Becoming A United Germany

Map of Germany as it is in 2014.

If someone were to look at a map of Germany today such as the picture above, they would see a decently sized country united by a definitive border.  However, if someone were to look for a map of Germany in the 1600s or 1700s, they would see an area divided by about three hundred states as shown in the picture below.

Map of German speaking lands and the Holy Roman Empire in 1789.

Germany at this time was not what we would today consider to be a country.  It was not even a united area.  These more than three hundred principalities functioned completely on their own, but were just very close together because of how small they were.  The one thing that truly connected these small states was the language.  They did not have the exact same dialect throughout all of these principalities, but all of them spoke a variation of German.  "In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries "German" still referred only to a language, nothing more, and at times even the prospects for its future were murky" (86).  As time went on and wars such as the thirty years' war took place, these small nations occasionally worked together to take on larger countries that threatened their territory.  However, none of the states ever had the desire to become one nation.  It was occasionally brought up in jest, but no one truly wanted a united Germany; they liked things just the way they were.  Eventually though, after many battles and losses, after treaties signed, abandonment of alliances, and the two powers' plan for compensation, the principalities had to ban together to form thirty states instead of the original three hundred and fourteen (97).  Even after this, the German states did not want to become united.  This condense was drastic enough for them.

Soon after this, Napoleon came into power.  As he worked to extend France's reign and power, German states worked to defend themselves against him.  They banned together to stop him from expanding into their countries.  While this was happening, words such as "fatherland" and "nation" emerged for the first time (104).  A sense of nationalism had started to surface in German speaking lands during this time, emulating a sense of unification.  When Napoleon was finally defeated and the Thirty Years' War ended, the Germans were filled with joy, unlike when the Holy Roman Empire collapsed and they did not appear to care one way or another (106).  This lead to a flood of nationalism with citizens rushing to help the cause of rebuilding and volunteering, even poets wrote frequently about the demise of Napoleon.  This really brought the states together.  Even after this large commotion simmered down and live went back to normal, German people were hoping that the nation states could keep their unity for the first time.  From here there was an attempt to unite, but there was still too much disconnect between the states.  There needed to be a quicker way for goods to be moved around.  This is where the first German railway line came in.  This allowed for the more swift transportation of goods,  opened up many jobs, and created quite a bit of an economic rise.

Finally, Otto von Bismarck came into power as the new prime minister.  He got involved in and won several small wars with Austria and France.  This allowed Germany to became a dominate force as seen by other countries, and led to its true unification.  The official unification of Germany took place on January 18, 1871 (145) and continues as one solid nation today.

Otto von Bismarck is responsible for the final and official unification of Germany as one country in 1871.

Word count: 625

Schulze, Hagen. Germany: A New History. Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP, 1998. Print. 

Wolf, G.H. "Germany." GLS 362 Meeting, Room 11, Oesterle Library, Naperville. 24 September, 2014. Lecture.

http://www.wwnorton.com/college/english/nael/images/20thc/Bismark.jpg 

http://geocurrents.info/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/Holy-Roman-Empire-1789-300x206.jpg

http://www.google.com/maps/vt/data=U4aSnIyhBFNIJ3A8fCzUmaVIwyWq6RtIfB4QKiGq_w,MEkRX9WBZwfBZilt7sAiiH9BwpfbHmh-ZkZ8x-2j9WElNMhHqT3mgt8XxcWfeQMVKhni_mTZ_MZrK71YIIE1s61uvCWA-xSWonGJETmuaGwMmiGsAXGvW2MLZKJTfZxu5MwQQh9pekjUzqDzaTCIQxDnEkGjsa8qiOCQCFX3ufmxKFzbRIsK0Fs-dIsnJ5zFWdChKeHx3R0bar81ig