When did the German Empire fall?
4077967#21
In November 1918, with internal revolution, a stalemated war, Bulgaria and the Ottoman Empire suing for peace, Austria-Hungary falling apart from multiple ethnic tensions, and pressure from the German high command, the Kaiser and all German ruling princes abdicated. On 9 November 1918, the Social Democrat Philipp Scheidemann proclaimed a Republic, in cooperation with the business and middle classes, not the revolting workers. The new government led by the German Social Democrats called for and received an armistice on 11 November 1918; in practice it was a surrender, and the Allies kept up the food blockade to guarantee an upper hand. The war was over; the history books closed on the German Empire. It was succeeded by the democratic, yet flawed, Weimar Republic.
History of Germany during World War I
12674#7
The high command under Paul von Hindenburg and Erich Ludendorff increasingly controlled the country, but in October after the failed offensive in spring 1918, the German armies were in retreat, allies Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire had collapsed, and Bulgaria had surrendered. The Empire collapsed in the November 1918 Revolution with the abdications of its monarchs. This left a postwar federal republic and a devastated and unsatisfied populace, which later led to the rise of Adolf Hitler and Nazism.
German Empire
12446#52
Some of the Germanic tribes are frequently credited in popular depictions of the decline of the Roman Empire in the late 5th century. Professional historians and archaeologists have since the 1950s shifted their interpretations in such a way that the Germanic peoples are no longer seen as "invading" a decaying empire but as being "co-opted" into helping defend territory the central government could no longer adequately administer. Germanic tribes nonetheless fought against Roman dominance when necessary. When the Roman Empire refused to allow the Visigoths to settle in Noricum for instance, they responded by sacking Rome in CE 410 under the leadership of Alaric I. Oddly enough, Alaric I did not see his imposition in Rome as an attack against the Roman Empire per se but as an attempt to gain a favorable position within its borders, particularly since the Visigoths held the Empire in high regard.
Germanic peoples
1123369#6
Gibbon took September 4, 476 as a convenient marker for the final dissolution of the Western Roman Empire, when Romulus Augustus, the last Emperor of the Western Roman Empire, was deposed by Odoacer, a Germanic chieftain. Some modern historians question the significance of the year 476 for its end. Julius Nepos, the Western emperor recognized by the Eastern Roman Empire, continued to rule in Dalmatia, until he was assassinated in 480. The Ostrogothic rulers of Italia considered themselves upholders of the direct line of Roman tradition, and the Eastern emperors considered themselves the sole rightful Roman rulers of a united empire. Roman cultural traditions continued throughout the territory of the Western Empire, and a recent school of interpretation argues that the great political changes can more accurately be described as a complex cultural transformation, rather than a fall.
Historiography of the fall of the Western Roman Empire
3943310#5
Only after Prussian Chancellor Otto von Bismarck gradually built a unified German state under the Prussian royal house of Hohenzollern did "Kleinstaaterei" largely end in 1871 with the founding of the German Empire. (The only surviving petty states—Luxembourg and Liechtenstein—lie at the periphery of the German-speaking world.) The founding of the German Empire created a largely German nation-state. While the German Empire excluded the partly German but multinational Habsburg domains of Austria–Hungary, it included a substantial Polish minority in parts of eastern Prussia and other minorities along its northern and western borders. The unification of the German Empire put Germany on the map as a major European power, albeit too late to become a major colonial presence. Internally in the nation some of these fragmented boundaries and small political units continued to exist until the modern States of Germany were established in the Federal Republic after World War II.
Kleinstaaterei
7120188#2
In "The Fall of the Roman Empire: The Military Explanation" (1998 ), Ferrill supports the claims of Vegetius, about increased "barbarisation" and "germanisation" helping to cause the collapse of the Western Roman Empire in the fifth century AD. He asserts that allowing barbarians to settle within Rome's borders, to act as a buffer zone against other barbarians, created friction and led to a decrease in the size of the Roman Empire's Borders. He also states that the Germans were recruited in such large numbers by the Western empire that they in fact changed it from a Roman to a German culture. For example, field army units would not use their helmets, the pilum was replaced, and the standard of drill declined, leading to a lack of military skill within the Empire.
Arther Ferrill
1123369#34
The culture of the German barbarians living just across the Rhine and Danube rivers was not so conducive to the spread of pathogens. Germans lived in small scattered villages that did not support the same level of trade as did Roman settlements. Germans lived in single-family detached houses. Germans did not have public baths nor as many brothels and drank ale made with boiled water. The barbarian population seemed to be on the rise. The demographics of Europe were changing.
Historiography of the fall of the Western Roman Empire
5734765#1
In 1944, unexpectedly for the Allies, a German winter offensive results in over 80% of European territories falling to German control. No one really knows what Hitler and his generals did to bring forth this course of events, but the fall of London made it clear that the Allies had little chance of winning the war. Soon after, the destruction of Moscow and the taking of Washington D.C. ended the war.
It was hard to believe that it was the German military technique or their leaders' tactical skills. People started to talk about final development of the Wunderwaffe, especially that
not many managed to flee from the battlefields to tell what they have seen - their reports were unclear and not explaining anything. Nevertheless, the world was unable to stop the Führer and his Reich.
Mortyr
849186#100
The fall of the inner German border came rapidly and unexpectedly in November 1989, along with the fall of the Berlin Wall. Its integrity had been fatally compromised in May 1989 when the Hungarian government began dismantling its border fence with Austria. The government was still notionally Communist but planned free elections and economic reform as part of a strategy of "rejoining Europe" and reforming its struggling economy.
Inner German border
142280#44
The German Confederation ended as a result of the Austro-Prussian War of 1866 between Austrian Empire and its allies on one side and the Kingdom of Prussia and its allies on the other. The Confederation had 34 members immediately before its dissolution. In the Prague peace treaty, on 23 August 1866, Austria had to accept that the Confederation was dissolved. The following day, the remaining member states confirmed the dissolution. The treaty allowed Prussia to create a new (a new kind of federation) in the North of Germany. The South German states were allowed to create a South German Confederation but this did not come into existence.
German Confederation
1123369#55
The French historian Lucien Musset, studying the Barbarian invasions, argues the civilization of Medieval Europe emerged from a synthesis between the Graeco-Roman world and the Germanic civilizations penetrating the Roman Empire. The Roman Empire did not fall, did not decline, it just transformed but so did the Germanic populations which invaded it. To support this conclusion, beside the narrative of the events, he offers linguistic surveys of toponymy and anthroponymy, analyzes archaeological records, studies the urban and rural society, the institutions, the religion, the art, the technology.
Historiography of the fall of the Western Roman Empire