Meaning of “German”
"German" originally meant "belonging to the people" and said the first of the continental West Germanic
dialects dialect continuum. The term is Germany since the 15th Century used is, in some documents, but
even before witnessed. Previously, only word additions of the attribute German occupied with land, for
example, in the indefinite singular form of a German country or certain plural form of the German states,
but not in the particular singular form, the German the country. What is meant countries were having a
guide layer, which referred to the political claim to power, which by the (East) Lake, later Holy Roman
Empire, had been regarded as justified. In a book of 1487 is, among others, "to land in teutschen make"
to read.
The terms were (pre-) as a synonym for governmental entities primarily used in the key areas of German
language and was developed / or dominion. The Holy Roman Empire ("Old Empire") evolved from 962
from the eastern part of the Frankish empire. With the additions the Holy Name and the German Nation
(Holy Roman Empire of German Nation) was formed between the 12th Century and in 1648 published a
confederation. Following the resignation of the imperial crown in 1806 dominated the Empire of Austria,
the Kingdom of Prussia and the Confederation of the Rhine, the events in the state space of imagination
Germany, after 1815 followed as the German nationality assurance confederation of German
Confederation under the leadership of Austria. The rivalry with Prussia for supremacy in Germany came
to a head with the German dualism. The German War and the Battle of Sadowa decided it Prussia in
1866 in his favor.
With the central government of Prussia initiated forms of government since 1867 have been combined in
two stages large parts of German-speaking countries in a state. Comprised of the North German
Confederation, only the states north of the Main Line, became the expression through the unification
Germany and proclamation of the German Empire in 1871 with the same identical. After the First World
War and the overthrow of the monarchy in 1918, was discussed to underline the country's name Republic
of Germany or German Republic, proclaimed the state form, but also kept the Weimar Republic in the
official name of Empire.
The Imperial Crown of the Holy Roman Empire (Sacrum Romanum Imperium). The territory receives in
the late 15th Century, the addition of German Nation (nationis germanica).
After the Second World War, the Allies used the term Germany occupied by them exclusively for the
German Empire (excluding Austria). In 1949 the Federal Republic of Germany by the United States and
the United Kingdom and the German Democratic Republic by the action of the USSR was initiated. As a
continuation of the state name Empire in the Parliamentary Council for its "aggressive accent" was
rejected, was instead "Germany" in the name of the then constituted the Federal Republic for the first time
by name use, consequently, the "emotional integration power of the name and his state of legal content
"testifies to the continuity and identity of the Federal Republic. The East Germany used the word while not
directly in the state name, but it has been explicitly used as a synonymous term for the GDR in Article 1 of
the Constitution of 1949. Later, the GDR used almost exclusively German, the attribute or the suffix "...
the German Democratic Republic" on state sovereignty names. With the German reunification in 1990,
the Germany question was definitively settled.
Over the centuries, some areas were out of the chamber of the German States or in Germany. Among
other things, this was due to the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, the Netherlands, including their language
varieties had separated by the printing press by the Germans (see Dutch (name)), the Confederation and
the Alsace (northeast), Lorraine (Moselle Fr.). After the end of the German Confederation in 1866 then
went Luxembourg, Liechtenstein and Austria (last 1945) out. The founding of the German Empire was
under appropriation Alsace-Lorraine, while the defeats in both world wars had field losses. After 1919,
Germany in addition to the Alsace and Lorraine had smaller areas of Denmark, Belgium, Czechoslovakia
and Lithuania, and especially the provinces of Posen and West Prussia to the newly created Second
Polish Republic to cede. The remaining areas east of the Oder-Neisse line, including Silesia, Pomerania
and East Prussia, from 1945, mostly Soviet and Polish administration. They were integrated into their
territories after the German population was expelled. In 1990 the former German eastern territories to the
claim by the reunification of Germany was formally abandoned by the Two-Plus-Four Treaty.
Despite the continuity of the concept of Germany of 17 Century to the present as well as international law
identity and continuity of constitutional law since the 19th Century until 1990 was de facto no continuous
linear politico-historical development. Rather, the term appropriated in the development of the political
power of the affluent middle class in Germany as a unifying idea for regional and local elites.