German empire: Did you mean...?

A captured German bunker with 50-mm gun at Gold Beach, attacked during the D-Day Normandy landings of 6 June 1944. (Imperial War Museums)

A rapier made by German swordmaker Meves Berns c. 1610-1620 CE. Steel blade, hilt decorated with silver and copper wire. Solingen, Germany. 120.2 cm (47 5/16 in). (Courtesy of the Metropolitan Museum of Art)

A photograph taken during the Christmas Truce of 1914 on the Western Front during the First World War (1914-18). Possibly showing Riflemen Andrew (middle) and Grigg (second from the right, background) of the London Rifle Brigade with troops...

A photograph taken during the Christmas Truce of 1914 on the Western Front during the First World War (1914-18). British troops from the Northumberland Hussars, 7th Division, Bridoux-Rouge Banc Sector. (Imperial War Museums)

So, we haven't talked much about Italy and Germany so far in Crash Course Euro, and that's because prior to the mid-19th Century CE, those two nation-states weren't really a thing. Today we'll look at how Italy and Germany pulled it together...

The Holy Roman Empire officially lasted from 962 to 1806. It was one of Europe’s largest medieval and early modern states, but its power base was unstable and continually shifting. The Holy Roman Empire was not a unitary state, but a confederation...

The Anschluss ('fusion') of 12 March 1938 was the annexation and formal union of Austria with Germany. Adolf Hitler (1889-1945), the Nazi leader of Germany, dreamed of an empire which enclosed all German speakers, his 'Greater Germany'. Hitler's...

Blitzkrieg ('lightning war') is a military tactic combining air and land forces deployed at speed against the enemy's weaker points while the rear lines are simultaneously disrupted by acts of sabotage and bombing. Speed, concentration, and...

The Roman Empire, at its height (c. 117), was the most extensive political and social structure in western civilization. Building upon the foundation laid by the Roman Republic, the empire became the largest and most powerful political and...

The Mongol Empire (1206-1368) was founded by Genghis Khan (r. 1206-1227), first Great Khan or 'universal ruler' of the Mongol peoples. Genghis forged the empire by uniting nomadic tribes of the Asian steppe and creating a devastatingly effective...