| German People's Republic Deutsche Volksrepublik Timeline: Art School and Spartacism | ||||||
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| Motto: "Proletarier aller Länder, vereinigt Euch!" ("Workers of the world, unite!") |
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| Anthem: Brüder, zur Sonne, zur Freiheit! "Brothers, to the sun, to freedom!" |
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Germany (green)
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| Capital | Berlin | |||||
| Official languages | German | |||||
| Demonym | German | |||||
| Government | Federal Marxist-Liebknechtist directorial multi-party socialist republic | |||||
| - | Federal Worker's Councilors | Kevin Kühnert Saskia Esken |
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| - | Premier | Friedrich Merz | ||||
| - | Speaker of the Worker's Congress | Gabi Zimmer | ||||
| Legislature | Worker's Congress | |||||
| Formation | ||||||
| - | Unification | 18 January 1871 | ||||
| - | Monarchy abolished | 9 November 1918 | ||||
| - | Constitution | 14 May 1919 | ||||
| Population | ||||||
| - | 2022 estimate | 84,249,540 | ||||
| Currency | German mark (DEM) |
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| Drives on the | right | |||||
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Germany (German: Deutschland), officially the German People's Republic (German: Deutsche Volksrepublik) and unofficially referred to as the German Republic (German: Deutsche Republik), is a socialist country in Central Europe. It borders East Prussia, Poland and Hungary to the east; Czechoslovakia, Italy, Yugoslavia and Switzerland to the south; France, Luxembourg, Belgium and the Netherlands to the west; and Denmark to the north. Berlin is the capital and largest industrial heartland of Germany.
Various Germanic tribes have inhabited the northern parts of modern Germany since classical antiquity. A region named Germania was documented before AD 100. In the 10th century, German territories formed a central part of the Holy Roman Empire. During the 16th century, northern German regions became the centre of the Protestant Reformation. During the Napoleonic Wars, Napoleon invaded the Holy Roman Empire and established the Confederation of the Rhine and several other puppet states, although they would initially collapse after Napoleon's loss. However, the idea of German unity arose, and after two confederations and wars with Austria and France, the German Empire was formed in 1871.
After a major naval arms race with the United Kingdom in the 1900s and rising tensions with Russia and France, the Great War broke out in 1914. At first, things went well for Germany, but after the United States intervened in 1917, things started going bad for the nation. In 1918, after failed offensives, a revolution overthrew Kaiser Wilhelm II and established a provisional republic, which in turn was overthrown in an uprising by the communist Spartacist League, establishing the German Soviet Republic (later renamed to the German People's Republic in 1923). During the Cold War, it was a neutral nation, although it had tense relations with the Soviet Union due to having different variants of communism.