Portal:Germany
Welcome to the Germany Portal!
Willkommen im Deutschland-Portal!
Germany (German: Deutschland), officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central and Western Europe, lying between the Baltic and North Seas to the north and the Alps to the south. It borders Denmark to the north, Poland and the Czech Republic to the east, Austria and Switzerland to the south, France to the southwest, and Luxembourg, Belgium and the Netherlands to the west.
Germany includes 16 constituent states, covers an area of 357,578 square kilometres (138,062 sq mi) and has a largely temperate seasonal climate. With 83 million inhabitants, it is the second most populous state of Europe after Russia, the most populous state lying entirely in Europe, as well as the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is a very decentralized country. Its capital and largest metropolis is Berlin, while Frankfurt serves as its financial capital and has the country's busiest airport.
In 1871, Germany became a nation-state when most of the German states unified into the Prussian-dominated German Empire. After World War I and the Revolution of 1918–19, the empire was replaced by the parliamentary Weimar Republic. The Nazi seizure of power in 1933 led to World War II, and the Holocaust. After the end of World War II in Europe and a period of Allied occupation, two new German states were founded: West Germany, formed from the American, British, and French occupation zones, and East Germany, formed from the western part of the Soviet occupation zone, reduced by the newly established Oder-Neisse line. Following the Revolutions of 1989 that ended communist rule in Central and Eastern Europe, the country was reunified on 3 October 1990.
Today, Germany is a federal parliamentary republic led by a chancellor. It is a great power with a strong economy. The Federal Republic of Germany was a founding member of the European Economic Community in 1957 and the European Union in 1993. Read more...
Selected article
Johann George Adam Forster, also known as Georg Forster (German pronunciation: [ˈɡeːɔʁk ˈfɔʁstɐ], 27 November 1754 – 10 January 1794), was a German geographer, naturalist, ethnologist, travel writer, journalist and revolutionary. At an early age, he accompanied his father, Johann Reinhold Forster, on several scientific expeditions, including James Cook's second voyage to the Pacific. His report of that journey, A Voyage Round the World, contributed significantly to the ethnology of the people of Polynesia and remains a respected work. As a result of the report, Forster, who was admitted to the Royal Society at the early age of twenty-two, came to be considered one of the founders of modern scientific travel literature.
After returning to continental Europe, Forster turned toward academia. He taught natural history at the Collegium Carolinum in the Ottoneum, Kassel (1778–84), and later at the Academy of Vilna (Vilnius University) (1784–87). In 1788, he became head librarian at the University of Mainz. Most of his scientific work during this time consisted of essays on botany and ethnology, but he also prefaced and translated many books about travel and exploration, including a German translation of Cook's diaries.
Forster was a central figure of the Enlightenment in Germany, and corresponded with most of its adherents, including his close friend Georg Christoph Lichtenberg. His ideas, travelogues and personality influenced Alexander von Humboldt, one of the great scientists of the 19th century who hailed Forster as the founder of both comparative ethnology (Völkerkunde) and regional geography (Länderkunde). When the French took control of Mainz in 1792, Forster played a leading role in the Mainz Republic, the earliest republican state in Germany. During July 1793 and while he was in Paris as a delegate of the young Mainz Republic, Prussian and Austrian coalition forces regained control of the city and Forster was declared an outlaw. Unable to return to Germany and separated from his friends and family, he died in Paris of illness in early 1794, not yet 40. (Full article...)
Selected picture
Related portals
- Parent portals
- Regional
- History
- Holy Roman Empire (900–1806)
- German Empire (1871–1918)
- East Germany (1949–1990)
- Neighbouring countries
Anniversaries for March 28
- 1802 - Heinrich Wilhelm Matthäus Olbers discovers asteroid 2 Pallas
- 1849 - The Frankfurt Parliament passes a constitution for Germany
- 1897 - Birth of football coach Sepp Herberger
- 1996 - Death of philosopher Hans Blumenberg
Did you know...
- ... that in Stieler's portrait of Beethoven (pictured), the composer's arms "are not convincingly attached to his shoulders"?
- ... that Prince Hubertus is the heir apparent to the head of the House of Saxe-Coburg and Gotha, a royal dynasty to which Elizabeth II belonged?
- ... that as music director of the Oper Hagen, Florian Ludwig promoted a wide repertoire that included contemporary operas such as Barber's Vanessa and crossover projects?
- ... that when Kelsey Lauritano portrayed Mozart's Cherubino, a reviewer from the FAZ noted her "almost metallic-brittle approach that spreads androgynous infatuation"?
- ... that American mezzo-soprano Cecelia Hall portrayed the lead male role in Mozart's Ascanio in Alba in Frankfurt?
- ... that in the 1934 German referendum, some areas recorded more votes than there were eligible voters?
- ... that after criticising horsegiirL's "My Barn My Rules" live on air, the British DJ Arielle Free was suspended from BBC Radio 1 for a week?
- ... that the first election in Baden in which women could vote resulted in nine women being elected to the state legislature?
Selected cuisines, dishes and foods
Topics
Categories
Things you can do
A list of articles needing cleanup associated with this project is available. See also the tool's wiki page and the index of WikiProjects.
Here are some tasks you can do. Please remove completed tasks from the list.
- Requests: German Archaeological Institute at Rome , Deutsche Familienversicherung , Dietlof von Arnim-Boitzenburg , Hennes Bender , Georg Bernhard (1875–1944), Eduard Georg von Bethusy-Huc , Rolf Brandt (1886–1953), Jan Philipp Burgard , Georg Arbogast von und zu Franckenstein , Ferdinand Heribert von Galen , Herbert Helmrich , Monty Jacobs (1875–1945), Hans Katzer , Siegfried Kauder , Heide Keller , Matze Knop , Isidor Levy (1852–1929), Markus Löning , Anke Plättner , Hans Heinrich X. Fürst von Pless , Gerd Poppe , Victor-Emanuel Preusker , Hans Sauer (inventor) , Franz August Schenk von Stauffenberg , Paul Schlesinger (1878-1928),Oscar Schneider , Hajo Schumacher , Otto Theodor von Seydewitz , Dorothea Siems , Werner Sonne , Anton Stark , Udo zu Stolberg-Wernigerode , Christoph Strässer , Torsten Sträter , Joseph von Utzschneider , Jürgen Wieshoff , Hans Wilhelmi ,
- Unreferenced: Unreferenced BLPs, Bundesautobahn 93, Benjamin Trinks, Steeler (German band), Amelie Beese, Zoologisches Museum in Kiel, Emil Krebs, Prussian semaphore system, Partenstein, Peter Krieg, Porsche 597, Christa Bauch, Curt Cress, Stefan Beuse
- Cleanup: 53541 issues in total as of 2024-03-03
- Translate: Articles needing translation from German Wikipedia
- Stubs: Albersdorf, Thuringia, Ingo Friedrich, Berndt Seite, Federal Social Court; 108 articles in Category:German MEP stubs
- Update: Deutsches Wörterbuch
- Portal maintenance: Update News, Did you know, announcements and the todo list
- Orphans: Orphaned articles in Germany
- Photo: Take/Add requested photographs
- Help assess the quality of 791 unassessed articles
Associated Wikimedia
The following Wikimedia Foundation sister projects provide more on this subject:
-
Commons
Free media repository -
Wikibooks
Free textbooks and manuals -
Wikidata
Free knowledge base -
Wikinews
Free-content news -
Wikiquote
Collection of quotations -
Wikisource
Free-content library -
Wikiversity
Free learning tools -
Wikivoyage
Free travel guide -
Wiktionary
Dictionary and thesaurus