Prussia

[Cold Fire]

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.. what's Prussia... ? .... does it still exist today...? ...if not does it at least in a way still exist..? .. is it a 'historic state '.. ?

. . . . . .

Prussia was a German state... 'State' as in that it's official language was German... But.. it was not, dare I say, a German state like some would imagine such... Like Bavaria for example or Franconia..

The German geographical area within Europe has always been a conglomerate of many Germanic tribes all drawn together in one realm..

So.. when one hears the words 'German state' one might think of a tribal area like Bavaria or Suebia....

Well.. Prussia was different..

How Prussia came into being..

.. you probably all know about the Thirty Years War.. It was one of the most devestating conflicts in European history.. Catholics and Protestants from all over Europe fought themselves via alliances... Especially Germany was very badly hit...

One of the most stricken places inside Germany was an area called 'Mark Brandenburg'.. ( 'Mark' was an old German expression for an area located 'outmost' )...


The sovereigns of Brandenburg inherited a very devestated area after the war...

Now.. through 'royal family intermarriage ' the ruler-class of Brandenburg had become the Hohenzollern , a nobility-family not native from Brandenburg but from the Southwestern-German region originally..

The rulers of Brandenburg were worried about their largely wasted land/area.. They became full of ideas..

Seeing that such a land needed 'repair', in a way , they more or less began 'looking outside'..

They didn't simply govern a certain area.. they in a way also were after in a way evening out the population-loss this area had suffered . . So, people from different regions came into this land , they were settled there... The only condition seemed to have been that they were Protestants.. ( Brandenburg had been on the Protestant side during the Thirty Years War..).. So , Protestants from France ( Huguenots ), from the Netherlands et al settled there...

The 'enlargement-of-population'-idea/ policy had reached such heights that the rulers of Brandenburg, who had inherited the baltic state of Prussia, once again via 'royal-family-intermarriage' from Poland, tried to enlarge their sphere of influence by incorporating the region of Prussia and the state which was about to form was to encompass Brandenburg in the west up to Prussia in the east....

.. so, one could say the rulers of Brandenburg tried to 'uplift' their region by first settling other people there and then by even territorialy connecting it to the region of Prussia in the east . .


Since many from the beginning kind of viewed 'a state within a state' in Prussia , since it had become a powerful region, it in time came into conflict with the rulers of Germany ( especially with the royal house of Habsburg ( whose origin was Austria )..


.. in time, Prussia got 'more and more' of Germany, to admit during the 1700s and 1800s, which were a time of much upheaval within Europe . .

When the last Habsburg German emperor put down his crown after Napoleon's invasion towards the beginning of the 1800s and Austria ( the core-region of the Habsburgs ) even officially splitted from the rest of the German area.. during that time the first Prussian ruler became German emperor.. With Wilhelm II. the Prussian influence on Germany was at its height..

Now the Prussians ruled 'all of Germany ', if you will..

.. many blamed the Prussian German leadership for World War 1..

And.. after the Second World War the state of Prussia was even officially dissolved by the Allied, who quote "viewed it as always having been a hoard of militarism and aggression "..

Well , well, well..
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.. so, that's that concerning Prussia..

I dedicate this thread to apricity-member Ruggery . . https://www.theapricity.com/forum/sh...y-rulers/page2

. . .

[Ruggery]

Good thread, Prussia was an important part of the Weimar Republic?

[Cold Fire]

Good thread

Thank you

Prussia was an important part of the Weimar Republic?

Yes , I suppose one can say so...

The so-called 'Weimar Republic ' was the first alleged democracy on German ground..

.. even though Prussia is said to have been a strict state , also after the 'people up there' were swept to the side, the state as such continued to exist.. like I said above, until the Allied dissolved the state Prussia after World War 2..

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Once again , concerning the history of Prussia... It is amazing to think that maybe the Thirty Years War was the reason why Prussia , that 'state within a state' inside Germany, came into being...
The rulers of Brandenburg, like I said, after the Thirty Years War, had a devestated land before them.. They acted as I have recited above..

I remember once reading a kind of record about how big the devastation was in the different German areas after the Thirty Years War.. It listed castles ( ancestral home of nobility ), cities and villages destroyed by number in the respective regions... It almost struck one immediately about the count of destroyed villages that in the region of Mark Brandenburg it was 5.000 ( ! ).. The next region on this compare-list had, I think, 1.400, the next 800 and the numbers went lower..

When you consider that villages back then ( 1600s ) were the dominating occurance in a region ( large cities in today's sense came very, very later ), one can imagine the havoc wrought upon Brandenburg back then..

By the way , there is a saying widely used in Berlin today which talks about "märkischer Sand "... "märkischer Sand" can be translated "the ( literal ) sand of the Mark Brandenburg"..

Most shockingly, that's almost literally what maybe many rulers found in that region after the Thirty Years War.. 'sand'.... signs of great devastation... This expression has become a household name eversince..


By the way, the Prussia leadership also let a swamp lay dry.. Anything to better-up the landscape back then, I suppose..

[Etelfrido]

Was the original area of Brandenburg always the center of Prussia or did East Prussia (where Königsberg was) ever surpass it? Because as you said East Prussia was a territory acquired by the rulers of Brandenburg and initially the Hohenzollerns ruled from Brandenburg because Prussia wasn't even considered a part of the Holy Roman Empire.

[majevica]

[Cold Fire]

Was the original area of Brandenburg always the center of Prussia or did East Prussia (where Königsberg was) ever surpass it? Because as you said East Prussia was a territory acquired by the rulers of Brandenburg and initially the Hohenzollerns ruled from Brandenburg because Prussia wasn't even considered a part of the Holy Roman Empire.

Brandenburg certainly was the thriving point of the later state Prussia..

Since the two regions Brandenburg and territorial Prussia were quite far apart geographically a lot had to be done to territorialy connect the two. As for your question whether the western part or the eastern part was of more significance, that depends on how you see Prussia.. The sovereigns of Brandenburg sure took residence in their ancestral lands ( Berlin, Potsdam ... ) but in the eastern part also cities of great significance appeared in time... As you yourself named, Königsberg for example..

So I think one could say that Brandenburg, the region, was the 'original home' but in the East big cities of significance appeared over the course of time.

Whether the western or eastern part per se was of more significance, I'd say they might have been regarded of equal importance..

.. Good one. You sure know your Prussian history, pal

[Ruggery]

Brother, look at this, no wonder in Germany there were many wars between all the micro-states that could easily be disputed.

[Ruggery]

Thank you


Yes , I suppose one can say so...

The so-called 'Weimar Republic ' was the first alleged democracy on German ground..

.. even though Prussia is said to have been a strict state , also after the 'people up there' were swept to the side, the state as such continued to exist.. like I said above, until the Allied dissolved the state Prussia after World War 2..

- - - - - -

Once again , concerning the history of Prussia... It is amazing to think that maybe the Thirty Years War was the reason why Prussia , that 'state within a state' inside Germany, came into being...
The rulers of Brandenburg, like I said, after the Thirty Years War, had a devestated land before them.. They acted as I have recited above..

I remember once reading a kind of record about how big the devastation was in the different German areas after the Thirty Years War.. It listed castles ( ancestral home of nobility ), cities and villages destroyed by number in the respective regions... It almost struck one immediately about the count of destroyed villages that in the region of Mark Brandenburg it was 5.000 ( ! ).. The next region on this compare-list had, I think, 1.400, the next 800 and the numbers went lower..

When you consider that villages back then ( 1600s ) were the dominating occurance in a region ( large cities in today's sense came very, very later ), one can imagine the havoc wrought upon Brandenburg back then..

By the way , there is a saying widely used in Berlin today which talks about "märkischer Sand "... "märkischer Sand" can be translated "the ( literal ) sand of the Mark Brandenburg"..

Most shockingly, that's almost literally what maybe many rulers found in that region after the Thirty Years War.. 'sand'.... signs of great devastation... This expression has become a household name eversince..


By the way, the Prussia leadership also let a swamp lay dry.. Anything to better-up the landscape back then, I suppose..

In fact, the 30 Years War left more German dead than the First World War. In addition to the economic effect, it was more catastrophic.

[Cold Fire]

Brother, look at this, no wonder in Germany there were many wars between all the micro-states that could easily be disputed.

Yup... Germany had always been a political entity consisting of different Germanic tribes drawn together in one realm... We had Frisians , Saxons ,Bavarians, Franks etc...

Before the protestant Reformation ( i. e. when all of Europe was catholic ) it already was a diverse place when it came to germanic peoples...

The Protestant reformation had as a consequence that many regions inside federal Germany converted away from Catholicism ( as was the the case with many countries / regions in Europe back then of course too )..

In time many Reformed/Protestant regions in Germany even formed an official alliance..

The emperors of Germany, which were set by the Habsburgs for a long time , whose main region was Austria ,were arch-Catholic...

So.. it was just a matter of time until maybe Protestant sovereigns within Germany would come into conflict with an arch-Catholic ruler-house..
The conflict, as is widely known , started in Bohemia..


Both sides, Catholic and Protestant, armed themselves..

In the end, an inner-German quarrel between sovereigns and a central-power became a war between Catholics and Protestants all over Europe.. Because both sides were supported by other countries..

Famous members of the Catholic side include.. Bavaria , the Rhineland.. Famous members of the Protestant side include.. Saxony , Brandenburg.. Sweden ( outside Germany ).. Denmark..

And so on....

Yes, one might call the Thirty Years War the final battle between Catholics and Protestants...


Apart from the Thirty Years War, the situation that Germany was always a federal state, not homogenous, always caused some tension within the Reich, at all times...

In fact, the 30 Years War left more German dead than the First World War. In addition to the economic effect, it was more catastrophic.

.. 30 years war all over Europe.. and, I might add, during a time when more people than probably during later ages were more or less unprotected from war.. i. e. they easily fell prey to marauding soldiers...
The Thirty Years War surely was a catastrophe...

[Cold Fire]

.. I think it's safe to say that without the Thirty Years War Prussia would have never existed..


Another historical catastrophe which in the end brought about a miraculous change in the way things were going ( in this case a state within a state in the Holy Roman ( German ) Empire, thriving on enrolling people from different backgrounds and expanding, expanding ... )