10 Facts About Pan-Germanism

Pan-Germanism, occasionally known as Pan-Germanicism, is a pan-nationalist political idea.

Pan-Germanism was highly influential in German politics in the 19th century during the unification of Germany when the German Empire was proclaimed as a nation-state in 1871 but without Austria, and the first half of the 20th century in the Austro-Hungarian Empire and the German Empire.

Today, Pan-Germanism is mainly limited to some nationalist groups in Germany and Austria.

Origins of Pan-Germanism began with the birth of Romantic nationalism during the Napoleonic Wars, with Friedrich Ludwig Jahn and Ernst Moritz Arndt being early proponents.

Pan-Germanism was widespread among the revolutionaries of 1848, notably among Richard Wagner and the Brothers Grimm.

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Jacob Grimm adopted Munch's anti-Danish Pan-Germanism and argued that the entire peninsula of Jutland had been populated by Germans before the arrival of the Danes and that thus it could justifiably be reclaimed by Germany, whereas the rest of Denmark should be incorporated into Sweden.

Pan-Germanism pointed out that Germany had more solid historical claims to large parts of France and England, and that Slavs—by the same reasoning—could annex parts of Eastern Germany.

In turn, this likely contributed to the fact that Pan-Germanism never caught on in Denmark as much as it did in Norway.

Pan-Germanism criticized the Holy Roman Emperors however for not pursuing an Ostpolitik resembling his own, while being politically focused exclusively on the south.

The scale of the Germans' defeat was unprecedented; Pan-Germanism became taboo because it had been tied to racist concepts of the "master race" and Nordicism by the Nazi party.