Coordinates: 50.108°N 8.

675°E

German Confederation
The German Confederation (German: Deutscher Bund) was an
association of 39 German-speaking states in Central Europe (adding
German Confederation
the mainly non-German speaking Kingdom of Bohemia and Duchy Deutscher Bund
of Carniola), created by the Congress of Vienna in 1815 to coordinate 1815–1848
the economies of separate German-speaking countries and to replace (interrupted by the German Empire (1848–49))
the former Holy Roman Empire, which had been dissolved in 1850–1866
1806.[1] The German Confederation excluded German-speaking
lands in the eastern portion of the Kingdom of Prussia (East Prussia,
West Prussia and Posen), the German cantons of Switzerland, and the
French region of Alsace, which was predominantly German speaking.

The Confederation was weakened by rivalry between the Kingdom of

Prussia and the Austrian Empire, revolution, and the inability of the Civil ensign Coat of arms
multiple members to compromise. In 1848, revolutions by liberals (1848–1866)
and nationalists attempted to establish a unified German state with a
progressive liberal constitution under the Frankfurt Convention. The
ruling body, the Confederate Diet, was dissolved on 12 July 1848, but
was re-established in 1850 after failed efforts to replace it.[2]

The Confederation was finally dissolved after the Prussian victory in

the Seven Weeks' War over Austria in 1866. The dispute over which
had the inherent right to rule German lands ended in favour of
Prussia, leading to the creation of the North German Confederation
under Prussian leadership in 1867, to which the eastern portions of
the Kingdom of Prussia were added. A number of South German
states remained independent until they joined the North German
Confederation, which was renamed and proclaimed as the "German
Empire" in 1871 for the now unified Germany with the Prussian king The German Confederation in 1815
as emperor (Kaiser) after the victory over French Emperor Napoleon Member states
III in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870.
Territories and crownlands of member
Most historians have judged the Confederation to have been weak states outside of the confederation
and ineffective, as well as an obstacle to the creation of a German Capital Frankfurt
nation-state.[3] However, the Confederation was designed to be weak,
Common languages German · Italian ·
as it served the interests of the European Great Powers, especially Low German ·
member states Austria and Prussia. Czech · Slovene ·
Polish · Limburgish
and others
Religion Roman Catholic,
Contents Protestant
Head of the
History
Präsidialmacht
Background
Austria
Establishment
• 1815–1835 Francis I
 Armed forces • 1835–1848 Ferdinand I
Ethnic composition • 1850–1866 Franz Joseph I

Situation in history Legislature Federal Convention

Impact of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic History
invasions
• Constitution 8 June 1815
Romanticism, nationalism, and liberalism in the adopted
Vormärz era • German 13 March 1848
High culture Revolutions
Population • Punctation of 29 November 1850
Demographic transition Olmütz
Nobility • Austro-Prussian 14 June 1866
War
Peasantry
• Peace of Prague 23 August 1866
Rapidly growing cities
Area
Zollverein: economic integration
1815 630,100 km2
Revolutions of 1848 (243,300 sq mi)
Dissolution of the Confederation Population
Rise of Bismarck
• 1815 29,200,000
Seven Weeks' War
North German Confederation Currency Reichsthaler (to
German Empire 1857)
Conventionsthaler
Territorial legacy (to 1857)
See also Vereinsthaler (from
Notes 1857)
References ISO 3166 code DE
Further reading
Preceded by Succeeded by
Confederation North German
of the Rhine Confederation
History Austrian Austrian
Empire Empire
Kingdom of Kingdom of
Background Prussia Bavaria
Kingdom of
The War of the Third Coalition lasted from about 1803 to 1806.
Württemberg
Following defeat at the Battle of Austerlitz by the French under Grand Duchy
Napoleon in December 1805, Holy Roman Emperor Francis II of Baden
abdicated, and the Empire was dissolved on 6 August 1806. The Grand Duchy
of Hesse
resulting Treaty of Pressburg established the Confederation of the
Grand Duchy
Rhine in July 1806, joining together sixteen of France's allies among of Luxembourg
the German states (including Bavaria and Württemberg). After the Principality of
Battle of Jena–Auerstedt of October 1806 in the War of the Fourth Liechtenstein
Coalition, various other German states, including Saxony and
Today part of Austria
Westphalia, also joined the Confederation. Only Austria, Prussia,
Danish Holstein, Swedish Pomerania, and the French-occupied
Belgium
Principality of Erfurt stayed outside the Confederation of the Rhine. Croatia
The War of the Sixth Coalition from 1812 to winter 1814 saw the Czech Republic
defeat of Napoleon and the liberation of Germany. In June 1814, the Germany
famous German patriot Heinrich vom Stein created the Central Italy
Managing Authority for Germany (Zentralverwaltungsbehörde) in Liechtenstein
Luxembourg
Frankfurt to replace the defunct Confederation of the Rhine. Netherlands
However, plenipotentiaries gathered at the Congress of Vienna were Poland
determined to create a weaker union of German states than envisaged Slovenia
by Stein.

Establishment
The German Confederation was created by the 9th Act of the Congress of Vienna on 8 June 1815 after being alluded to in Article
6 of the 1814 Treaty of Paris, ending the War of the Sixth Coalition.[4]

The Confederation was formally created by a second treaty, the Final Act of the Ministerial Conference to Complete and
Consolidate the Organization of the German Confederation. This treaty was not concluded and signed by the parties until 15 May
1820. States joined the German Confederation by becoming parties to the second treaty. The states designated for inclusion in the
Confederation were:

1. Anhalt-Bernburg (inherited by the Duke of Anhalt-Dessau, 1863)

2. Anhalt-Dessau
3. Anhalt-Köthen (inherited by the Duke of Anhalt-Dessau, 1847/53)
4. Austrian Empire (including Crown of Bohemia – Bohemia, Moravia and Austrian Silesia – and Austrian lands –
Austria, Carinthia, Carniola, the Littoral, Salzburg, Styria, Tyrol, and Vorarlberg)
5. Baden
6. Bavaria
7. Brunswick
8. Hanover
9. Electorate of Hesse (also known as Hesse-Kassel)
10. Grand Duchy of Hesse (also known as Hesse-Darmstadt)
11. Hohenzollern-Hechingen (became part of Prussia in 1850)
12. Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen (became part of Prussia in 1850)
13. Holstein and Lauenburg, held by Denmark
14. Holstein-Oldenburg
15. Liechtenstein
16. Lippe-Detmold
17. Luxembourg, held by the Netherlands
18. Mecklenburg-Schwerin
19. Mecklenburg-Strelitz
20. Nassau
21. Prussia
22. Reuss, elder line
23. Reuss, younger line
24. Saxony
25. Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach
26. Saxe-Coburg (ruler became Duke of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha 1826)
27. Saxe-Gotha (partitioned 1826)
28. Saxe-Hildburghausen (ruler became Duke of Saxe-Altenburg, 1826)
29. Saxe-Meiningen
30. Schaumburg-Lippe
31. Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt
32. Schwarzburg-Sondershausen
33. Waldeck
34. Württemberg
35. Hesse-Homburg (inherited by the grand-duke of Hesse-Darmstadt, 1866) (joined by treaty in 1820)
36. Lübeck (joined by treaty in 1820)
37. Frankfurt (joined by treaty in 1820)
38. Bremen (joined by treaty in 1820)
39. Hamburg (joined by treaty in 1820)
In 1839, as compensation for the loss of the province of Luxemburg to Belgium, the Duchy of Limburg (held by the Netherlands)
was created and it was a member of the German Confederation until its dissolution in 1866. The cities of Maastricht and Venlo
were not included in the Confederation.

The Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Prussia were the

largest and by far the most powerful members of the
Confederation. Large parts of both countries were not included in
the Confederation, because they had not been part of the former
Holy Roman Empire, nor had the greater parts of their armed
forces been incorporated in the federal army. Austria and Prussia
each had one vote in the Federal Assembly. Six other major states The monarchs of the member states of the German
had one vote each in the Federal Assembly: the Kingdom of Confederation meet at Frankfurt in 1863
Bavaria, the Kingdom of Saxony, the Kingdom of Württemberg,
the Electorate of Hesse, the Grand Duchy of Baden, and the
Grand Duchy of Hesse. Three member states were ruled by foreign monarchs: the King of Denmark as Duke of Holstein; the
King of the Netherlands as Grand Duke of Luxembourg and Duke of Limburg; and the King of Great Britain (until 1837) as King
of Hanover were members of the German Confederation. Each of them had a vote in the Federal Assembly. The four free cities of
Bremen, Frankfurt, Hamburg, and Lübeck shared one vote in the Federal Assembly. The 23 remaining states shared five votes in
the Federal Assembly.

Armed forces
The German Federal Army (Deutsche Bundesheer) was formed in 1815 to collectively defend the German Confederation from
external enemies, primarily France. Successive laws passed by the Confederate Diet set the form and function of the army, as well
as contribution limits of the member states. The Diet had the power to declare war and was responsible for appointing a supreme
commander of the army and commanders of the individual army corps. This made mobilization extremely slow and added a
political dimension to the army. In addition, the Diet oversaw the construction and maintenance of several German Federal
Fortresses and collected funds annually from the member states for this purpose.

The German Federal Army was divided into ten Army Corps (later expanded to include a Reserve Corps). However, the Army
Corps were not exclusive to the German Confederation but composed from the national armies of the member states, and did not
include all of the armed forces of a state. For example, Prussia's army consisted of nine Army Corps but contributed only three to
the German Federal Army.

The strength of the mobilized German Federal Army was projected to total 303,484 men in 1835 and 391,634 men in 1860, with
the individual states providing the following figures[5]:
 Matriculation Annual
class[A 2] expenditures Army Troop
State Area [km²] Population[A 1]
(proportion (in Austrian Corps Totals[A 3]
of total) Gulden)

Austrian Empire[A 4] [A 5]197,573 [A 5]10,086,900 31.44% 9,432,000 I, II, III 158,037

Kingdom of [A 5]185,496 [A 5]9,957,000 26.52% 7,956,000 IV, V, VI 133,769

Prussia[A 6]
Kingdom of Bavaria 76,258 4,120,000 11.8% 3,540,000 VII 59,334
X (1st
Kingdom of Hannover 38,452 1,549,000 4.33% 1,299,000 Div., 21,757
part)
Kingdom of VIII (1st
19,504 1,547,400 4.63% 1,389,000 23,259
Württemberg Div.)
IX (1st
Kingdom of Saxony 14,993 1,480,000 3.98% 1,194,000 20,000
Div.)
VIII
Grand Duchy of
15,269 1,175,000 3.31% 993,000 (2nd 16,667
Baden
Div.)
VIII (3rd
Grand Duchy of
7,680 720,000 2.05% 615,000 Div., 10,325
Hesse-Darmstadt
part)
Grand Duchy of X (2nd
Mecklenburg- 13,304 455,000 1.19% 357,000 Div., 5,967
Schwerin part)
X (2nd
Grand Duchy of
2,929 85,000 0.24% 72,000 Div., 1,197
Mecklenburg-Strelitz
part)
X (2nd
Grand Duchy of
6,420 250,000 0.73% 219,000 Div., 3,740
Oldenburg
part)
Grand Duchy of IX (2nd
Luxemburg (with the 2,586 259,500 0.40% 120,000 Div., 2,706
Duchy of Limburg) part)
Grand Duchy of Reserve
3,593 233,814 0.67% 201,000 3,350
Saxe-Weimar (part)
IX (2nd
Electoral Hesse 9,581 629,000 1.88% 564,000 Div., 9,466
part)
Duchy of Anhalt- Reserve
840 57,629 0.19% 57,000 1,422
Dessau (part)
Duchy of Anhalt- Reserve
727 36,000 0.10% 30,000 325[A 8]
Cöthen[A 7] (part)

Duchy of Anhalt- Reserve

780 43,325 0.12% 36,000 616
Bernburg[A 9] (part)

X (1st
Duchy of Brunswick 3,690 245,783 0.69% 20,000 Div., 3,493
part)
Duchies of Holstein X (2nd
and Saxe- 9,580 450,000 0.12% 35,000 Div., 6,000
Lauenburg[A 10] part)
 Duchy of Nassau 4,700 360,000 1.00% 300,000 IX (2nd 6,109
Div.,
part)
Duchy of Saxe- Reserve
1,287 114,048 0.33% 99,000 1,638
Altenburg (part)
Duchy of Saxe- Reserve
2,688 156,639 0.37% 111,000 1,860
Coburg-Gotha[A 11] (part)

Duchy of Saxe- Reserve

0 0 0% 0 0[A 13]
Hildburghausen[A 12] (part)

Duchy of Saxe- Reserve

2,293 136,000 0.38% 114,000 1,918
Meiningen (part)
Principality of VIII (3rd
Hohenzollern- 906 42,341 1.40% 420,000 Div., 356[A 14]
Sigmaringen part)
Principality of VIII (3rd
Hohenzollern- 236 17,000 0.05% 15,000 Div., 155
Hechingen part)
Principality of Lippe- Reserve
1,133 77,500 0.23% 69,000 1,202
Detmold (part)
Principality of Reserve
536 23,128 0.07% 21,000 350
Schaumburg-Lippe (part)
Principality of Reserve
159 5,800 0.02% 6,000 91
Liechtenstein (part)
Principality of Reuß Reserve
316 24,500 0.07% 21,000 1,241
elder line (part)
Principality of Reuß Reserve see Reuß
826 59,000 0.17% 51,000
younger line (part) elder line
Principality of
Reserve
Schwarzburg- 940 60,000 0.18% 54,000 899
(part)
Rudolstadt
Principality of Reserve
1,121 56,000 0.17% 51,000 866
Waldeck (part)
Principality of
Reserve
Schwarzburg- 862 51,767 0.15% 45,000 751
(part)
Sondershausen
Landgraviate of
Reserve
Hessen- 275 23,000 0.07% 21,000 333
(part)
Homburg[A 15]
X (2nd
Free City of Lübeck 298 45,600 0.13% 39,000 Div., 669
part)
X (2nd
Free City of Hamburg 410 154,000 0.43% 129,000 Div., 2,163
part)
X (2nd
Free City of Bremen 256 52,000 0.16% 48,000 Div., 748
part)
Reserve
Free City of Frankfurt 101 54,000 0.16% 48,000 1,119
(part)

Notes
 1. For the year 1835.
2. The matriculation class determined the percentage of expenditures for 1835.
3. For the year 1860.
4. Not included Hungary, Transylvania, Galicia (but with Auschwitz and Zator), Dalmatia, Slavonia, Croatia and
upper Italian lands apart from Trieste.
5. federal share.
6. Without East Prussia, West Prussia, and Posen.
7. Merged with Anhalt-Dessau in 1847.
8. Figures for 1835; merged with Anhalt-Dessau army in 1847.
9. Merged with Anhalt-Dessau in 1863.
10. Troops were attached to the Danish army until 1864, as the King of Denmark was also Duke of both lands.
11. Gotha passed to Saxe-Coburg in 1825.
12. Partitioned between Saxe-Coburg and Saxe-Meiningen in 1826.
13. No figures reported before partition.
14. Figures for 1835; merged with Prussian army in 1850.
15. Merged with Grand Ducal Hesse in 1863.

Ethnic composition
Despite its name and intention, the German Confederation was not entirely populated by Germans; many people of other ethnic
groups lived within its borders:

French-speaking Walloons lived in western Luxembourg prior to its division in 1839;

the Duchy of Limburg (a member between 1839 and 1866) was populated solely by Dutchmen;
Italians and Slovenians lived in south and southeast Austria;
Bohemia and Moravia, of the Lands of the Bohemian Crown, were inhabited by a majority Czechs;
Silesia had a Polish minority, while Sorbs were present in the parts of Saxony and the Prussian province of
Brandenburg known as Lusatia.

Situation in history
Between 1806 and 1815, Napoleon organized the German states, aside from Prussia and Austria, into the Confederation of the
Rhine, but this collapsed after his defeats in 1812 to 1815. The German Confederation had roughly the same boundaries as the
Empire at the time of the French Revolution (less what is now Belgium). It also kept intact most of Confederation's reconstituted
member states and their boundaries. The member states, drastically reduced to 39 from more than 300 (see Kleinstaaterei) under
the Holy Roman Empire, were recognized as fully sovereign. The members pledged themselves to mutual defense, and joint
maintenance of the fortresses at Mainz, the city of Luxembourg, Rastatt, Ulm, and Landau.

The only organ of the Confederation was the Federal Assembly (officially Bundesversammlung, often called Bundestag), which
consisted of the delegates of the states' governments. There was no head of state, but the Austrian delegate presided over the
Assembly (according to the Bundesakte). Austria did not have extra powers, but consequently the Austrian delegate was called
Präsidialgesandther and Austria the Präsidialmacht (presiding power). The Assembly met in Frankfurt.

The Confederation was enabled to accept and deploy ambassadors. It allowed ambassadors of the European powers to the
Assembly, but rarely deployed ambassadors itself.
During the revolution of 1848/49 the Federal Assembly was inactive. It transferred its powers to the Provisorische Zentralgewalt,
the revolutionary German Central Government of the Frankfurt National Assembly. After crushing the revolution and illegally
disbanding the National Assembly, the Prussian King failed to create a German nation state by himself. The Federal Assembly
was revived in 1850 on Austrian initiative, but only fully reinstalled in the Summer of 1851.

Rivalry between Prussia and Austria grew more and more, especially after 1859. The Confederation was dissolved in 1866 after
the Austro-Prussian War, and was succeeded in 1866 by the Prussian-dominated North German Confederation. Unlike the
German Confederation, the North German Confederation was in fact a true state. Its territory comprised the parts of the German
Confederation north of the river Main, plus Prussia's eastern territories and the Duchy of Schleswig, but excluded Austria and the
other southern German states.

Prussia's influence was widened by the Franco-Prussian War resulting in the proclamation of the German Empire at Versailles on
18 January 1871, which united the North German Federation with the southern German states. All the constituent states of the
former German Confederation became part of the Kaiserreich in 1871, except Austria, Luxembourg, the Duchy of Limburg, and
Liechtenstein.

Impact of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic invasions

The late 18th century was a period of political, economic, intellectual, and
cultural reforms, the Enlightenment (represented by figures such as Locke,
Rousseau, Voltaire, and Adam Smith), but also involving early Romanticism,
and climaxing with the French Revolution, where freedom of the individual and
nation was asserted against privilege and custom. Representing a great variety of
types and theories, they were largely a response to the disintegration of previous
cultural patterns, coupled with new patterns of production, specifically the rise
of industrial capitalism.

However, the defeat of Napoleon enabled conservative and reactionary regimes

such as those of the Kingdom of Prussia, the Austrian Empire, and Tsarist Russia
to survive, laying the groundwork for the Congress of Vienna and the alliance
that strove to oppose radical demands for change ushered in by the French
Revolution. The Great Powers at the Congress of Vienna in 1815 aimed to
restore Europe (as far as possible) to its pre-war conditions by combating both
Austrian chancellor Klemens von
liberalism and nationalism and by creating barriers around France. With Metternich dominated the German
Austria's position on the continent now intact and ostensibly secure under its Confederation from 1815 until 1848.
reactionary premier Klemens von Metternich, the Habsburg empire would serve
as a barrier to contain the emergence of Italian and German nation-states as well,
in addition to containing France. But this reactionary balance of power, aimed at blocking German and Italian nationalism on the
continent, was precarious.

After Napoleon's final defeat in 1815, the surviving member states of the defunct Holy Roman Empire joined to form the German
Confederation (Deutscher Bund)—a rather loose organization, especially because the two great rivals, the Austrian Empire and
the Kingdom of Prussia, each feared domination by the other.

In Prussia the Hohenzollern rulers forged a centralized state. By the time of the Napoleonic Wars, Prussia was a socially and
institutionally backward state, grounded in the virtues of its established military aristocracy (the Junkers), stratified by rigid
hierarchical lines. After 1815, Prussia's defeats by Napoleonic France highlighted the need for administrative, economic, and
social reforms to improve the efficiency of the bureaucracy and encourage practical merit-based education. Inspired by the
Napoleonic organization of German and Italian principalities, the reforms of Karl August von Hardenberg and Count Stein were
conservative, enacted to preserve aristocratic privilege while modernizing institutions.

Outside Prussia, industrialization progressed slowly, and was held back because of political disunity, conflicts of interest between
the nobility and merchants, and the continued existence of the guild system, which discouraged competition and innovation.
While this kept the middle class at bay, affording the old order a measure of stability not seen in France, Prussia's vulnerability to
Napoleon's military proved to many among the old order that a fragile, divided, and traditionalist Germany would be easy prey
for its cohesive and industrializing neighbor.

The reforms laid the foundation for Prussia's future military might by professionalizing the military and decreeing universal
military conscription. In order to industrialize Prussia, working within the framework provided by the old aristocratic institutions,
land reforms were enacted to break the monopoly of the Junkers on land ownership, thereby also abolishing, among other things,
the feudal practice of serfdom.

Romanticism, nationalism, and liberalism in the Vormärz era

Although the forces unleashed by the French Revolution were seemingly under control after the Vienna Congress, the conflict
between conservative forces and liberal nationalists was only deferred at best. The era until the failed 1848 revolution, in which
these tensions built up, is commonly referred to as Vormärz ("pre-March"), in reference to the outbreak of riots in March 1848.

This conflict pitted the forces of the old order against those inspired by the French Revolution and the Rights of Man. The
sociological breakdown of the competition was, roughly, one side engaged mostly in commerce, trade, and industry, and the other
side associated with landowning aristocracy or military aristocracy (the Junkers) in Prussia, the Habsburg monarchy in Austria,
and the conservative notables of the small princely states and city-states in Germany.

Meanwhile, demands for change from below had been fomenting since the influence of the French Revolution. Throughout the
German Confederation, Austrian influence was paramount, drawing the ire of the nationalist movements. Metternich considered
nationalism, especially the nationalist youth movement, the most pressing danger: German nationalism might not only repudiate
Austrian dominance of the Confederation, but also stimulate nationalist sentiment within the Austrian Empire itself. In a multi-
national polyglot state in which Slavs and Magyars outnumbered the Germans, the prospects of Czech, Slovak, Hungarian,
Polish, Serb, or Croatian sentiment along with middle class liberalism was certainly horrifying.

Figures like August Heinrich Hoffmann von Fallersleben, Ludwig Uhland, Georg Herwegh, Heinrich Heine, Georg Büchner,
Ludwig Börne, and Bettina von Arnim rose in the Vormärz era. Father Friedrich Jahn's gymnastic associations exposed middle
class German youth to nationalist and democratic ideas, which took the form of the nationalistic and liberal democratic college
fraternities known as the Burschenschaften. The Wartburg Festival in 1817 celebrated Martin Luther as a proto-German
nationalist, linking Lutheranism to German nationalism, and helping arouse religious sentiments for the cause of German
nationhood. The festival culminated in the burning of several books and other items that symbolized reactionary attitudes. One
item was a book by August von Kotzebue. In 1819, Kotzebue was accused of spying for Russia, and then murdered by a
theological student, Karl Ludwig Sand, who was executed for the crime. Sand belonged to a militant nationalist faction of the
Burschenschaften. Metternich used the murder as a pretext to issue the Carlsbad Decrees of 1819, which dissolved the
Burschenschaften, cracked down on the liberal press, and seriously restricted academic freedom.[6]

High culture
German artists and intellectuals, heavily influenced by the French Revolution, turned to Romanticism. At the universities, high-
powered professors developed international reputations, especially in the humanities led by history and philology, which brought
a new historical perspective to the study of political history, theology, philosophy, language, and literature. With Georg Wilhelm
Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831) in philosophy, Friedrich
Schleiermacher (1768–1834) in theology and Leopold von Ranke
(1795–1886) in history, the University of Berlin, founded in 1810,
became the world's leading university. Von Ranke, for example,
professionalized history and set the world standard for
historiography. By the 1830s, mathematics, physics, chemistry, and
biology had emerged with world class science, led by Alexander von
Humboldt (1769–1859) in natural science and Carl Friedrich Gauss
(1777–1855) in mathematics. Young intellectuals often turned to
politics, but their support for the failed Revolution of 1848 forced
The University of Berlin in 1850
many into exile.[7]

Population

Demographic transition
The population of the German Confederation (excluding Austria) grew 60% from 1815 to 1865, from 21,000,000 to
34,000,000.[8] The era saw the demographic transition take place in Germany. It was a transition from high birth rates and high
death rates to low birth and death rates as the country developed from a pre-industrial to a modernized agriculture and supported a
fast-growing industrialized urban economic system. In previous centuries, the shortage of land meant that not everyone could
marry, and marriages took place after age 25. The high birthrate was offset by a very high rate of infant mortality, plus periodic
epidemics and harvest failures. After 1815, increased agricultural productivity meant a larger food supply, and a decline in
famines, epidemics, and malnutrition. This allowed couples to marry earlier, and have more children. Arranged marriages became
uncommon as young people were now allowed to choose their own marriage partners, subject to a veto by the parents. The upper
and middle classes began to practice birth control, and a little later so too did the peasants.[9] The population in 1800 was heavily
rural,[10] with only 8% of the people living in communities of 5,000 to 100,000 and another 2% living in cities of more than
100,000.

Nobility
In a heavily agrarian society, land ownership played a central role. Germany's nobles, especially those in the East called Junkers,
dominated not only the localities, but also the Prussian court, and especially the Prussian army. Increasingly after 1815, a
centralized Prussian government based in Berlin took over the powers of the nobles, which in terms of control over the peasantry
had been almost absolute. They retained control of the judicial system on their estates until 1848, as well as control of hunting
and game laws. They paid no land tax until 1861 and kept their police authority until 1872, and controlled church affairs into the
early 20th century. To help the nobility avoid indebtedness, Berlin set up a credit institution to provide capital loans in 1809, and
extended the loan network to peasants in 1849. When the German Empire was established in 1871, the nobility controlled the
army and the Navy, the bureaucracy, and the royal court; they generally set governmental policies.[11][12]

Peasantry
Peasants continued to center their lives in the village, where they were members of a corporate body and helped manage
community resources and monitor community life. In the East, they were serfs who were bound prominently to parcels of land. In
most of Germany, farming was handled by tenant farmers who paid rents and obligatory services to the landlord, who was
typically a nobleman.[13] Peasant leaders supervised the fields and ditches and grazing rights, maintained public order and
morals, and supported a village court which handled minor offenses. Inside the family the patriarch made all the decisions, and
tried to arrange advantageous marriages for his children. Much of the villages' communal life centered around church services
and holy days. In Prussia, the peasants drew lots to choose conscripts required by the army. The noblemen handled external
relationships and politics for the villages under their control, and were not typically involved in daily activities or
decisions.[14][15]

Rapidly growing cities

After 1815, the urban population grew rapidly, due primarily to the influx of young people from the rural areas. Berlin grew from
172,000 people in 1800 to 826,000 in 1870; Hamburg grew from 130,000 to 290,000; Munich from 40,000 to 269,000; Breslau
(now Wrocław) from 60,000 to 208,000; Dresden from 60,000 to 177,000; Königsberg (now Kaliningrad) from 55,000 to
112,000. Offsetting this growth, there was extensive emigration, especially to the United States. Emigration totaled 480,000 in the
1840s, 1,200,000 in the 1850s, and 780,000 in the 1860s.[16]

Zollverein: economic integration

Further efforts to improve the confederation began in 1834 with
the establishment of a customs union, the Zollverein. In 1834, the
Prussian regime sought to stimulate wider trade advantages and
industrialism by decree—a logical continuation of the program of
Stein and Hardenberg less than two decades earlier. Historians
have seen three Prussian goals: as a political tool to eliminate
Austrian influence in Germany; as a way to improve the
economies; and to strengthen Germany against potential French
aggression while reducing the economic independence of smaller
states.[17]

Inadvertently, these reforms sparked the unification movement

and augmented a middle class demanding further political rights,
but at the time backwardness and Prussia's fears of its stronger
neighbors were greater concerns. The customs union opened up a
common market, ended tariffs between states, and standardized
weights, measures, and currencies within member states
(excluding Austria), forming the basis of a proto-national
economy.[18]

By 1842 the Zollverein included most German states. Within the

next twenty years the output of German furnaces increased
fourfold. Coal production grew rapidly as well. In turn, German
industry (especially the works established by the Krupp family) Zollverein and German Unification
introduced the steel gun, cast-steel axle, and a breech-loading
rifle, exemplifying Germany's successful application of
technology to weaponry. Germany's security was greatly enhanced, leaving the Prussian state and the landowning aristocracy
secure from outside threat. German manufacturers also produced heavily for the civilian sector. No longer would Britain supply
half of Germany's needs for manufactured goods, as it did beforehand.[19] However, by developing a strong industrial base, the
Prussian state strengthened the middle class and thus the nationalist movement. Economic integration, especially increased
national consciousness among the German states, made political unity a far likelier scenario. Germany finally began exhibiting all
the features of a proto-nation.
The crucial factor enabling Prussia's conservative regime to survive the Vormärz era was a rough coalition between leading
sectors of the landed upper class and the emerging commercial and manufacturing interests. Marx and Engels, in their analysis of
the abortive 1848 Revolutions, defined such a coalition: "a commercial and industrial class which is too weak and dependent to
take power and rule in its own right and which therefore throws itself into the arms of the landed aristocracy and the royal
bureaucracy, exchanging the right to rule for the right to make money."[20] Even if the commercial and industrial element is
weak, it must be strong enough (or soon become strong enough) to become worthy of co-optation, and the French Revolution
terrified enough perceptive elements of Prussia's Junkers for the state to be sufficiently accommodating.

While relative stability was maintained until 1848, with enough bourgeois elements still content to exchange the "right to rule for
the right to make money", the landed upper class found its economic base sinking. While the Zollverein brought economic
progress and helped to keep the bourgeoisie at bay for a while, it increased the ranks of the middle class swiftly—the very social
base for the nationalism and liberalism that the Prussian state sought to stem.

The Zollverein was a move toward economic integration, modern industrial capitalism, and the victory of centralism over
localism, quickly bringing to an end the era of guilds in the small German princely states. This led to the 1844 revolt of the
Silesian Weavers, who saw their livelihood destroyed by the flood of new manufactures.

The Zollverein also weakened Austrian domination of the Confederation as economic unity increased the desire for political unity
and nationalism.

Revolutions of 1848
News of the 1848 Revolution in Paris quickly reached discontented bourgeois liberals,
republicans and more radical working-men. The first revolutionary uprisings in
Germany began in the state of Baden in March 1848. Within a few days, there were
revolutionary uprisings in other states including Austria, and finally in Prussia. On 15
March 1848, the subjects of Friedrich Wilhelm IV of Prussia vented their long-repressed
political aspirations in violent rioting in Berlin, while barricades were erected in the
streets of Paris. King Louis-Philippe of France fled to Great Britain. Friedrich Wilhelm
War Ensign of the Reichsflotte
gave in to the popular fury, and promised a constitution, a parliament, and support for
German unification, safeguarding his own rule and regime.[21][22]

On 18 May, the Frankfurt Parliament (Frankfurt Assembly) opened its first session, with
delegates from various German states. It was immediately divided between those
favoring a kleindeutsche (small German) or grossdeutsche (greater German) solution.
The former favored offering the imperial crown to Prussia. The latter favored the
Habsburg crown in Vienna, which would integrate Austria proper and Bohemia (but not
Hungary) into the new Germany.

From May to December, the Assembly eloquently debated academic topics while
conservatives swiftly moved against the reformers. As in Austria and Russia, this
Naval Jack of the Reichsflotte
middle-class assertion increased authoritarian and reactionary sentiments among the
landed upper class, whose economic position was declining. They turned to political
levers to preserve their rule. As the Prussian army proved loyal, and the peasants were uninterested, Friedrich Wilhelm regained
his confidence. The Assembly issued its Declaration of the Rights of the German people, a constitution was drawn up (excluding
Austria, which openly rejected the Assembly), and the leadership of the Reich was offered to Friedrich Wilhelm, who refused to
"pick up a crown from the gutter". Thousands of middle class liberals fled abroad, especially to the United States.
In 1849, Friedrich Wilhelm proposed his own constitution. His document concentrated real power in the hands of the King and
the upper classes, and called for a confederation of North German states—the Erfurt Union. Austria and Russia, fearing a strong,
Prussian-dominated Germany, responded by pressuring Saxony and Hanover to withdraw, and forced Prussia to abandon the
scheme in a treaty dubbed the "humiliation of Olmütz".

Dissolution of the Confederation

Rise of Bismarck
A new generation of statesmen responded to popular demands for national unity for their own ends, continuing Prussia's tradition
of autocracy and reform from above. Germany found an able leader to accomplish the seemingly paradoxical task of conservative
modernization. Bismarck was appointed by King Wilhelm I of Prussia (the future Kaiser Wilhelm I) to circumvent the liberals in
the Landtag of Prussia, who resisted Wilhelm's autocratic militarism. Bismarck told the Diet, "The great questions of the day are
not decided by speeches and majority votes ... but by blood and iron" — that is, by warfare and industrial might.[23] Prussia
already had a great army; it was now augmented by rapid growth of economic power.

Gradually, Bismarck won over the middle class, reacting to the revolutionary sentiments expressed in 1848 by providing them
with the economic opportunities for which the urban middle sectors had been fighting.[24]

Seven Weeks' War

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.[25] The
following day, the remaining member states confirmed the dissolution. The treaty allowed Prussia to create a new
Bundesverhältnis (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.

North German Confederation

Prussia created the North German Confederation in 1867 covering all German states north of the river Main and also the
Hohenzollern territories in Swabia. Besides Austria, the South German states Bavaria, Württemberg, Baden, and Hesse-
Darmstadt remained separate from the rest of Germany. However, due to the successful prosecution of the Franco-German War,
the four southern states joined the North German Confederation by treaty in November 1870.[26]

German Empire
As the Franco-Prussian War drew to a close, King Ludwig II of Bavaria was persuaded to ask King Wilhelm to assume the crown
of the new German Empire. On 1 January 1871, the Empire was declared by the presiding princes and generals in the Hall of
Mirrors in the Palace of Versailles, near Paris. The Diet of the North German Confederation to rename the North German
Confederation as the German Empire and give the title of German Emperor to the King of Prussia.[27] The new constitution of the
state, the Constitution of the German Confederation, effectively transformed the Diet of the Confederation into the German
Parliament (Reichstag).[28]

Territorial legacy
The current countries whose territory were partly or entirely located inside the boundaries of German Confederation 1815–1866
are:
 Germany (all states except Southern Schleswig in the north of
Schleswig-Holstein)
Austria (all states except Burgenland)
Luxembourg (entire territory)
Liechtenstein (entire territory)
Netherlands (Duchy of Limburg, was a member of the Confederation
from 1839 till 1866)
Czech Republic (entire territory)
Slovenia (except for Prekmurje and the municipalities of Koper, Izola
and Piran)
Poland (West Pomeranian Voivodship, Lubusz Voivodship, Lower
Silesian Voivodship, Opole Voivodship, part of Silesia —
overwhelmingly German speaking at the time; East Prussia, West
Prussia, and much of the Grand Duchy of Posen were admitted into
the Confederation on 11 April 1848,[29] but the terms of the restored Map of the German Confederation
Confederate Diet removed these territories on 30 May 1851)[30]
Belgium (German-speaking community and some other territory in
the east of the province of Liège); the larger province of Luxembourg had left the Confederation at its accession
to Belgium in 1839
Italy (autonomous region of Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol, the Province of Trieste, most of the Province of Gorizia
except the Monfalcone enclave, and the municipalities of Tarvisio, Malborghetto Valbruna, Pontebba, Aquileia,
Fiumicello, and Cervignano in the Province of Udine)
Croatia (the Pazin territory in Istria county and the coastal strip between Opatija and Plomin in the Liburnia
region)
The Danish crown had been a member only in the context of its duchy of Holstein. Schleswig first joined on 12
April 1848 after a revolutionary government was formed in opposition to the new Danish Constitution.[31] The
London Protocol of 1852 removed Schleswig from the Confederation, but the Second War of Schleswig returned
the Duchy to the Confederation under Prussian governance as per the Treaty of Vienna in 1864.

See also
States of the German Confederation
History of Germany
German Empire
North German Confederation
Former countries in Europe after 1815
Federal Convention
Frankfurt Parliament

Notes
1. "German Confederation" (http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/230682/German-Confederation).
Encyclopædia Britannica.
2. Deutsche Geschichte 1848/49 (http://susi.e-technik.uni-ulm.de:8080/Meyers2/seite/werk/meyers/band/4/seite/08
92/meyers_b4_s0892.html), Meyers Konversationslexikon 1885–1892
3. Lee, Loyd E. (1985). "The German Confederation and the Consolidation of State Power in the South German
States, 1815–1848". Consortium on Revolutionary Europe, 1750–1850: Proceedings. 15: 332–346. ISSN 0093-
2574 (https://www.worldcat.org/issn/0093-2574).
4. Heeren, Arnold Hermann Ludwig (1873), Talboys, David Alphonso (ed.), A Manual of the History of the Political
System of Europe and its Colonies (https://books.google.com/books?id=Vc88AAAAIAAJ&pg=PA480), London: H.
G. Bohn, pp. 480–481
5. Beilage zum Militaer-Wochenblatt fuer das deutsche Bundesheer. No. 3, 1860.
 6. Williamson, George S. (2000). "What Killed August von Kotzebue? The Temptations of Virtue and the Political
Theology of German Nationalism, 1789–1819". Journal of Modern History. 72 (4): 890–943. JSTOR 318549 (http
s://www.jstor.org/stable/318549).
7. Sheehan, James J. (1989). German History: 1770–1866 (https://archive.org/details/germanhistory17700shee).
New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 324–371, 802–820. ISBN 0198221207.
8. Nipperdey, Thomas (1996). Germany from Napoleon to Bismarck: 1800–1866. Princeton: Princeton University
Press. p. 86. ISBN 069102636X.
9. Nipperdey, Thomas (1996). Germany from Napoleon to Bismarck: 1800–1866. Princeton: Princeton University
Press. pp. 87–92, 99. ISBN 069102636X.
10. Clapham, J. H. (1936). The Economic Development of France and Germany: 1815–1914. Cambridge University
Press. pp. 6–28.
11. Weber, Eugen (1971). A Modern History of Europe. New York: Norton. p. 586. ISBN 0393099814.
12. Sagarra 1977, pp. 37–55, 183–202
13. The monasteries of Bavaria, which controlled 56% of the land, were broken up by the government, and sold off
around 1803. Nipperdey, Thomas (1996). Germany from Napoleon to Bismarck: 1800–1866. Princeton:
Princeton University Press. p. 59. ISBN 069102636X.
14. Sagarra 1977, pp. 140–154
15. For details on the life of a representative peasant farmer, who migrated in 1710 to Pennsylvania, see Kratz,
Bernd (2008). "Hans Stauffer: A Farmer in Germany Before his Emigration to Pennsylvania". Genealogist. 22 (2):
131–169.
16. Nipperdey, Germany from Napoleon to Bismarck: 1800–1866 pp 96–97
17. Murphy, David T. (1991). "Prussian aims for the Zollverein, 1828–1833". Historian. 53 (2): 285–302.
doi:10.1111/j.1540-6563.1991.tb00808.x (https://doi.org/10.1111%2Fj.1540-6563.1991.tb00808.x).
18. W. O. Henderson, The Zollverein (1959) is the standard history in English
19. William Manchester, The Arms of Krupp, 1587–1968 (1968)
20. Karl Marx, Selected Works, II., "Germany: Revolution and Counter-Revolution", written mainly by Engels.
21. James J. Sheehan, German History, 1770–1866 (1993), pp 656–710
22. Mattheisen, Donald J. (1983). "History as Current Events: Recent Works on the German Revolution of 1848".
American Historical Review. 88 (5): 1219–1237. JSTOR 1904890 (https://www.jstor.org/stable/1904890).
23. Martin Kitchen, A History of Modern Germany, 1800–2000 (2006) p. 105
24. Otto Pflanze, Bismarck and the Development of Germany, Vol. 1: The Period of Unification, 1815–1871 (1971)
25. Ernst Rudolf Huber: Deutsche Verfassungsgeschichte seit 1789. Vol. III: Bismarck und das Reich. 3rd edition, W.
Kohlhammer, Stuttgart 1988, p. 571, 576.
26. Case, Nelson (1902). European Constitutional History (https://books.google.com/books?id=G2t9AAAAMAAJ&pg
=PA139). Cincinnati: Jennings & Pye. p. 139. OCLC 608806061 (https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/608806061).
27. Case 1902, pp. 139–140
28. Ernst Rudolf Huber: Deutsche Verfassungsgeschichte seit 1789. Vol. III: Bismarck und das Reich. 3rd edition, W.
Kohlhammer, Stuttgart [u. a.] 1988, p. 747.
29. Heinrich Sybel, The Founding of the German Empire by William I. 1890. Volume 1, page 182.
30. Charles Eugene Little, Cyclopedia of Classified Dates: With an Exhaustive Index, 1900, page 819.
31. Wilhelm Eichhoff, How Schleswig-Holstein has become what it is. Henry Gaskarth, 1864, page 18.

References
Westermann, Großer Atlas zur Weltgeschichte (in German, detailed maps)
WorldStatesmen- here Germany (http://www.worldstatesmen.org/Germany.html); also links to a map on
rootsweb.com (http://www.rootsweb.com/~wggerman/map/germanconf.htm)
Barrington Moore, Jr. 1993 [1966]. Social Origins of Dictatorship and Democracy. Boston: Beacon Press.
Further reading
Blackbourn, David. The Long Nineteenth Century: A History of Germany, 1780–1918 (1998) excerpt and text
search (https://www.amazon.com/dp/063123196X/)
Blackbourn, David, and Geoff Eley. The Peculiarities of German History: Bourgeois Society and Politics in
Nineteenth-Century Germany (1984) online edition (https://www.questia.com/read/27706474)
Brose, Eric Dorn. German History, 1789–1871: From the Holy Roman Empire to the Bismarckian Reich. (1997)
online edition (https://www.questia.com/read/10401562)
Evans, Richard J., and W. R. Lee, eds. The German Peasantry: Conflict and Community from the Eighteenth to
the Twentieth Centuries (1986)
Nipperdey, Thomas. Germany from Napoleon to Bismarck (1996), very dense coverage of every aspect of
German society, economy and government
Pflanze, Otto. Bismarck and the Development of Germany, Vol. 1: The Period of Unification, 1815-1871 (1971)
Ramm, Agatha. Germany, 1789–1919 (1967)
Sagarra, Eda (1977). A Social History of Germany: 1648–1914. New York: Holmes & Meier. pp. 37–55, 183–202.
ISBN 0841903328.
Sagarra, Eda. Introduction to Nineteenth Century Germany (1980)
Sheehan, James J. German History, 1770–1866 (1993), 969pp; the major survey in English
Werner, George S. Bavaria in the German Confederation 1820–1848 (1977)

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