Roman Empire, which became to be identified with Germany.[13] Sony VAIO PCG-3C2M Battery Otto strengthened the royal authority by re-asserting the old Carolingian rights over ecclesiastical appointments.[14] Otto wrested from the nobles the powers of appointment of the bishops and abbots, who controlled large land holdings. Additionally, Otto revived the old Carolingian program of appointing missionaries in the border lands. Sony VAIO PCG-5N2M Battery Otto continued to support the celibacy rule for the higher clergy. Thus, the ecclesiastical appointments never became hereditary. By granting land to the abbotts and bishops he appointed, Otto actually made these bishops into "princes of the Empire" (Reichsfürsten).[15]In this way, Otto was able to establish a national church. Sony VAIO PCG-5P1M Battery Outside threats to the kingdom were contained with the decisive defeat of the Magyars of Hungary at the Battle of Lechfeld in 955. The Slavs between the Elbe and the Oderrivers were also subjugated. Otto marched on Rome and drove John XII from the papal throne and for years controlled the election of the pope, setting a firm precedent for imperial control of the papacy for years to come. Sony VAIO PCG-5S1M Battery During the reign of Conrad II's son, Henry III (1039 to 1056 ), the Holy Roman Empire supported the Cluniac reform of the Church – the Peace of God, the prohibition of simony (the purchase of clerical offices) and required the celibacy of priests. Imperial authority over the Pope reached its peak. Sony VAIO PCG-9Z1M Battery In the Investiture Controversy which began between Henry IV and Pope Gregory VII over appointments to ecclesiastical offices, the emperor was compelled to submit to the Pope atCanossa in 1077, after having been excommunicated. In 1122 a temporary reconciliation was reached between Henry V and the Pope with the Concordat of Worms. Sony VAIO PCG-7171M Battery The consequences of the investiture dispute were a weakening of the Ottonian church (Reichskirche), and a strengthening of the Imperial secular princes.[16] The time between 1096 and 1291 was the age of the crusades. Knightly religious orders were established, including theTemplars, the Knights of St John and the Teutonic Order.[17] Sony VAIO PCG-7186M Battery The term sacrum imperium (Holy Empire) was first used under Friedrich I, documented first in 1157. The addition Nationis Germanicæ (of German Nation) appeared first in the 15th century, 1486 in a law decreed by Friedrich III; 1512 in reference to the Reichstag in Cologne by Maximilian I. Sony VAIO PCG-81112M Battery By then, the emperors had lost their influence in Italy and Burgondy. In 1525, the most advanced document of the German peasant war, the Heilbronn reform plan referred to the Reichas von Teutscher Nation (of German nation). 1521, Martin Luther translated the Christian Bible into the German popular language. Sony VAIO PCG-31311M BatteryTowns and cities
The German lands had a population of about 5 or 6 million. The great majority were farmers, typically in a state ofserfdom under the control of nobles and monasteries.[18] A few towns were starting to emerge. From 1100, new towns were founded around imperial strongholds, castles, bishops' palaces and monasteries. Sony VAIO PCG-8152M Battery The towns began to establish municipal rights and liberties (see German town law). Several cities such as Cologne became Imperial Free Cities, which did not depend on princes or bishops, but were immediately subject to the Emperor.[19] The towns were ruled by patricians (merchants carrying on long-distance trade). Sony VAIO PCG-31111M Battery The craftsmen formed guilds, governed by strict rules, which sought to obtain control of the towns; a few were open to women. Society was divided into sharply demarcated classes: the clergy, physicians, merchants, various guilds of artisans; full citizenship was not available to paupers. Sony VAIO PCG-61111M Battery Political tensions arose from issues of taxation, public spending, regulation of business, and market supervision, as well as the limits of corporate autonomy. Cologne's central location on the Rhine river placed it at the intersection of the major trade routes between east and west and was the basis of Cologne's growth. Sony VAIO PCG-51112M Battery The economic structures of medieval and early modern Cologne were characterized by the city's status as a major harbor and transport hub upon the Rhine. It was the seat of the archbishops, who ruled the surrounding area and (from 1248 to 1880) built the great Cologne Cathedral, with sacred relics that made it the destination for many worshippers. Sony VAIO PCG-51211M Battery By 1288 the city had secured its independence from the archbishop (who relocated to Bonn), and was ruled by its burghers. ong-distance trade in the Baltic intensified, as the major trading towns became drawn together in the Hanseatic League, under the leadership of Lübeck. Sony VAIO PCG-51212M Battery It was a business alliance of trading cities and their guilds that dominated trade along the coast of Northern Europe and flourished from the 1200 to 1500, and continued with lesser importance after that. The chief cities were Cologne on the Rhine River, Hamburg and Bremen on the North Sea, and Lübeck on the Baltic. Sony VAIO PCG-41111M Battery Each of the Hanseatic cities had its own legal system and a degree of political autonomy. The German colonisation and the chartering of new towns and villages began into largely Slav-inhabited territories east of the Elbe, such as Bohemia, Silesia, Pomerania, and Livonia. Sony VAIO PCG-41111V Battery Beginning in 1226, the Teutonic Knights began their conquest of Prussia. The native Baltic Prussians were conquered and Christianized by the Knights with much warfare, and numerous German towns were established along the eastern shore of the Baltic Sea.[26] Sony VAIO PCG-61412V Battery Henry V (1086–1125), great-grandson of Conrad II became Holy Roman Emperor in 1106 in the midst of a civil war. Hoping to gain complete control over the church inside the Empire, Henry V appointed Adalbert of Saarbruken as archbishop of Mainz in 1111 Adalbert began to assert the powers of the Church against secular authorities, that is, the Emperor. Sony VAIO PCG-71112M Battery This precipitated the "Crisis of 1111", part of the long-term Investiture Controversy.[27] In 1137 the magnates turned back to the Hohenstaufen family for a candidate, Conrad III. Conrad III tried to divest Henry the Proud of his two duchies, leading to war in southern Germany as the Empire divided into two factions. Sony VAIO PCG-81111V Battery The first faction called themselves the "Welfs" after Henry the Proud's family name which was the ruling dynasty in Bavaria. The other faction was known as the "Waiblings." In this early period, the Welfs generally represented ecclesiastical independence under the papacy plus "particularism" (a strengthening of the local duchies against the central imperial authority).Sony VAIO PCG-81111V Battery The Waiblings on the other hand stood for control of the Church by a strong central Imperial government.[28] Between 1152 and 1190, during the reign of Frederick I (Barbarossa), of the Hohenstaufen dynasty, an accommodation was reached with the rival Guelph party by the grant of the duchy of Bavaria to Henry the Lion, duke of Saxony. Sony VAIO PCG-81212M Battery Austria became a separate duchy by virtue of the Privilegium Minus in 1156.[29] Barbarossa tried to reassert his control over Italy. In 1177 a final reconciliation was reached between the emperor and the Pope in Venice. In 1180 Henry the Lion was outlawed and Bavaria was given to Otto of Wittelsbach (founder of the Wittelsbach dynasty which was to rule Bavaria until 1918), while Saxony was divided.Sony VAIO PCG-81212V Battery From 1184 to 1186 the Hohenstaufen empire under Barbarossa reached its peak in the Reichsfest (imperial celebrations) held atMainz and the marriage of his son Henry in Milan to the Norman princess Constance of Sicily. The power of the feudal lords was undermined by the appointment of "ministerials" (unfree servants of the Emperor) as officials. Sony VAIO PCG-51111M Battery Chivalry and the court life flowered, leading to a development of German culture and literature (see Wolfram von Eschenbach). Between 1212 and 1250 Frederick II established a modern, professionally administered state from his base in Sicily. Sony VAIO VPCS13X9E/B battery He resumed the conquest of Italy, leading to further conflict with the Papacy. In the Empire, extensive sovereign powers were granted to ecclesiastical and secular princes, leading to the rise of independent territorial states. The struggle with the Pope sapped the Empire's strength, as Frederick II was excommunicated three times. Sony VAIO VPCS12V9E/B battery After his death, the Hohenstaufen dynasty fell, followed by an interregnum during which there was no Emperor.[30] The failure of negotiations between Emperor Louis IV with the papacy led in 1338 to the declaration at Rhense by six electors to the effect that election by all or Sony VAIO VPCS12V9E/B battery the majority of the electors automatically conferred the royal title and rule over the empire, without papal confirmation. Between 1346 and 1378 Emperor Charles IV of Luxembourg, king of Bohemia, sought to restore the imperial authority. Sony VAIO VPCF13M8E/B battery Around 1350 Germany and almost the whole of Europe were ravaged by the Black Death. Jews were persecuted on religious and economic grounds; many fled to Poland. The Golden Bull of 1356 stipulated that in future the emperor was to be chosen by four secular electors (the King of Bohemia, the Count Palatine of the Rhine, Sony VAIO VPCF13Z0E/B battery the Duke of Saxony, and the Margrave of Brandenburg) and three spiritual electors (the Archbishops of Mainz, Trier, and Cologne). After the disasters of the 14th century, early-modern European society gradually came into being as a result of economic, religious and political changes. Sony VAIO VPCM13M1E/L battery A money economy arose which provoked social discontent among knights and peasants. Gradually, a proto-capitalistic system evolved out of feudalism. The Fugger family gained prominence through commercial and financial activities and became financiers to both ecclesiastical and secular rulers. Sony VAIO VPCM13M1E/W battery The knightly classes found their monopoly on arms and military skill undermined by the introduction of mercenary armies and foot soldiers. Predatory activity by "robber knights" became common. From 1438 the Habsburgs, who controlled most of the southeast of the Empire (more or less modern-day Austria and Slovenia, Sony VAIO VPCF22M1E battery and Bohemia and Moravia after the death of King Louis II in 1526), maintained a constant grip on the position of the Holy Roman Emperor until 1806 (with the exception of the years between 1742 and 1745). This situation, however, gave rise to increased disunity among the Holy Roman Empires territorial rulers and prevented sections of the country from coming together and forming nations in the manner of France and England. Sony VAIO VPCF11M1E/H battery During his reign from 1493 to 1519, Maximilian I tried to reform the Empire: an Imperial supreme court (Reichskammergericht) was established, imperial taxes were levied, the power of the Imperial Diet (Reichstag) was increased. The reforms were, however, frustrated by the continued territorial fragmentation of the Empire. Sony VAIO VPCF13M0E/B batteryScience and culture
In the 12th century, German Benedictine abbess Hildegard von Bingen (1098–1179) wrote several influential theological, botanical and medicinal texts, as well as letters, liturgical songs, poems, and arguably the oldest surviving morality play, while supervising brilliant miniature Illuminations. Sony VAIO VPCYB2M1E battery Ca. 100 years later,Walther von der Vogelweide (c. 1170-c. 1230) became the most celebrated of the Middle High German lyric poets. Around 1439, Johannes Gutenberg, a citizen ofMainz, was the first European to use movable type printing and became the global inventor of the printing press, thereby starting the Printing Revolution. Sony VAIO VPCYB3V1E battery Gutenberg's inventions and works (e.g. the Gutenberg Bible) would play key roles for the development of the Reformation and the Scientific Revolution. Around the transition from the 15th to the 16th century, Albrecht Dürer from Nuremberg established his reputation across Europe as painter, Sony VAIO VPCY11M1E battery printmaker, mathematician,engraver, and theorist when he was still in his twenties and secured his reputation as one of the most important figures of the Northern Renaissance. In the early 16th century there was much discontent occasioned by abuses such as indulgences in the Catholic Church, and a general desire for reform. Sony VAIO VPCS12L9E/B battery In 1517 the Reformation began with the publication of Martin Luther's 95 Theses; he had posted them in the town square, and gave copies of them to German nobles, but it is debated whether he nailed them to the church door in Wittenberg as is commonly said. Sony VAIO VPCF11S1E/B battery The list detailed 95 assertions Luther believed to show corruption and misguidance within the Catholic Church. One often cited example, though perhaps not Luther's chief concern, is a condemnation of the selling of indulgences; another prominent point within the 95 Theses is Luther's disagreement both with the way in which the higher clergy, especially the pope, used and abused power, and with the very idea of the pope. Sony VAIO VPCYB3V1E/R Battery In 1521 Luther was outlawed at the Diet of Worms. But the Reformation spread rapidly, helped by the Emperor Charles V's wars with France and the Turks. Hiding in the Wartburg Castle, Luther translated the Bible from Latin to German, establishing the basis of the German language. Sony VAIO VPCF23P1E Battery A curious fact is that Luther spoke a dialect which had minor importance in the German language of that time. After the publication of his Bible, his dialect suppressed the others and evolved into what is now the modern German. In 1524 the German Peasants' War broke out in Swabia, Sony VAIO VPCF23N1E Battery Franconia and Thuringia against ruling princes and lords, following the preachings of Reformist priests. But the revolts, which were assisted by war-experienced noblemen like Götz von Berlichingen andFlorian Geyer (in Franconia), and by the theologian Thomas Münzer (in Thuringia), were soon repressed by the territorial princes. Sony VAIO VPCY21S1E/L Battery It is estimated that as many as 100,000 German peasants were massacred during the revolt,[32]usually after the battles had ended.[33] With the protestation of the Lutheran princes at the Reichstag of Speyer(1529) and rejection of the Lutheran "Augsburg Confession" at Augsburg (1530), a separate Lutheran church emerged. Sony VAIO VPCY21S1E/G battery From 1545 the Counter-Reformation began in Germany. The main force was provided by the Jesuit order, founded by the Spaniard Ignatius of Loyola. Central and northeastern Germany were by this time almost wholly Protestant, whereas western and southern Germany remained predominantly Catholic. Sony VAIO VPCF24M1E battery In 1547, Holy Roman Emperor Charles V defeated the Schmalkaldic League, an alliance of Protestant rulers. The Peace of Augsburg in 1555 brought recognition of the Lutheran faith. But the treaty also stipulated that the religion of a state was to be that of its ruler (Cuius regio, eius religio). Sony VAIO VGN-CS118E/Q Battery In 1556 Charles V abdicated. The Habsburg Empire was divided, as Spain was separated from the Imperial possessions. In 1608/1609 the Protestant Union and the Catholic League were formed.Literacy
The Reformation was a triumph of literacy and the new printing press. Sony VAIO VGN-CS118E/R Battery Luther's translation of the Bible into German was a decisive moment in the spread of literacy, and stimulated as well the printing and distribution of religious books and pamphlets. From 1517 onward religious pamphlets flooded Germany and much of Europe. By 1530 over 10,000 publications are known, with a total of ten million copies. Sony VAIO VGN-CS118E/W Battery The Reformation was thus a media revolution. Luther strengthened his attacks on Rome by depicting a "good" against "bad" church. From there, it became clear that print could be used for propaganda in the Reformation for particular agendas. Reform writers used pre-Reformation styles, Sony VAIO VGN-CS11S/P Battery clichés, and stereotypes and changed items as needed for their own purposes.[34]Especially effective were Luther's Small Catechism, for use of parents teaching their children, and Larger Catechism, for pastors.[35] Using the German vernacular they expressed the Apostles' Creed in simpler, more personal, Trinitarian language. Sony VAIO VGN-CS11S/Q Battery Illustrations in the newly translated Bible and in many tracts popularized Luther's ideas. Lucas Cranach the Elder (1472–1553), the great painter patronized by the electors of Wittenberg, was a close friend of Luther, and illustrated Luther's theology for a popular audience. Sony VAIO VGN-CS11S/W Battery He dramatized Luther's views on the relationship between the Old and New Testaments, while remaining mindful of Luther's careful distinctions about proper and improper uses of visual imagery.[36]Thirty Years War
From 1618 to 1648 the Thirty Years' War ravaged in the Holy Roman Empire. Sony VAIO VGN-CS11Z/R Battery The causes were the conflicts between Catholics and Protestants, the efforts by the various states within the Empire to increase their power and the Catholic Emperor's attempt to achieve the religious and political unity of the Empire. The immediate occasion for the war was the uprising of the Protestant nobility of Bohemia against the emperor, Sony VAIO VGN-CS120J/P Battery but the conflict was widened into a European War by the intervention ofKing Christian IV of Denmark (1625–29), Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden (1630–48) and France under Cardinal Richelieu. Germany became the main theatre of war and the scene of the final conflict between France and the Habsburgs for predominance in Europe.[37] Sony VAIO VGN-CS120J/Q Battery The fighting often was out of control, with marauding bands of hundreds or thousands of starving soldiers spreading plague, plunder, and murder. The armies that were under control moved back and forth across the countryside year after year, levying heavy taxes on cities, and seizing the animals and food stocks of the peasants without payment. Sony VAIO VGN-CS120J/R Battery The enormous social disruption over three decades caused a dramatic decline in population because of killings, disease, crop failures, declining birth rates and random destruction, and the out-migration of terrified people. One estimate shows a 38% drop from 16 million people in 1618 to 10 million by 1650, while another shows "only" a 20% drop from 20 million to 16 million. Sony VAIO VGN-CS190JTB Battery The Altmark andWürttemberg regions especially hard hit. It took generations for Germany to fully recover.[38] The war ended in 1648 with thePeace of Westphalia. Alsace was permanently lost to France, Pomerania was temporarily lost to Sweden, and the Netherlands officially left the Empire. The imperial power declined further as the states' rights were increased. Sony VAIO VGN-CS190JTP BatteryScience
Decisive scientific developments took place during the 16th and 17th centuries, especially in the fields of astronomy, mathematics and physics. In 1543,astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus from Toruń (Thorn) published his work De revolutionibus orbium coelestium and became the first person to formulate a comprehensive heliocentric cosmology Sony VAIO VGN-CS190JTQ Battery which displaced the Earth from the center of the universe. Almost 70 years after Copernicus' death and building on his theories, mathematician, astronomer and astrologer Johannes Kepler from Stuttgart would be a key figure in the 17th century scientific revolution. Sony VAIO VGN-CS190JTR Battery He is best known for his eponymous laws of planetary motion, codified by later astronomers, based on his works Astronomia nova and Harmonices Mundi. These works also influenced contemporary scientist Galileo Galilei and provided one of the foundations for Isaac Newton's theory of universal gravitation. Sony VAIO VGN-CS190JTW Battery From 1640, Brandenburg-Prussia had started to rise under the Great Elector, Frederick William. The Peace of Westphalia in 1648 strengthened it even further, through the acquisition of East Pomerania. From 1713 to 1740, King Frederick William I, also known as the "Soldier King",Sony VAIO VGN-CS190NAB Battery established a highly centralized, militarized state with a heavily rural population of about three million (compared to the nine million in Austria). In terms of the boundaries of 1914, Germany in 1700 had a population of 16 million, increasing slightly to 17 million by 1750, and growing more rapidly to 24 million by 1800. Sony VAIO VGN-CS190NAC Battery Wars continued, but they were no longer so devastating to the civilian population; famines and major epidemics did not occur, but increased agricultural productivity led to a higher birth rate, and a lower death rate.[39]Wars
Louis XIV of France conquered parts of Alsace and Lorraine (1678–1681), Sony VAIO VGN-CS190NAD Battery and had invaded and devastated the Electorate of the Palatinate (1688–1697) in the War of Palatinian Succession. Louis XIV benefited from the Empire's problems with the Turks, which were menacing Austria. Louis XIV ultimately had to relinquish the Electorate of the Palatinate.Sony VAIO VGN-CS190NBB Battery Afterwards Hungary was reconquered from the Turks; Austria, under the Habsburgs, developed into a great power. In the War of Austrian Succession (1740–1748) Maria Theresa fought successfully for recognition of her succession to the throne. Sony VAIO VGN-CS190NCA Battery But in the Silesian Wars and in the Seven Years' War she had to cede Silesia to Frederick II, the Great, of Prussia. After the Peace of Hubertsburg in 1763 between Austria, Prussia and Saxony, Prussia became a European great power. This gave the start to the rivalry between Prussia and Austria for the leadership of Germany. Sony VAIO VGN-CS190NCB Battery From 1763, against resistance from the nobility and citizenry, an "enlightened absolutism" was established in Prussia and Austria, according to which the ruler governed according to the best precepts of the philosophers. The economies developed and legal reforms were undertaken, Sony VAIO VGN-CS190NCC Battery including the abolition of torture and the improvement in the status of Jews; the emancipation of the peasants slowly began. Compulsory education began. In 1772–1795 Prussia took part in the partitions of Poland, occupying western territories of Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, which led to centuries of Polish resistance against Germanization. Sony VAIO VGN-CS50B/W BatterySmaller states
Completely overshadowed by Prussia and Austria, the smaller German states were generally characterized by political lethargy and administrative inefficiency, often compounded by rulers who were more concerned with their mistresses and their hunting dogs than with the affairs of state. Sony VAIO VGN-CS51B/W Battery The smaller states failed to form coalitions with each other, and were eventually overwhelmed by Prussia.[40] Bavaria was especially unfortunate in this regard; it was a rural land with very heavy debts and few growth centers. Saxony was in economically good shape, although its government was seriously mismanaged, and numerous wars had taken their toll. Sony VAIO VGN-CS52JB/W Battery InWürttemberg the duke lavished funds on palaces, mistresses, great celebration, and hunting expeditions.In Hesse-Kassel, the Landgrave Frederick II, ruled 1760–1785 as an enlightened despot, and raised money by renting soldiers (called "Hessians") to Great Britain to help fight the American Revolutionary War. Sony VAIO VGN-CS60B/P Battery He combined Enlightenment ideas with Christian values, cameralist plans for central control of the economy, and a militaristic approach toward diplomacy. Hanover did not have to support a lavish court—its rulers were also kings of England and resided in London. Sony VAIO VGN-CS60B/Q Battery George III, elector (ruler) from 1760 to 1820, never once visited Hanover. The local nobility who ran the country opened the University of Göttingen in 1737; it soon became a world-class intellectual center. Baden sported perhaps the best government of the smaller states. Karl Friedrich ruled well for 73 years (1738–1811) and was an enthusiast for The Enlightenment; Sony VAIO VGN-CS60B/R Battery he abolished serfdom in 1783. Many of the city-states of Germany were run by bishops, who in reality were from powerful noble families and showed scant interest in religion. None developed a significant reputation for good government.[42] Between 1807 and 1871, Prussia swallowed up many of the smaller states, with minimal protest, then went on to found the German Empire. Sony VAIO VGN-CS61B/P Battery In the process, Prussia became too heterogeneous, lost its identity, and by the 1930s had become an administrative shell of little importance.Nobility
In a heavily agrarian society, land ownership played a central role. Germany's nobles, especially those in the East called Junkers, dominated not only the localities, Sony VAIO VGN-CS61B/Q Battery but also the Prussian court, and especially the Prussian army. Increasingly after 1815, a centralized Prussian government based in Berlin took over the powers of the nobles, which in terms of control over the peasantry had been almost absolute. To help the nobility avoid indebtedness, Sony VAIO VGN-CS61B/R Battery Berlin set up a credit institution to provide capital loans in 1809, and extended the loan network to peasants in 1849. When the German Empire was established in 1871, the Junker nobility controlled the army and the Navy, the bureaucracy, and the royal court; they generally set governmental policies.[43] Sony VAIO VGN-CS62JB/P BatteryPeasants and rural life
Peasants continued to center their lives in the village, where they were members of a corporate body and help manage the community resources and monitor the community life. In the East, they were serfs who were bound permanently to parcels of land. Sony VAIO VGN-CS62JB/Q Battery In most of Germany, farming was handled by tenant farmers who paid rents and obligatory services to the landlord, who was typically a nobleman. Around 1800 the Catholic monasteries, which had large land holdings, were nationalized and sold off by the government. In Bavaria they had controlled 56% of the land[44] Sony VAIO VGN-CS62JB/R Battery Peasant leaders supervised the fields and ditches and grazing rights, maintained public order and morals, and supported a village court which handled minor offenses. Inside the family the patriarch made all the decisions, and tried to arrange advantageous marriages for his children. Much of the villages' communal life centered around church services and holy days. Sony VAIO VGN-CS71B/W Battery In Prussia, the peasants drew lots to choose conscripts required by the army. The noblemen handled external relationships and politics for the villages under their control, and were not typically involved in daily activities or decisions.[45][46] The emancipation of the serfs came in 1770–1830, beginning with Schleswig in 1780. Sony VAIO VGN-CS72JB/W Battery The peasants were now ex-serfs and could own their land, buy and sell it, and move about freely. The nobles approved for now they could buy land owned by the peasants. The chief reformer was Baron vom Stein (1757–1831), who was influenced by The Enlightenment, especially the free market ideas of Adam Smith.[47] Sony VAIO VGN-CS90HS Battery The end of serfdom raised the personal legal status of the peasantry. A bank was set up so that landowner could borrow government money to buy land from peasants (the peasants were not allowed to use it to borrow money to buy land until 1850). The result was that the large landowners obtained larger estates, Sony VAIO VGN-CS90NS Battery and many peasant became landless tenants, or moved to the cities or to America. The other German states imitated Prussia after 1815. In sharp contrast to the violence that characterized land reform in the French Revolution, Germany handled it peacefully. In Schleswig the peasants, who had been influenced by the Enlightenment, played an active role; Sony VAIO VGN-CS90S Battery elsewhere they were largely passive. Indeed, for most peasants, customs and traditions continued largely unchanged, including the old habits of deference to the nobles whose legal authority remains quite strong over the villagers. Although the peasants were no longer tied to the same land like serfs had been, the old paternalistic relationship in East Prussia lasted into the 20th century.[48] Sony VAIO VGN-CS91HS Battery The agrarian reforms in northwestern Germany in the era 1770–1870 were driven by progressive governments and local elites. They abolished feudal obligations and divided collectively owned common land into private parcels and thus created a more efficient market-oriented rural economy. Sony VAIO VGN-CS91NS Battery It produced increased productivity and population growth. It strengthened the traditional social order because wealthy peasants obtained most of the former common land, while the rural proletariat was left without land; many left for the cities or America. Sony VAIO VGN-CS91S Battery Meanwhile the division of the common land served as a buffer preserving social peace between nobles and peasants.[49] In the east the serfs were emancipated but the Junker class maintained its large estates and monopolized political power.[50]Enlightenment
Before 1750 the German upper classes looked to France for intellectual, cultural and architectural leadership; Sony VAIO VGN-CS92DS Battery French was the language of high society. By the mid-18th century the "Aufklärung" (The Enlightenment) had transformed German high culture in music, philosophy, science and literature. Christian Wolff (1679–1754) was the pioneer as a writer who expounded the Enlightenment to German readers; Sony VAIO VGN-CS92JS Battery he legitimized German as a philosophic language.[51] Johann Gottfried von Herder (1744–1803) broke new ground in philosophy and poetry, as a leader of the Sturm und Drang movement of proto-Romanticism. Weimar Classicism ("Weimarer Klassik") was a cultural and literary movement based in Weimar that sought to establish a new humanism by synthesizing Romantic, classical and Enlightenment ideas. Sony VAIO VGN-CS92XS Battery The movement, from 1772 until 1805, involved Herder as well as polymath Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832) and Friedrich Schiller (1759–1805), a poet and historian. Herder argued that every folk had its own particular identity, which was expressed in its language and culture. Sony VAIO VGN-CR11H/B Battery This legitimized the promotion of German language and culture and helped shape the development of German nationalism. Schiller's plays expressed the restless spirit of his generation, depicting the hero's struggle against social pressures and the force of destiny.[52] Sony VAIO VGN-CR11S/L Battery German music, sponsored by the upper classes, came of age under composers Johann Sebastian Bach (1685–1750), Franz Joseph Haydn (1732–1809), and Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (1756–1791).[53] In remote Königsberg philosopher Immanuel Kant (1724–1804) tried to reconcile rationalism and religious belief, Sony VAIO VGN-CR11S/P Battery individual freedom and political authority. Kant's work contained basic tensions that would continue to shape German thought—and indeed all of European philosophy—well into the 20th century.[54] The German Enlightenment won the support of princes, aristocrats and the middle classes and permanently reshaped the culture.[55] Sony VAIO VGN-CR11S/W BatteryFrench Revolution 1789–1815
German intellectuals celebrated the outbreak of the French Revolution, hoping to see the triumph of Reason and The Enlightenment. The royal courts in Vienna and Berlin denounced the overthrow of the king and the threatened spread of notions of liberty, equality, and fraternity. Sony VAIO VGN-CR11Z/R Battery By 1793 the execution of the French king and the onset of the Terror disillusioned the Bildungsbürgertum (educated middle classes). Reformers said the solution was to have faith in the ability of Germans to reform their laws and institutions in peaceful fashion.[56] Europe was racked by two decades of war revolving around France's efforts to spread its revolutionary ideals, and the opposition of reactionary royalty. Sony VAIO VGN-CR120E/L Battery The German lands saw armies marching back and forth, bringing devastation (albeit on a far lower scale than the Thirty Years War), but also bringing new ideas of liberty and civil rights for the people. War broke out in 1792 as Austria and Prussia invaded France, but were defeated at the Battle of Valmy. Sony VAIO VGN-CR120E/P Battery Prussia and Austria ended their failed wars with France but (with Russia) partitioned Poland among themselves in 1793 and 1795. The French took control of the Rhineland, imposed French-style reforms, abolished feudalism, established constitutions, promoted freedom of religion, emancipated Jews, Sony VAIO VGN-CR120E/R Battery opened the bureaucracy to ordinary citizens of talent, and forced the nobility to share power with the rising middle class. Napoleon created the Kingdom of Westphalia (1807–1813) as a model state.[57] These reforms proved largely permanent and modernized the western parts of Germany. Sony VAIO VGN-CR120E/W Battery When the French tried to impose the French language, German opposition grew in intensity. A Second Coalition of Britain, Russia, and Austria then attacked France but failed. Napoleon established direct or indirect control over most of western Europe, including the German states apart from Prussia and Austria. Sony VAIO VGN-CR125E/B Battery The old Holy Roman Empire was little more than a farce; Napoleon simply abolished it in 1806 while forming new countries under his control. In Germany Napoleon set up the Confederation of the Rhine comprising most of the German states except Prussia and Austria.[58] Sony VAIO VGN-CR13/B Battery Prussia tried to remain neutral while imposing tight controls on dissent, but with German nationalism sharply on the rise the small nation blundered by going to war with Napoleon in 1806. Its economy was weak, its leadership poor, and the once mighty Prussian army was a hollow shell. Napoleon easily crushed it at theBattle of Jena. Sony VAIO VGN-CR13/L Battery Napoleon occupied Berlin and Prussia paid dearly. Prussia lost its recently acquired territories in western Germany, its army was reduced to 42,000 men, no trade with Britain was allowed, and Berlin had to pay Paris heavy reparations and fund the French army of occupation . Saxony changed sides to support Napoleon and join his Confederation of the Rhine; Sony VAIO VGN-CR13/P Battery its elector was rewarded with the title of king and given a slice of Poland taken from Prussia. After Napoleon's fiasco in Russia in 1812, including the deaths of many Germans in his invasion army, Prussia joined with Russia. Major battles followed in quick order, and when Austria switched sides to oppose Napoleon his situation grew tenuous. Sony VAIO VGN-CR13/R Battery He was defeated in a great Battle of Leipzig in late 1813, and Napoleon's empire started to collapse. One after another the German states switched to oppose Napoleon, but he rejected peace terms. Allied armies invaded France in early 1814, Paris fell, and in April Napoleon surrendered. Sony VAIO VGN-CR13/W Battery He returned for 100 days in 1815, but was finally defeated by the British and German armies at Waterloo. Prussia was the big winner at the Vienna peace conference, gaining extensive territory.[59]German Confederation
The German Confederation (German: Deutscher Bund) was the loose association of 39 states created in 1815 to coordinate the economies of separate German-speaking countries. Sony VAIO VGN-CR131E/L Battery It acted as a buffer between the powerful states of Austria and Prussia. Britain approved of it because London felt that there was need for a stable, peaceful power in central Europe that could discourage aggressive moves by France or Russia. According to Lee (1985), most historians have judged the Confederation to be weak and ineffective, Sony VAIO VGN-CR13G Battery as well as an obstacle to German nationalist aspirations. It collapsed because the rivalry between Prussia and Austria (known as German dualism), warfare, the 1848 revolution, and the inability of the multiple members to compromise.[60] It was replaced by the North German Confederation in 1866. Sony VAIO VGN-CR13G/B BatteryPopulation
The population of the German Confederation (excluding Austria) grew 60% from 1815 to 1865, from 21,000,000 to 34,000,000.[61] The era saw the Demographic Transition take place in Germany. Sony VAIO VGN-CR13G/L Battery It was a transition from high birth rates and high death rates to low birth and death rates as the country developed from a pre-industrial to a modernized agriculture and supported a fast-growing industrialized urban economic system. In previous centuries, the shortage of land meant that not everyone could marry, and marriages took place after age 25. Sony VAIO VGN-CR13G/P Battery The high birthrate was offset by a very high rate of infant mortality, plus periodic epidemics and harvest failures. After 1815, increased agricultural productivity meant a larger food supply, and a decline in famines, epidemics, and malnutrition. This allowed couples to marry earlier, and have more children. Sony VAIO VGN-CR13G/R Battery Arranged marriages became uncommon as young people were now allowed to choose their own marriage partners, subject to a veto by the parents. The upper and middle classes began to practice birth control, and a little later so too did the peasants.[62]Industrialization
Before 1850 Germany lagged far behind the leaders in industrial development, Sony VAIO VGN-CR13G/W Battery Britain, France and Belgium by a wide margin. By midcentury, the German states were catching up, and by 1900 Germany was a world leader in industrialization, along with Britain and the United States. In 1800, Germany's social structure was poorly suited to entrepreneurship or economic development. Sony VAIO VGN-CR13T/L Battery Domination by France during the era of the French Revolution (1790s to 1815), produced important institutional reforms, including the abolition of feudal restrictions on the sale of large landed estates, the reduction of the power of the guilds in the cities, and the introduction of a new, more efficient commercial law. Sony VAIO VGN-CR13T/P Battery Nevertheless, traditionalism remained strong in most of Germany. Until midcentury, the guilds, the landed aristocracy, the churches, and the government bureaucracies had so many rules and restrictions that entrepreneurship was held in low esteem, and given little opportunity to develop. Sony VAIO VGN-CR13T/R Battery From the 1830s and 1840s, Prussia, Saxony, and other states reorganized agriculture, introducing sugar beets, turnips, and potatoes, yielding a higher level of food production that enabled a surplus rural population to move to industrial areas. The beginnings of the industrial revolution in Germany came in the textile industry, Sony VAIO VGN-CR13T/W Battery and was facilitated by eliminating tariff barriers through the Zollverein, starting in 1834.[63]Urbanization
Industrialization brought rural Germans to the factories, mines and railways. The population in 1800 was heavily rural, with only 10% of the people living in communities of 5000 or more people, and only 2% living in cities of more than 100,000. Sony VAIO VGN-CR15/B Battery After 1815, the urban population grew rapidly, due primarily to the influx of young people from the rural areas. Berlin grew from 172,000 in 1800, to 826,000 in 1870; Hamburg grew from 130,000 to 290,000; Munich from 40,000 to 269,000; and Dresden from 60,000 to 177,000. Sony VAIO VGN-CR150E/B Battery Offsetting this growth, there was extensive emigration, especially to the United States. Emigration totaled 480,000 in the 1840s, 1,200,000 in the 1850s, and 780,000 in the 1860s.[64]Railways
The takeoff stage of economic development came with the railroad revolution in the 1840s, Sony VAIO VGN-CR190 Battery which opened up new markets for local products, created a pool of middle managers, increased the demand for engineers, architects and skilled machinists and stimulated investments in coal and iron. Political disunity of three dozen states and a pervasive conservatism made it difficult to build railways in the 1830s. Sony VAIO VGN-CR190E/L Battery However, by the 1840s, trunk lines did link the major cities; each German state was responsible for the lines within its own borders. Economist Friedrich List summed up the advantages to be derived from the development of the railway system in 1841: As a means of national defence, it facilitates the concentration, distribution and direction of the army. Sony VAIO VGN-CR190E/P Battery- It is a means to the improvement of the culture of the nation. It brings talent, knowledge and skill of every kind readily to market.
The iron rails become a nerve system, which, on the one hand, strengthens public opinion, and, on the other hand, strengthens the power of the state for police and governmental purposes.[65]
Lacking a technological base at first, the Germans imported their engineering and hardware from Britain, but quickly learned the skills needed to operate and expand the railways. Sony VAIO VGN-CR19VN/B Battery In many cities, the new railway shops were the centres of technological awareness and training, so that by 1850, Germany was self sufficient in meeting the demands of railroad construction, and the railways were a major impetus for the growth of the new steel industry. Observers found that even as late as 1890, their engineering was inferior to Britain’s. Sony VAIO VGN-CR19XN/B Battery However, German unification in 1870 stimulated consolidation, nationalisation into state-owned companies, and further rapid growth. Unlike the situation in France, the goal was support of industrialisation, and so heavy lines crisscrossed the Ruhr and other industrial districts, and provided good connections to the major ports of Hamburg and Bremen. Sony VAIO VGN-CR20 Battery By 1880, Germany had 9,400 locomotives pulling 43,000 passengers and 30,000 tons of freight a day, and forged ahead of France.German artists and intellectuals, heavily influenced by the French Revolution and by the great German poet and writer Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749–1832), turned to Romanticism after a period of Enlightenment. Sony VAIO VGN-CR21/B Battery Philosophical thought was decisively shaped by Immanuel Kant (1724–1804). Ludwig van Beethoven (1770–1827) was the leading composer of Romantic music. His use of tonal architecture in such a way as to allow significant expansion of musical forms and structures was immediately recognized as bringing a new dimension to music. Sony VAIO VGN-CR21E/L Battery His later piano music and string quartets, especially, showed the way to a completely unexplored musical universe, and influenced Franz Schubert (1797–1828) and Robert Schumann (1810–1856). In opera, a new Romantic atmosphere combining supernatural terror and melodramatic plot in a folkloric context was first successfully achieved by Sony VAIO VGN-CR21E/P Battery Carl Maria von Weber (1786–1826) and perfected by Richard Wagner (1813–1883) in his Ring Cycle. The Brothers Grimm (1785–1863 & 1786–1859) not only wrote the popular Grimm's Fairy Tales, but were among the founding fathers of German philology and German studies. Sony VAIO VGN-CR21E/W Battery At the universities high-powered professors developed international reputations, especially in the humanities led by history and philology, which brought a new historical perspective to the study of political history, theology, philosophy, language, and literature. With Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831) in philosophy, Sony VAIO VGN-CR21S/L Battery Friedrich Schleiermacher (1768–1834) in theology and Leopold von Ranke (1795–1886) in history, the University of Berlin, founded in 1810, became the world's leading university. Von Ranke, for example, professionalized history and set the world standard for historiography. Sony VAIO VGN-CR21S/P Battery By the 1830s mathematics, physics, chemistry, and biology had emerged with world class science, led by Alexander von Humboldt (1769–1859) in natural science and Carl Friedrich Gauss(1777–1855) in mathematics. Young intellectuals often turned to politics, but their support for the failed Revolution of 1848 forced many into exile. Sony VAIO VGN-CR21S/W Battery After the fall of Napoleon, Europe's statesmen convened in Vienna in 1815 for the reorganisation of European affairs, under the leadership of the Austrian Prince Metternich. The political principles agreed upon at this Congress of Vienna included the restoration, legitimacy and solidarity of rulers for the repression of revolutionary and nationalist ideas. Sony VAIO VGN-CR21Z/N Battery The German Confederation (Deutscher Bund) was founded, a loose union of 39 states (35 ruling princes and 4 free cities) under Austrian leadership, with a Federal Diet (Bundestag) meeting in Frankfurt am Main. It was a loose coalition that failed to satisfy most nationalists. The member states largely went their own way, and Austria had its own interests. Sony VAIO VGN-CR21Z/R Battery In 1819 a student radical assassinated the reactionary playwright August von Kotzebue, who had scoffed at liberal student organisations. In one of the few major actions of the German Confederation, Prince Metternich called a conference that issued the repressive Carlsbad Decrees, Sony VAIO VGN-CR220E/R Battery designed to suppress liberal agitation against the conservative governments of the German states.[68] The Decrees terminated the fast-fading nationalist fraternities '(Burschenschaften),' removed liberal university professors, and expanded the censorship of the press. The decrees began the "persecution of the demagogues",Sony VAIO VGN-CR23/B Battery which was directed against individuals who were accused of spreading revolutionary and nationalist ideas. Among the persecuted were the poet Ernst Moritz Arndt, the publisher Johann Joseph Görres and the "Father of Gymnastics" Ludwig Jahn.[69] Sony VAIO VGN-CR23/L Battery In 1834 the Zollverein was established, a customs union between Prussia and most other German states, but excluding Austria. As industrialisation developed, the need for a unified German state with a uniform currency, legal system, and government became more and more obvious. Sony VAIO VGN-CR23/N Battery Growing discontent with the political and social order imposed by the Congress of Vienna led to the outbreak, in 1848, of theMarch Revolution in the German states. In May the German National Assembly (the Frankfurt Parliament) met in Frankfurt to draw up a national German constitution. Sony VAIO VGN-CR23/P Battery But the 1848 revolution turned out to be unsuccessful: King Frederick William IV of Prussia refused the imperial crown, the Frankfurt parliament was dissolved, the ruling princes repressed the risings by military force and the German Confederation was re-established by 1850. Sony VAIO VGN-CR23/R Battery Many leaders went into exile, including a number who went to the United States and became a political force there. The 1850s were a period of extreme political reaction. Dissent was vigorously suppressed, and many Germans emigrated to America following the collapse of the 1848 uprisings. Sony VAIO VGN-CR23/W Battery Frederick William IV became extremely depressed and melancholy during this period, and was surrounded by men who advocated clericalism and absolute divine monarchy. The Prussian people once again lost interest in politics. Prussia not only expanded its territory but began to industrialize rapidly, while maintaining a strong agricultural base. Sony VAIO VGN-CR240E/B Battery
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