Brandenburg

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For other uses, see Brandenburg (disambiguation).

Flag
Image:Flag of Brandenburg.svg
Coat-of-Arms
Image:Brandenburg Wappen.svg
Capital:	Potsdam
Area:	29,478.14 km²
Inhabitants:	2.568.507 (31/12/2004)
pop. density:	87 people/km²
Website:	http://www.brandenburg.de/
ISO 3166-2:	DE-BR
Politics
Minister-president:	Matthias Platzeck (SPD)
Ruling party:	SPD/CDU coalition
Map
Image:Deutschland Lage von Brandenburg.svg

Brandenburg (help·info) (Lower Sorbian: Bramborska; Upper Sorbian: Braniborska) is one of Germany's sixteen Bundesländer (federal states). It lies in the east of the country as it is one of the new states created in 1990 upon the reunification of the former West Germany and East Germany. The capital is Potsdam. Brandenburg surrounds but excludes the national capital Berlin.

Historically Brandenburg was an independent state which grew to become the core of modern Germany (see below). The state of Brandenburg was named after the town of Brandenburg an der Havel.

1 Geography
- 1.1 Protected areas
2 Administration
3 History
4 List of minister presidents of Brandenburg
5 September, 2004 State Election
6 Miscellaneous
7 External links

[edit] Geography

Brandenburg is bordered by Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania in the north, Poland in the east, the Free State of Saxony in the south, Saxony-Anhalt in the west, and Lower Saxony in the northwest.

The Oder River forms a part of the eastern border, the Elbe River a portion of the western border. The main rivers in the state itself are the Spree and the Havel. In the southeast there is a wetlands region called the Spreewald; it is the northernmost part of Lusatia, where the Sorbs, a Slavic people, still live. These areas are bilingual, i.e., German and Sorbian are both used.

[edit] Protected areas

Image:Bockwindmuehle Borne (Naturparkverein Flaeming).jpg Brandenburg is known for its intact natural environment and its ambitious nature protection policy in the 1990s. After the political change, 15 large protected areas were founded, each of them has a state financed administration and rangers, who guide visitors and work for nature protection. Most protected areas have visitor centers.

National Park
- Lower Oder Valley National Park(106 km²)

Biosphere Reserves
- Spreewald Biosphere Reserve (474 km²)
- Schorfheide-Chorin Biosphere Reserve (1.291 km²)
- River Landscape Elbe-Brandenburg Biosphere Reserve (533 km²)

Nature Parks
- Barnim Nature Park (750 km²)
- Dahme-Heideseen Nature Park (594 km²)
- High Fläming Nature Park (827 km²)
- Märkische Schweiz Nature Park (204 km²)
- Niederlausitzer Heidelandschaft Nature Park (490 km²)
- Niederlausitzer Landrücken Nature Park (580 km²)
- Nuthe-Nieplitz Nature Park (623 km²)
- Schlaube Valley Nature Park (225 km²)
- Uckermark Lakes Nature Park (895 km²)
- Westhavelland Nature Park (1.315 km²)
- Stechlin-Ruppiner Land Nature Park (1.080 km²)

See also: List of places in Brandenburg.

[edit] Administration

Brandenburg is divided into fourteen (rural) counties (Landkreise),

and four urban districts (kreisfreie Städte),

[edit] History

In late medieval and early modern times, Brandenburg was one of seven Electorships of the Holy Roman Empire, and, along with Prussia, formed the original core of the German Empire, the first unified German state. It contained the future German capital Berlin and since 1618 both Brandenburg and Prussia, then Brandenburg-Prussia, were ruled by Hohenzollern dukes and later kings of Prussia. Franconian Nuremberg and Ansbach, Swabian Hohenzollern, and the eastern European connections of Berlin and the prince-elector together were instrumental in the rise of that state.

[edit] Early Middle Ages

Brandenburg is situated in territory known as Magna Germania. By 600 AD the first groups of Slavic people as well as Magyars, Avars, Hungarians arrived in Germany. By the early 900s Henry the Fowler and later king/emperors re-affirmed supremacy over the inhabitants up to the Oder river including Slavic settlements like Brenna Brandenburg, Budišin Bautzen, Chotebuž Kottbus and Misnia Meissen and many more. Henry became known as the city-builder. Further attacks by Hungarians from the south east and Vikings along northern Germany and Europe caused continued damage and unrest. In 948 Emperor Otto I the Great again established German control over the Slavic territory and founded the dioceses of Havelberg and Brandenburg. Due to the large influx of mixed population, referred to as Slavs, the territory under Margrave Gero became too much to handle by one margrave. When Gero died in 965 the empire sectioned the territory into several smaller marches, among them Saxon Eastmarch, Lusatian March, Landsberg March and Osterland. The margraves and counts held the same position as other imperial princes (Reichsfürsten).

Emperor Otto died young in 983. In the great uprising in 983 the Slavs wiped out German control from the territory of present-day Brandenburg. The monasteries were burned, priests and German officials killed or expelled. The Slavic peple living east of the Elbe River remained independent and pagan for the next 150 years.

[edit] 12th century

By the beginning of the 12th century the Ottonian German kings and emperors re-established government over the mixed Slav-inhabited lands of present-day Brandenburg. Many Slavic inhabitants survived the conquests and live there still today, such as the Sorbs in Lusatia. The church brought bishoprics which, with their walled towns, afforded protection for the townspeople from attack. With the monks and bishops, the history of the town of Brandenburg, which in time became the state of Brandenburg, began. In 1134, in the wake of a German crusade against the Wends, the German magnate Albert the Bear was granted the Northern March by the Emperor Lothar II. For some time up until the 15th century, some part of the area that would become Brandenburg was inhabited by the Slavic Wends, who still make up a part of the area's modern population.

Albert's control of the region was nominal for several decades, but he engaged in a variety of campaigns against the Wends, as well as more diplomatic efforts which saw his control become more real by the middle of the century. In 1150, he formally inherited Brandenburg from its last Wendish ruler, Pribislav. Albert, and his descendants the Ascanians, then made considerable progress in Christianizing and cultivating the lands. There was never any distinction made by any of the German rulers and the Slavic and German tribes intermarried. During the 13th century they began acquiring territory east of the Oder River, later known as the Neumark (see also Altmark). Image:Belzig Burg 2.JPG

[edit] 13th century

In 1320 the Brandenburg Ascanian line came to an end, and from 1323 until 1373 Brandenburg was under the control of the Wittelsbach family, better known as the rulers of Bavaria. After a period of rule by the Luxembourg dynasty, however, the margraviate was granted in 1415 by Emperor Sigismund to the House of Hohenzollern, which would rule until the end of World War I. From the Golden Bull in 1356 until the Empire's end in 1806, the Margrave of Brandenburg was also one of the Electors of the Holy Roman Empire.

[edit] 16th century

Brandenburg was one of the German states to convert in 1539 to Protestantism in the wake of the Protestant Reformation, and generally did quite well in the century following, as the dynasty expanded its lands to include the Duchy of Prussia in 1618 and, along the lower Rhine, the Duchy of Cleves (1614) and elsewhere. The result was a sprawling, disconnected country that was in poor shape to defend itself during the Thirty Years' War.

Towards the end of that devastating conflict and after, however, Brandenburg (and its successor states) enjoyed a string of talented rulers who gradually maneuvered their country towards the heights of power in Europe. The first of these was Frederick William, the so-called "Great Elector", who worked tirelessly to rebuild and consolidate the nation. He moved the capital from the town of Brandenburg to Potsdam. Image:Potsdam - Schloss Sanssouci.jpg When Frederick William died in 1688, he was followed by his son Frederick, third of that name in Brandenburg. As the lands that had been acquired in Prussia were outside the formal boundaries of the Holy Roman Empire, Frederick assumed (as Frederick I) the title of "King in Prussia" (1701), basing this promotion from margrave on his title to what were, in actuality, vast but less agriculturally valuable stretches of sandy ground. Brandenburg was still the most important portion of the kingdom (and the state was often referred to informally as Brandenburg-Prussia) but for the purposes of accuracy, the continuation of this history can be found at Kingdom of Prussia.

When Prussia was subdivided into provinces in 1815, the territory of the Margraviate of Brandenburg became the Province of Brandenburg. In 1881, the City of Berlin was separated from the Province of Brandenburg. Brandenburg had an area of 39,039 km² and a population of 2.6 million (1925). After World War II, the Neumark, the part of Brandenburg east of the Oder-Neisse Line, was annexed by Poland; the remainder of the province became a state when Prussia was dissolved in 1947. The State of Brandenburg was dissolved in 1952 by the government of East Germany.

[edit] Reunification

The present State of Brandenburg was re-established after German reunification in 1990. In 1995 the governments of Berlin and Brandenburg proposed to merge the states in order to form a new state with the name of "Berlin-Brandenburg". The merger was rejected in a plebiscite in 1996: While West Berliners voted for a merger, East Berliners and Brandenburgers voted against it.

Image:Matplatzeck.jpg

[edit] List of minister presidents of Brandenburg

For earlier rulers, see List of rulers of Brandenburg.

1947 - 1949: Karl Steinhoff (SED, formerly SPD)
1949 - 1952: Rudolf Jahn (SED)
1990 - 2002: Manfred Stolpe (SPD)
since 2002: Matthias Platzeck (SPD)

[edit] September, 2004 State Election

party	1999		2004		Difference
party	%	S	%	S	%	S
Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD)	39.3	37	31.9	33	-7.4	-4
The Left Party.PDS (PDS)	23.3	22	28.0	29	+4.7	+7
Christian Democratic Union (CDU)	26.6	25	19.4	20	-7.2	-5
German People's Union (DVU)	5.3	5	6.1	6	+0.8	+1
all others	5.5	0	14.6	0	+9.1	±0