1.
Sorbs
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Sorbs, known also by their former autonyms Lusatians and Wends, are a West Slavic ethnic group predominantly inhabiting their homeland in Lusatia, a region divided between Germany and Poland. They traditionally speak the Sorbian languages, closely related to Polish, Kashubian, Czech, Sorbian is an officially recognized minority language of Germany. The Sorbs are linguistically and genetically closest to the Czechs and Poles, the community is divided religiously between Roman Catholicism and Lutheranism. An indicator of the degree of assimilation is the fact that the Prime Minister of Saxony is at present a Sorb, the ethnonym Sorbs derives from the medieval tribe, Sorbs. The original ethnonym, Srbi, was retained by the Sorbs and Serbs in the Balkans, by the 6th century, Slavs occupied the area west of the Oder formerly inhabited by Germanic peoples. The Sorbs are first mentioned in the 7th century, in the 19th century the autonym of the Slavic population of Lusatia was Lusatians. According to a study published in May 2011, Sorbs show the greatest genetic similarity to Poles, followed by Czechs. They show subtle evidence of genetic isolation but less than Sardinians, demographic history of the Sorb population since 1700, Sorbs are divided into two ethnographical groups, Upper Sorbs, who speak Upper Sorbian. Lower Sorbs, who speak Lower Sorbian, the dialects spoken vary in intelligibility in different areas. Sorbs arrived in the area extending between the Bober, Kwisa, and Oder rivers to the East and the Saale and Elbe rivers to the West during the 6th century, in the north, the area of their settlement reached Berlin. The earliest surviving mention of the tribe was in 631 A. D. when Fredegars Chronicle described them as Surbi and as under the rule of a Dervan, an ally of Samo. The Annales Regni Francorum state that in 806 A. D. Sorbian Duke Miliduch fought against the Franks and was killed, in 840, Sorbian Duke Czimislav was killed. In 932, Henry I conquered Lusatia and Milsko, gero II, Margrave of the Saxon Ostmark, reconquered Lusatia the following year and, in 939, murdered 30 Sorbian princes during a feast. As a result, there were many Sorbian uprisings against German rule, a reconstructed castle, at Raddusch in Lower Lusatia, is the sole physical remnant from this early period. Lusatian tribes are noted in the work of the Bavarian Geographer, the document contains a list of the tribes in Central-Eastern Europe east of the Elbe and north of the Danube to the Volga rivers to the Black and Caspian Sea most of them of Slavic origin. Having settled by the Elbe, Spree and Neisse in the 6th century, Sorbs living on the swampy broads of the Lower Spree have taken their name from the word marsh. The Milceni settled on fertile soil around Upper Spree, the name derives from the word měl’, the two groups were separated from each other by a wide and uninhabited forest range. The rest of the tribes settled themselves between the Elbe and Saale, among the many Slavic tribes, the Bavarian Geographer also noted a few Lusatian tribes, Glomacze - Dolomici, Milceni, Chutizi and Sitice
2.
Lusatia
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Lusatia is a region in Central Europe. The region is the home of the group of Lusatian Sorbs. Historically, Lusatia belonged to different countries. Being part of the Lands of the Bohemian Crown for three hundred years, alongside them it passed to the Habsburg Monarchy and from it to the Electorate of Saxony, the greater part passed to the Kingdom of Prussia in 1815 and the whole region merged into Germany in 1871. In the Polish part today Polish is spoken, and in the German part German, Upper-, the biggest Lusatian town is Cottbus. The name derives from the Sorbian word łužicy meaning swamps or water-hole, Lusatia is the Latinised form which spread in the English and Romance languages area. Lusatia comprises two both scenically and historically different parts, a hilly southern section and a lower region. Neighbouring regions were Silesia in the east, Bohemia in the south, the Margraviate of Meissen and the Duchy of Saxe-Wittenberg in the west as well as the Margraviate of Brandenburg in the north. Upper Lusatia is today part of the German state of Saxony, except for a part east of the Neisse River around Lubań. Among those villages are Niedercunnersdorf, Obercunnersdorf, Wehrsdorf, Jonsdorf, Sohland an der Spree with Taubenheim, Oppach, most of the area belonging to the German state of Brandenburg today is called Lower Lusatia and is characterised by forests and meadows. In the course of much of the 19th and the entire 20th century, it was shaped by the lignite industry, important towns include Cottbus, Eisenhüttenstadt, Lübben, Lübbenau, Spremberg, Finsterwalde, Senftenberg, and Żary, which is now considered the capital of Polish Lusatia. Between Upper and Lower Lusatia is a called the Grenzwall, literally meaning border dyke. In the Middle Ages this area had forests, so it represented a major obstacle to civilian. Some of the villages were damaged or destroyed by the open-pit lignite mining industry during the DDR era. The Lusatian Lake District will become Europes largest artificial lake district, some of the biggest lakes are Lake Senftenberg and Bluno Southern Lake. The Upper Lusatian Heath and Pond Landscape is the region richest in ponds in Germany, as Lusatia is not, and never has been, a single administrative unit, Upper and Lower Lusatia have different, but in some aspects similar, histories. The city of Cottbus is the largest in the region, and though it is recognized as the capital of Lower Lusatia. Historically, the centres of Lower Lusatia were at Luckau and Lübben
3.
Germany
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Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a federal parliamentary republic in central-western Europe. It includes 16 constituent states, covers an area of 357,021 square kilometres, with about 82 million inhabitants, Germany is the most populous member state of the European Union. After the United States, it is the second most popular destination in the world. Germanys capital and largest metropolis is Berlin, while its largest conurbation is the Ruhr, other major cities include Hamburg, Munich, Cologne, Frankfurt, Stuttgart, Düsseldorf and Leipzig. Various Germanic tribes have inhabited the northern parts of modern Germany since classical antiquity, a region named Germania was documented before 100 AD. During the Migration Period the Germanic tribes expanded southward, beginning 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, 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 German Revolution of 1918–1919, the Empire was replaced by the parliamentary Weimar Republic, the establishment of the national socialist dictatorship in 1933 led to World War II and the Holocaust. After a period of Allied occupation, two German states were founded, the Federal Republic of Germany and the German Democratic Republic, in 1990, the country was reunified. In the 21st century, Germany is a power and has the worlds fourth-largest economy by nominal GDP. As a global leader in industrial and technological sectors, it is both the worlds third-largest exporter and importer of goods. Germany is a country with a very high standard of living sustained by a skilled. It upholds a social security and universal health system, environmental protection. Germany was a member of the European Economic Community in 1957. It is part of the Schengen Area, and became a co-founder of the Eurozone in 1999, Germany is a member of the United Nations, NATO, the G8, the G20, and the OECD. The national military expenditure is the 9th highest in the world, the English word Germany derives from the Latin Germania, which came into use after Julius Caesar adopted it for the peoples east of the Rhine. This in turn descends from Proto-Germanic *þiudiskaz popular, derived from *þeudō, descended from Proto-Indo-European *tewtéh₂- people, the discovery of the Mauer 1 mandible shows that ancient humans were present in Germany at least 600,000 years ago. The oldest complete hunting weapons found anywhere in the world were discovered in a mine in Schöningen where three 380, 000-year-old wooden javelins were unearthed
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Saxony
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Its capital is Dresden, and its largest city is Leipzig. Saxony is the tenth largest of Germanys sixteen states, with an area of 18,413 square kilometres, located in the middle of a large, formerly all German-speaking part of Europe, the history of the state of Saxony spans more than a millennium. It has been a medieval duchy, an electorate of the Holy Roman Empire, a kingdom, the area of the modern state of Saxony should not be confused with Old Saxony, the area inhabited by Saxons. Old Saxony corresponds approximately to the modern German states of Lower Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, Saxony is divided into 10 districts,1. After a reform in 2008, these regions - with some alterations of their respective areas - were called Direktionsbezirke, in 2012, the authorities of these regions were merged into one central authority, the Landesdirektion Sachsen. The Erzgebirgskreis district includes the Ore Mountains, and the Schweiz-Osterzgebirge district includes Saxon Switzerland, the largest cities in Saxony according to the 31 December 2015 estimate. To this can be added that Leipzig forms a metropolitan region with Halle. The latter city is located just across the border to Saxony-Anhalt, Leipzig shares for instance an S-train system and an airport with Halle. Saxony has, after Saxony Anhalt, the most vibrant economy of the states of the former East Germany and its economy grew by 1. 9% in 2010. Nonetheless, unemployment remains above the German average, the eastern part of Germany, excluding Berlin, qualifies as an Objective 1 development-region within the European Union, and is eligible to receive investment subsidies of up to 30% until 2013. FutureSAX, a business competition and entrepreneurial support organisation, has been in operation since 2002. Microchip makers near Dresden have given the region the nickname Silicon Saxony, the publishing and porcelain industries of the region are well known, although their contributions to the regional economy are no longer significant. Today the automobile industry, machinery production and services contribute to the development of the region. Saxony is also one of the most renowned tourist destinations in Germany - especially the cities of Leipzig and Dresden, new tourist destinations are developing, notably in the lake district of Lausitz. Saxony reported an unemployment of 8. 8% in 2014. By comparison the average in the former GDR was 9. 8% and 6. 7% for Germany overall, the unemployment rate reached 8. 2% in May 2015. The Leipzig area, which recently was among the regions with the highest unemployment rate, could benefit greatly from investments by Porsche. With the VW Phaeton factory in Dresden, and many part suppliers, zwickau is another major Volkswagen location
5.
Brandenburg
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Brandenburg is one of the sixteen federated states of Germany. It lies in the northeast of the country covering an area of 29,478 square kilometers and has 2.48 million inhabitants, the capital and largest city is Potsdam. Brandenburg surrounds but does not include the capital and city-state Berlin forming a metropolitan area. Brandenburg is one of the states that was re-created in 1990 upon the reunification of the former East Germany. Governed by the Hohenzollern dynasty from 1415, it contained the future German capital Berlin, after 1618 the Margraviate of Brandenburg and the Duchy of Prussia were combined to form Brandenburg-Prussia, which was ruled by the same branch of the House of Hohenzollern. In 1701 the state was elevated as the Kingdom of Prussia, Brandenburg is situated in territory known in antiquity as Magna Germania, which reached to the Vistula river. By the 7th century, Slavic peoples are believed to have settled in the Brandenburg area, the Slavs expanded from the east, possibly driven from their homelands in present-day Ukraine and perhaps Belarus by the invasions of the Huns and Avars. They relied heavily on river transport, the two principal Slavic groups in the present-day area of Brandenburg were the Hevelli in the west and the Sprevane in the east. Beginning in the early 10th century, Henry the Fowler and his successors conquered territory up to the Oder River, Slavic settlements such as Brenna, Budusin, and Chośebuz came under imperial control through the installation of margraves. Their main function was to defend and protect the eastern marches, in 948 Emperor Otto I established margraves to exert imperial control over the pagan Slavs west of the Oder River. Otto founded the Bishoprics of Brandenburg and Havelberg, the Northern March was founded as a northeastern border territory of the Holy Roman Empire. However, an uprising of Wends drove imperial forces from the territory of present-day Brandenburg in 983. The region returned to the control of Slavic leaders, the Roman Catholic Church brought bishoprics which, with their walled towns, afforded protection from attacks for the townspeople. With the monks and bishops, the history of the town of Brandenburg an der Havel, in 1134, in the wake of a German crusade against the Wends, the German magnate, Albert the Bear, was granted the Northern March by the Emperor Lothar III. He formally inherited the town of Brandenburg and the lands of the Hevelli from their last Wendish ruler, Pribislav, after crushing a force of Sprevane who occupied the town of Brandenburg in the 1150s, Albert proclaimed himself ruler of the new Margraviate of Brandenburg. Albert, and his descendants the Ascanians, then made progress in conquering, colonizing, Christianizing. Within this region, Slavic and German residents intermarried, during the 13th century, the Ascanians began acquiring territory east of the Oder, later known as the Neumark. In 1320, the Brandenburg Ascanian line came to an end, under the Luxembourgs, the Margrave of Brandenburg gained the status of a prince-elector of the Holy Roman Empire
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East Germany
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East Germany, formally the German Democratic Republic, was an Eastern Bloc state during the Cold War period. The Soviet zone surrounded West Berlin, but did not include it, as a result, the German Democratic Republic was established in the Soviet Zone, while the Federal Republic was established in the three western zones. East Germany, which lies culturally in Central Germany, was a state of the Soviet Union. Soviet occupation authorities began transferring administrative responsibility to German communist leaders in 1948, Soviet forces, however, remained in the country throughout the Cold War. Until 1989, the GDR was governed by the Socialist Unity Party, though other parties participated in its alliance organisation. The economy was centrally planned, and increasingly state-owned, prices of basic goods and services were set by central government planners, rather than rising and falling through supply and demand. Although the GDR had to pay war reparations to the USSR. Nonetheless it did not match the growth of West Germany. Emigration to the West was a significant problem—as many of the emigrants were well-educated young people, the government fortified its western borders and, in 1961, built the Berlin Wall. Many people attempting to flee were killed by guards or booby traps. In 1989, numerous social and political forces in the GDR and abroad led to the fall of the Berlin Wall, the following year open elections were held, and international negotiations led to the signing of the Final Settlement treaty on the status and borders of Germany. The GDR was dissolved and Germany was unified on 3 October 1990, internally, the GDR also bordered the Soviet sector of Allied-occupied Berlin known as East Berlin which was also administered as the states de facto capital. It also bordered the three sectors occupied by the United States, United Kingdom and France known collectively as West Berlin. The three sectors occupied by the Western nations were sealed off from the rest of the GDR by the Berlin Wall from its construction in 1961 until it was brought down in 1989, the official name was Deutsche Demokratische Republik, usually abbreviated to DDR. West Germans, the media and statesmen purposely avoided the official name and its abbreviation, instead using terms like Ostzone, Sowjetische Besatzungszone. The centre of power in East Berlin was referred to as Pankow. Over time, however, the abbreviation DDR was also used colloquially by West Germans. However, this use was not always consistent, for example, before World War II, Ostdeutschland was used to describe all the territories east of the Elbe, as reflected in the works of sociologist Max Weber and political theorist Carl Schmitt
