The financial crisis of 1873 that triggered a depression in Europe and North America that lasted from 1873 until 1879, and even longer in some countries, had its first symptoms in the Austro-Hungarian capital, Vienna, the largest city in Austria.
The unification of Germany as a nation state occurred on January 18, 1871, at the Versailles Palace in the Hall of Mirrors in France. Versailles was the 'seat of political power' in the Kingdom of France from 1682, when Louis XIV moved the royal court from Paris, until the royal family was forced to return to Paris in October 1789, within 3 months after the beginning of the French Revolution. Versailles is therefore famous not only as a building, but as a symbol of the system of absolute monarchy of the Ancient Regime.
The Hall of Mirrors is the central gallery of the Versailles and the principal and most remarkable feature of Louis XIV's third building campaign of the Palace (1678-1684). The principal feature is the 17 mirror-clad arches that reflect the 17 arcaded windows to overlook the gardens. Each arch contains 21 mirrors with a total complement of 357 used in the decoration of the gallery. The arches themselves are fixed between marble pilasters whose gilded bronze capitals depict the symbols of France, the fleur-de-lys and the Gallic cockerel or rooster.
Princes of the German states gathered there to proclaim William I of Prussia as German Emperor after the French capitulation in the Franco-Prussian War. The transition had been planned for some time before the capitulation through alliances formal and informal between princely rulers. William was known for his anti-Catholicism and tough handling of subordinates, disguised in his polite, gentlemanly conservative, and more open to certain liberal ideas.
A liberalized incorporation law in the New Germany gave impetus to the foundation of new enterprises and the incorporation of already established ones. Euphoria over the military victory against France in 1871 and the influx of capital from the payment by France of war reparations fueled stock market speculation in railways, factories, docks, steamships -the same industrial branches that expanded unsustainable in the United States.
Otto Eduard Leopold, Prince of Bismarck, Duke of Lauen-Burg was a conservative Prussian who dominated German and European affairs from the 1860s until 1890. In the 1860s he engineered a series of wars that unified the German States, significantly and deliberately excluding Austria, into a powerful German Empire under Prussian leadership. He remained as an undisputed world champion at the game of multilateral diplomatic chess for almost 20 years after 1871devoted himself conveniently, exclusively and successfully, in maintaining "peace" between the powers.
Otto was born in Schon-Hausen, west Berlin, Prussian province of Saxony, formed by the merging of territories, which were formerly part of the Kingdom of Saxony and ceded to Prussia in 1815.
The House of Wet-Tin, a dynasty of counts, dukes, prince-electors and kings that once ruled Saxony and Thuringia for 1,000 years. The royal house, one of the oldest of Europe, can be traced back in time to the town of Wet-Tin, Saxony-Anhalt. Otto I (23 November 912 - 7 May 973) traditionally known as Otto I the Great, emperor of the Holy Roman Empire from 962 until his death in 973, was the older son of Henry I 'the Fowler' and Matilda.
Henry I 'the Fowler' was the first of the Ottonian Dynasty of German kings and emperors and known to be the founder and 1st king of the medieval German state known as East Francia. An avid hunter, with the epithet 'the Fowler.' He was fixing his birding nets when messengers arrived to inform him that he was to be king. He was the son of Otto the Illustrious, Duke of Saxony, and his wife Hedwiga. Hedwiga's father was Henry of Franconia, the ancestral lord of a castle named Baben-Berg on the River Main, the longest River (527km/327mi) lying entirely in Germany, and the noble class ruling the House of Austria from 976 to 1246.
Henry of Franconia, was the most important East Frankish general during the reign of Charles the Fat. East Francia was formed out of the division of the Carolingian Empire after the death of Emperor Louis the Pious, at the same time as West Francia and Middle Francia. The East-West division gradually hardened into the establishment of separate kingdoms, with East Francia becoming the Kingdom of Germany and West Francia the Kingdom of France.
Charles the Fat was the youngest of 3 sons of Louis the German, 1st King of East Francia, and Emma, a Welf. The Elder House of Welf or Wolf was a Frankish noble dynasty documented since the 9th century and closely related to the Carolingian dynasty. The ancestry of the Welf can be traced back to the Skirian prince Edeko (d.469), a confidant of King Attila the Hun, and to his son Odoacer, King of Italy from 476. They are known a the Scirri in the writings of Pliny the Elder, stating that the territory extending from the Vistula River, as far as Eningia, probably Finland, was inhabited by the Wends, the Scirri, and the Hirri. An incident of demonic possession is recorded in Charles the Fat's youth, in which he was said to have been foaming from his mouth before he was taken to the church's altar. This greatly affected his father and himself. Charles' father, Louis II was Charlesmagne's grandson, from whom he won special affection since his early years were spent at his grandfather court.
Otto Von Bismarck, using his ancestral background, started his political and financial control over Europe using as a starting point a career in law (1832-1833)at the University of Gottingen, founded in 1734 by George II, King of Great Britain, as a public comprehensive research university, in Germany. George II was born outside Britain in Northern Germany. His grandmother, Sophia of Hanover, became 2nd in line to the British throne after about 50 Catholics higher in line were excluded by the Act of Settlement 1701 and the Acts of Union 1707, which restricted the succession to Protestants. After the deaths of Sophia and Anne, Queen of Great Britain, in 1774, his father George I, Elector of Hanover, inherited the British throne. Both of George's parents committed adultery, and in 1694 their marriage was dissolved on the pretext that Sophia had abandoned her husband. George spoke only French, the language of diplomacy and the court, then he learned German, English and Italian, and studied genealogy, military ancient history and battle tactics with particular diligence. This is the reason why the University of Gottingen was founded by him. He left the place putting his law studies in jeopardy in the pursuing of 2 English girls, none of whom he married.
At Gottingen, Otto befriended an American student John Lothrop Motley, who later became an eminent historian and diplomat. He remained close to Otto and in his novel Morton's Hope about life in a German university, he described Otto as a reckless and dashing eccentric, extremely gifted in his pursuing of power disguised as a charming and noble in spirit.
Then Otto Von Bismarck enrolled at the University of Berlin (1833-1835), founded in 1810 anchoring traditional subjects such as science, law, philosophy, history, theology, and medicine. In 1838, while he stationed as an army reservist in Greifswald, he studied agriculture .
Around the age of 30, Otto met a woman, Marie Von Thadden, married to one of his friends, with whom he formed an intense relationship. Under her influence, Otto became a Pietist Lutheran. At Marie's deathbed from typhoid he prayed for the first time since his childhood. He married Marie's cousin, a devout Pietist Lutheran with whom he produced 3 children. In 1847, at 32 he was chosen to be a representative to the newly created Prussian legislature. From that specific time and until his death
he was just behind the curtains directing the course of Europe power and when he himself in his lasts years tried to write his autobiography he often increased the drama and presented himself in a favorable light. He was diagnosed with gangrene in his foot, but refused to accept treatment for it; as a result he had difficulty walking and was often confined to a wheelchair. After a painful stage due to his illness, he died on July 30, 1898, at the age of 83. He managed a posthumous snub by having his own sarcophagus inscribed with the words: "A loyal German of Emperor Wilhelm I."
Following unification, Germany became one of the most powerful nations in Europe. Otto's astute, cautious, and pragmatic foreign policies allowed Germany to 'peacefully' retain power, maintaining 'amiable' diplomacy with almost all European nations. France was the exception because of the consequences of the Franco-Prussian War over its monarchy and became one of Germany's most bitter enemies in Europe. Austria, too, was weakened by the unification of Germany, though to a much lesser extent than France. Otto believed that as long as Britain, Russia, and Italy, were assured of the 'peaceful nature' of the German unification, French belligerency could be contained. His diplomatic feats were undone, however, by Kaisser Wilhelm II, whose policies unified other European powers against Germany in time for World War I.
Otto was a demonic and genius who was deeply vengeful, even toward his closest friends and family members. His disguise and various postures, concealed an ice-cold contempt for his fellow human beings and a methodical determination to control and ruin them. His easy chat combined with blunt truths, partial revelations, and outright deceptions, was part of his charade in pursue of the greedy feeling of being in control. He just enjoyed his extraordinary ability to see how groups react and the willingness to use violence to make them obey, the capacity to read group behavior and the supernatural force to make them move to his will. Altogether gave him the chance to feel the evil force that control world power and to exercise it in his sovereign-self.
Otto's spirit was intimidating and unscrupulous, playing to others, frailties, not their strengths. An ambivalent figure, a man of great and evil skills who was not able to leave on records a lasting system in place to guide successors less skilled than himself, being a committed monarchist himself.
Otto, an extraordinary fellow with a gifted sense of directness and lucidity, allowed no effective constitutional check over the power invested in the Emperor, thus placing a time bomb in the foundation of the Germany that he himself created. During most of his nearly 30 years long tenure, Otto held undisputed control over government's policies. He was well supported by the war minister and personal friend, Albrecht Von Roon as well as the leader of the Prussian army, Helmuth Von Moltke, in facilitated the power he needed in his personal decisions over the steps taken to silence or restrain political opposition. This is evidently proved by the laws restricting the freedom of press, and the anti-socialist laws. He crafted a culture war against the Catholic Church until he realized that Catholic's conservatism could be used to make them natural allies against the Socialists.
Otto's ambition was to be assimilated into the mediatized houses of Germany. The mediatization was the major territorial restructuring that took place between 1802 and 1814 by means of mediatization and secularization of large number of imperial states. They were ecclesiastical principalities, free imperial cities, secular principalities and other minor self-ruling entities that lost their independent status and were absorbed into the remaining states. It came under relentless military and diplomatic pressure from revolutionary France and Napoleon. It constituted the most extensive redistribution of property and territories in German history prior to 1945. Germany before the 19th century did not coalesce into a relatively centralized nation like most of its neighbors did. Instead, the Holy Roman empire ended up a polyglot congeries of literally hundreds of nearly sovereign states and territories raging in size from considerable to minuscule. The traditional explanation for this fragmentation (ecclesiastical [136], secular lords [173], free imperial cities [85]) has focused on the gradual usurpation by the princes of the powers. Otto attempted to persuade Kaiser Wilhelm I that he should be endowed with the sovereign duchy of Lauen-Burg, in reward for his service to the imperial family and the German empire. This was on the understanding that Otto would immediately restore the duchy to Prussia; all he wanted was the status and privileges of a mediatized family for himself and his descendants. He was rejected by Kaiser Wilhelm II since he was informed about Otto's ambition. After being forced to resign at his position as a Chancellor, he received the purely honorific title of "Duke of Lauen-Burg,"without the duchy itself and the sovereignty that would have transformed his family into a mediatized House. Otto regarded it as a mockery of his ambition, and he considered nothing more cruel than this action of the emperor.
Upon Otto's death in 1898 his dukedom, held only for his lifetime, became extinct.
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