Western Civilization - History Of European Society

Europe in the Belle Époque, 1871–1914505

the Prussian-dominated North German Confederation.
The result was the German Empire (called the Second
Empire, or Second Reich). Unquestionably the most
powerful state on the continent, it stretched from the
newly annexed French provinces of Alsace and Lorraine
in the west to the Lithuanian frontier on the Baltic Sea
(nine hundred miles away); its population roughly
equaled France and Spain combined or Italy and
Austria-Hungary combined. The German army had
proven its mastery of the battlefield; German industry
was beginning to demonstrate a comparable superiority.
Just as the French had been forced to swallow German
military leadership, the British increasingly lost ground

to German industrial might. Germany surpassed

Britain in iron consumption by the late 1890s, then

in coal consumption in the early twentieth century

(see chart 26.1).

Although the German army and economy were the

most modern in Europe, the government and its institu-

tions remained rooted in the eighteenth century. Prus-

sia had created Germany, and the German constitution

(1871) showed the dominance of Prussia. The empire

was a federal government of twenty-five unequal states.

Many historic states survived with their monarchies

intact but subordinated to the Prussian king, who was

crowned emperor (Kaiser) of Germany. The empire thus

Crete Cyprus

Sicily

Sardinia

Corsica

Mediterranean Sea

Black Sea

Atlantic

Ocean

North

Sea

Baltic

Sea

Arctic Ocean

FINLAND

GREECE

MOROCCO

ALGERIA TUNISIA

ITALY

SPAIN

PORTUGAL

FRANCE

GREAT

BRITAIN

BELGIUM

NETHERLANDS

LUXEMBOURG

SWITZERLAND AUSTRIA

HUNGARY

POLAND

SERBIAROMANIA

BULGARIA

BOSNIA

HERZ.

MONTENEGRO

ALBANIA

MA

CEDO

NIA

CROATIA -

SLOVENIA

BES

SA

RA

BI

A

CRIMEA

DENMARK

GERMAN

EMPIRE

NORWAY

and

SWEDEN

RUSSIAN

EMPIRE

OTTOMAN EMPIRE

AUSTRIA-

HUNGARY

Athens

Naples

Rome

Venice

Tunis

Tangier Algiers

Lisbon

Madrid

Marseilles

Paris Munich

London

Kristiania Stockholm

Helsingfors

St. Petersburg

Moscow

Kiev

Odessa

Sinope

Constantinople

Budapest

Vienna

Prague

Warsaw

Dresden

Berlin

Copenhagen

Sevastopol

RhineR

.

ElbeR

.

Od

erR.

VolgaR.

DanubeR.

PoR.

Ebro

R.

Al

ps

Mts

.

TaurusMts.

Pyrene

esMts.

Balear

icIs

land

s

0 250 500 Miles

0 250 500 750 Kilometers

German Empire

Austria-Hungary

Italy

France

Ottoman Empire

MAP 26.1

Europe in 1871