Germany has had an incredibly turbulent history, especially in the last 100 years, one full
of rises and falls of all kinds throughout it’s more than 100 years (more like 2,000)
of history.
So, in early celebration of Tag der Deutschen Einheit (Day of German Unity), hier gibt es
die Geschichte von Deutschland (here is the History of Germany)!
It all started thousands of years ago, when humans first set foot on German soil, and
when the Neanderthals (named after the Neander valley in western Germany) had later…
left (they actually died, but still).
For thousands of years, people all across Europe lived in many different tribal cultures,
which would later explain why Germany has so many names now…
[Germany] Hallo, ich heiße Deutschland!
[Spain] ¡Buenos días, Alemania!
[Britain] Hello, Germany!
[Poland] Pozdrowienia, Niemcy!
[Estonia] Tere, Saksamaa!
[Sweden] Hej, Tyskland!
[Netherlands] Goedendag, Duitsland!
[Germany] Was?
Nein!
Wie seid ihr so falsch über dieses?!
Aber, die Niederlände haben recht.
[Britain] I guess the Dutch would know.
[Germany] Dutch?
Sprichst du über mir?
[Britain] What?
No, I’m talking about the Netherlands…
[Germany] Was?
[Netherlands] Maar ik ben niet “Dutch”.
[Germany] Ja, und ich bin Deutschland, Dummkopf!
[Spain] Espera, ¿cómo podemos comprender el uno del otro?
This is because each group of Ausländer would encounter a different tribe or group from
the rest, or come up with their own word.
When the Romans arrived, after their conquest of Gaul, they named the territory “Germania”.
These names came from tribes such as the Alemanni, Nemetes, Saxons, etc.
“Deutsch” came from a word meaning “of the people”, but Britain couldn’t tell
the difference between the Netherlands and northern Germany, which is how Netherlanders
are actually called “Dutch”.
Soon after, the Romans, as they so often do, decided to invade, but only held onto the
territory until the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest in 9 AD, pushing the Roman border back
to the Rhine, where it would remain for the next few centuries.
In the 5th century, invaders from the east, known as the Huns, started to invade the area,
causing the (now larger) Germanic tribes to seek refuge in the Roman Empire, and even
took over some small bits of the ailing empire in the Great Migration period, where the Visigoths
ended up in Spain, and the Vandals smashed some stuff and ended up in north Africa.
Rome’s last western emperor, Romulus Augustus, was deposed in 476 by Odoacer, effectively
starting the Middle Ages.
Over the next few centuries, a tribe called the Franks started to conquer their way through
modern-day France and Germany, becoming the namesake behind France.
In 800, the Pope decided to declare that Charlemagne, King of the Franks, was now the first Roman
emperor in over 300 years, even though Rome was still well and alive in Constantinople,
which would later contribute to the Great Schism in 1054.
Nevertheless, Charlemagne’s Empire eventually led to the Holy Roman Empire, which was more
of a loose federation of a crap-ton of city-states and small kingdoms.
The Hanseatic League, a northern European commercial confederation, also became a thing
that Hamburg and Bremen would love to remind you about, and became the namesake behind
the largest airline in Germany (and possibly Europe), Lufthansa.
In 1517, amid recent corruption in the church (and possibly influenced by China), Martin
Luther gave 95 reasons he thought the church should change.
However, some people didn’t take too kindly to that, which started the Protestant Reformation,
and is how there are now three types of Christianity, one for the north, south and east.
The new ideas could be spread by the new invention, the printing press, invented partially to
help with the labor shortage from the Black Death, which was brought to Europe through
the new Silk Road trade system in the huge Mongol Empire, which started because of how
badly the Mongols were treated by China.
Remember?
After a while, two German-speaking kingdoms came to dominate politics and affairs in Germany:
Brandenburg Prussia (Preußen) in the north, and Austria (Österreich [Eastern Empire])
in the south— or is it the east (Osten)?
The Holy Roman Empire was effectively destroyed by Napoleon, and the German Empire was established
in its place, leading to a growing sense of nationalism, and a realization of how late
they were to colonization, and so only barely colonized a few small areas.
In 1914, a Serb shot the heir to the Austrian throne while in Bosnia, which led to threats
that Austria-Hungary would invade Serbia, who was a friend of Russia, which meant Russia
would invade Austria-Hungary, who was friends with Germany, who would invade Russia, but
would first have to invade Russia’s ally France, by going through Britain’s ally
Belgium.
It really was this complicated, and this started World War I— so-called, because it was really
a European continental war, it’s just that Europe still kind of owned the world at the
time— and eventually, Germany became a huge player in the Central Powers.
So you can probably guess who’s to blame, right?
[Serbia?]
That’s right, Germany!
After the war, the Allies demanded that Germany dismantle its military and pay so much in
war reparations that the Deutsche Mark’s value spiraled out of control, and it became
impossible to pay for anything sensibly.
All this led to a pretty rough time in the new Weimar Republic, which no one really liked
much.
The bad economic situation, made even worse with the Great Depression, made some fringe
ideas more and more appealing.
When a well-spoken politician and former soldier joined the Nazionalsozialistische Partei in
the 1920’s, he quickly rose through the ranks, through help of scapegoating Communists,
Allies, and most notably, Jews.
In the 1932 election, the party didn’t win the election.
Noting their leader’s popularity, President Paul von Hindenburg (who had just won reelection)
appointed Chancellor (Kanzler) Adolf Hitler.
Hitler expanded the role of Chancellor, and his supporters formed paramilitary groups
to suppress uprisings.
Propagating fears of a Communist uprising, Hitler argued that only he could restore law
and order, and bring Germany back to its former greatness.
A young staffer set the Reichtagsgebäude on fire, and Hitler used the event to convince
the government to give him more power, and quickly used it to end freedom of the press,
disband other parties, and pass anti-Semitic policies.
When President von Hindenburg died in office in 1934, Hitler’s power was cemented.
Nazi Germany allied itself with Fascist Italy and Imperial Japan, and started its rapid
march throughout Europe, conquering France, Poland, Norway, and invading the USSR, leaving
horrific and racist policies in their wake.
However, a series of busts and failures, combined with fresh help from America in 1941, meant
that, once D-Day happened, Nazi Germany was effectively dead in the water.
The Allies stormed their way into Berlin, destroying many German cities, and Adolf Hitler
committed suicide in his underground bunker with Eva Braun, before they could be captured.
After the war, Germany lost much of its land to its neighbors, and Germany, Austria and
Berlin were split up between the French, British, Americans and Soviets.
Austria fully reunited, as well as the non-Soviet parts of Germany and Berlin.
The Federal Republic of Germany was established in the west, with its capital in the city
of Bonn.
The USSR, however, took advantage of this now severely weakened Germany, and kept the
eastern half as a satellite state, with West Berlin being a western exclave in East Germany.
Germany prospered, and became one of the founding members of the EU, while East Germany (or
the DDR) largely stagnated, which prompted some East Berliners to defect to West Berlin,
where they could then move somewhere else.
Embarrassed by this, the Soviets built a huge, scarily secure wall in 1961, surrounding West
Berlin, and East Berliners were not allowed in.
However, no one who actually lived in Berlin liked the idea of this, like at all, and there
were frequent calls in the 80’s for democracy and to tear down the wall.
No one thought these would ever happen, but then, in 1989, it happened.
The DDR government allowed people to enter the West, and pretty soon, people started
climbing over the wall, and some even got whatever tools they had and started to hack
away at the wall.
At first, the guards tried to resist, but they eventually let the inevitable happen,
one of the worlds most secure and controversial barricades started to fall, finally bringing
the two sides back together.
Once the wall was down (and the USSR was on its last legs), unifying Germany was, in a
way, easier done than said, because the two sides didn’t want to be split up.
Finally, on 3.Oct.1990, the former DDR became part of the Federal Republic of Germany, which
finally moved its capital back to Berlin, and in the next 27 years, Germany became a
rapid success story.
Germany is now the most populous country in the EU, and essentially leads the EU (alongside
France, it’s new best friend), and is the #3 manufacturer in the world, directly competing
with the US and China.
So, basically, Germany figured out how to be a great country: don’t be a &@#*ing Nazi.
Thanks for watching this video on the history of Germany, und wenn Sie mögen es, geben
Sie es ein “gefällt mir” angaben, und bis Sonntag mit mehr zu lernen!
Tschüß!