Elbe duchies

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The duchies of Schleswig, Holstein and Lauenburg in the 19th century

Elbe duchies is a German collective term used especially in the 19th century for the duchies of Schleswig , Holstein and (depending on the time and context) Lauenburg . In the Schleswig-Holstein question of the 19th century, the term can represent an attempt to emphasize the historical, cultural and constitutional ties between Schleswig and Holstein and to play down Schleswig's close ties to Denmark . Seen in this way, the Elbe forms the geographical opposite pole to the Eider , whose 1000-year-old function as a border river was of elementary importance for the Danish National Liberals.

Christian Jansen criticized the expression as "deliberate misleading, however, common in contemporary [1860s, note] literature, because only Holstein touched the Elbe in the south ."

The historian and politician Theodor Mommsen used the collective term because he attached decisive geostrategic importance to the three duchies taken together : Their location between the North Sea and the Baltic Sea made the Elbe duchies for Prussia / Germany the “key to the ocean, to world politics ”. In doing so, he broke away from a historical-legal and linguistic-national approach and anticipated considerations of great power politics .

Sometimes the term is still used, especially where the duchies, referring to the nationalist discourse of the 19th century, appear as undoubtedly German areas of interest and assets.

historical overview

In 1440 Schleswig and Holstein formed a Schleswig-Holstein state for the first time, after the Danish King Christoph III. the Schleswig fief of the Schauenburgers had changed from a personal to a hereditary one. The Schleswig-Holstein knighthood campaigned for the continuation of the connection and only wanted to accept a common sovereign. Christian I of Denmark asserted his claims by granting political and economic privileges. The Treaty of Ripen (1460) began a close legal connection between Schleswig, Holstein and Denmark for over 400 years. Holstein led the Danish king as a German fiefdom (duchy since 1474), Schleswig analogously as a Danish fiefdom. Unlike Holstein, Schleswig was never part of the Holy Roman Empire , but after its establishment as a duchy around 1200 it was no longer directly considered part of the actual Danish kingdom. However, Danish imperial laws were still valid in Schleswig until the 16th century. In terms of language, Holstein was (Lower) German-speaking, Schleswig, on the other hand, was characterized by both Danish, German and North Frisian, with the Danish and Frisian dialects extending even further south until the language change within Schleswig.

The Duchy of Saxony-Lauenburg did not fall to the Danish king until 1815. Allocated to Prussia at the Congress of Vienna , it was given to the Danish crown on June 4, 1815 by being exchanged for Western Pomerania. The former conglomerate state, consisting of Denmark, the duchies, Norway and the Danish-Norwegian possessions in the North Atlantic, was summarized in the 18th and 19th centuries as the entire Danish state .

In 1848, the Schleswig-Holstein Uprising (First Schleswig War) led to a conflict over the national ties to Schleswig. Schleswig was then claimed by both German and Danish national liberals. After the end of the war, the London Protocol laid down the existence of the entire Danish state by the major European powers, but at the same time it was stipulated that Schleswig should not be bound more closely to Denmark than Holstein. From this, however, a constitutional conflict developed in the following years, which was to lead to the German-Danish War in 1864. First of all, the Bundestag in Frankfurt suspended the entire state constitution for the member state of Holstein in 1858. In November 1863, Denmark finally passed the November Constitution, which tied Schleswig more closely to Denmark than Holstein. This in turn was viewed by the German side as a violation of the London Protocol and at the end of 1863 led to the federal execution of the federal duchies of Holstein and Lauenburg . On February 1, 1864, Prussian and Austrian troops finally crossed the border river Eider - against the protest of the German Confederation - and thus marked the beginning of the German-Danish War . The war ultimately ended with the defeat of Denmark. Negotiations about a possible national division of Schleswig failed. On October 30, 1864, the three duchies became a Prussian-Austrian condominium . The Treaty of Gastein (August 14, 1865) redistributed responsibilities: Prussia exercised community rights in Schleswig, Austria in Holstein; Lauenburg came to Prussia in personal union.

With the victory of Prussia over Austria in 1866, all rights were transferred to Prussia alone ( Peace of Prague of 23 August ). The inheritance claims of the House of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Augustenburg were settled with financial compensation. The existence of the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein ended on January 12, 1867, when they became part of Prussia as the province of Schleswig-Holstein . Lauenburg lost its formal status as a duchy in 1876 when it was incorporated into the province of Schleswig-Holstein.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Christian Jansen: "... wished to be a citizen." Theodor Mommsen and German politics in the first half of the sixties . In: Christian Jansen, Hans Mommsen (ed.): From the task of freedom. Political Responsibility and Civil Society in the 19th and 20th Centuries. Festschrift for Hans Mommsen on November 5, 1995. Akademie Verlag, Berlin 1995, ISBN 3-05-002835-1 . Pp. 29-49, p. 44.
  2. ^ The annexation of Schleswig-Holstein , in: Theodor Mommsen, speeches and essays , Berlin 1905, pp. 373-401.
  3. ↑ See, for example, Ulrich Schwarze : The Art of Possible, 800–1871. From the empire without power to the small German solution , Tübingen 2013, published by right-wing Hohenrain Verlag . ISBN 978-3-89180-096-6 , p. 222 ff.
  4. ↑ Robert Bohn: History of Schleswig-Holstein , CH Beck, 2nd edition Munich 2015, p. 28.
  5. ↑ Robert Bohn, p. 40.
  6. ^ Christian von Ditfurth: German history for dummies , Weinheim 2009, ISBN 978-3-527-70322-7 , p. 351.
  7. ^ Karl N. Bock: Middle Low German and today's Low German in the former Duchy of Schleswig , København 1948, page 42/43