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Definition: German from The Hutchinson Unabridged Encyclopedia with Atlas and Weather Guide

The native people or inhabitants of Germany, or a person of German descent, as well as their culture and language. In eastern Germany the Sorbs (or Wends) comprise a minority population who speak a Slavic language. The Austrians and Swiss Germans speak German, although they are ethnically distinct. German-speaking minorities are found in France (Alsace-Lorraine), Romania (Transylvania), the Czech Republic, Siberian Russia, Central Asia, Poland, and Italy (Tyrol).


Germans

From The Columbia Encyclopedia
great ethnic complex of ancient Europe, a basic stock in the composition of the modern peoples of Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Iceland, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, N Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, N and central France, Lowland Scotland, and England. From archaeology it is clear that the Germans had little ethnic solidarity; by the 7th cent. B.C. they had begun a division into many peoples. They did not call themselves Germans; the origin of the name is uncertain. Their rise to significance (4th cent. B.C. ) in the history of Europe began roughly with the general breakup of Celtic culture in central Europe. Before their expansion, the Germans inhabited N Germany, S Sweden and Denmark, and the shores of the Baltic. From these areas they spread out in great migrations southward, southeastward, and westward. Although the earliest mention of the Germans is by a Greek navigator who saw them in Norway and Jutland in the 4th cent. B.C. , their real appearance in history began with…
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Full text Article Germans

From The Columbia Encyclopedia
great ethnic complex of ancient Europe, a basic stock in the composition of the modern peoples of Sweden, Norway, Denmark, Iceland, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, N Italy, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, N and central France, Lowland Scotland, and England. From archaeology it is clear that the…
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Full text Article GERMANS

From Historical Dictionary of Australia
From 1871 to 1921, the German born were the largest non-British immigrant group in Australia. Their most important settlements were in South Australia and Queensland . The first German immigrants were 517 Old Lutherans from Klepsk in present-day Poland who came to South Australia in 1838 to practice…
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Full text Article GERMANS, EARLY

From Cassell's Peoples, Nations and Cultures Full text Article Europe
Germans, Early
A major group of peoples of Iron Age and early Medieval Europe who spoke Germanic languages. The earliest written references to the Germans date to the end of the 2nd century BC , when two tribes from Denmark, the CIMBRI and TEUTONES , migrated southwards and threatened the northern frontiers of the…
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Full text Article GERMANS, MODERN

From Cassell's Peoples, Nations and Cultures Full text Article Europe
The people of the Federal Republic of Germany. Numbering over 80 million, the Germans are, after the Russians, the most numerous of the European peoples. The German identity is now confined almost exclusively to Germany, but until World War II large German minorities were found in most eastern…
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Full text Article Germans

From Encyclopedia of Sex and Gender: Men and Women in the World's Cultures
ALTERNATIVE NAMES The German name is “Deutsche” from Germanic thiot (“nation/people”). It does not go back to an ancient name or term but was developed following the line: deutsche (German) language— Deutsche (Germans)— Deutschland (Germany). The term was first coined as “theodiscus” in 768 under…
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Full text Article Germany

From The Columbia Encyclopedia
(jûr'mӘnē), Ger. Deutschland , officially Federal Republic of Germany, republic (2015 est. pop. 81,708,000), 137,699 sq mi (356,733 sq km). Located in the center of Europe, it borders the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, and France on the west; Switzerland and Austria on the south; the Czech…
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Full text Article Germany

From The Oxford Companion to Food
notoriously divided into two states for most of the second half of the 20th century, had only been a single entity since 1871 when the first unified Germany was formed by Prince Otto von Bismarck. Previously the region was a collection of small independent states, with the separate German-speaking…
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Full text Article GERMANY

From Political Handbook of the World 2016-2017
GERMANY
Federal Republic of Germany Bundesrepublik Deutschland Political Status: Divided into British, French, Soviet, and U.S. occupation zones in July 1945; Federal Republic of Germany under democratic parliamentary regime established in Western zones on May 23, 1949; German Democratic Republic…
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Full text Article Germany

From Worldmark Encyclopedia of Religious Practices
Germany
POPULATION 81,147,265 ROMAN CATHOLIC 30.2 percent EVANGELICAL CHURCH IN GERMANY (EKD) 29.2 percent EVANGELICAL FREE CHURCHES 1.8 percent OTHER CHRISTIAN 1.6 percent ISLAM 4.9 percent JUDAISM 0.1 percent OTHER 1.6 percent NONAFFILIATED 30.6 percent Introduction A predominantly Christian country where…
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Full text Article Germany

From Political Handbook of the World 2018-2019
Germany
Federal Republic of Germany Political Status: Divided into British, French, Soviet, and U.S. occupation zones in July 1945; Federal Republic of Germany under democratic parliamentary regime established in Western zones on May 23, 1949; German Democratic Republic established under Communist auspices…
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