Saxony, home of Martin Luther, was the first country to be divided over the issue of the Protestant faith. While Ernestine Saxony became the heartland of the Reformation, the neighbouring principality of Albertine Saxony saw the beginnings of the Counter-Reformation. The two Saxonies provide almost perfect laboratory conditions for comparing contrary reactions to the Reformation. By investigating the lives, piety and politics of the Wettin princes, Frederick the Wise, John the Constant and George of Saxony the Reformation is revealed to have been a true game changer. Christian humanism, attempts at church reform and sympathy for the Reformation did not correlate neatly. Rather, the dynamics of religious conversion disrupted lines of continuity from the Middle Ages into the early modern era. That disruption testifies to the groundbreaking impact of Protestant ideas. At the same time, early resistance to Luther in Electoral Saxony proves that even in his homeland, Reformation and Catholic reform were alternatives right from the very beginning.

After losing 500,000 soldiers in Russia during 1812, Napoleon quickly rebuilt his army in early 1813 to stop the pursuing Russians in Germany. His strategic situation took an unfavorable turn after Prussia broke its alliance with him and joined the Russians and British to form the Sixth Coalition. With Austria choosing to remain neutral, the Allies hoped to achieve a victory to convince Vienna to join the Coalition. Although the Allies took the offensive against his raw conscripts, Napoleon remained the master of operations. He drove the Allied army over 200 miles eastward in one month, earning important yet indecisive victories at Lützen and Bautzen. With the Allied army pinned against the Oder River in eastern Silesia, Napoleon agreed to an armistice brokered by the Austrians. Both sides used the time to build up massive forces and to woe Austria but Napoleon’s intransigence drove them to join the Coalition. After the armistice expired on 17 August, Napoleon won his only victory in the campaign at Dresden on 27 August. For the first time in the history of the coalition wars, the Allies had a plan of operations that Napoleon could not overcome. For the next six weeks, he chased phantoms, exhausting his troops, and grinding his army into the ground while the Allies defeated his subordinates in Silesia, Bohemia, and Saxony. Finally, tired of running after an elusive enemy, Napoleon allowed himself to be surrounded in the city of Leipzig in the hope of finally waging and winning a decisive battle. The contest started on 16 October and ended with Napoleon commencing the retreat to France with a battered army on 19 October. Germany was lost.

In representing print in the context of the history of human knowledge more generally, the national libraries were at an advantage. However, while they could offer permanent exhibitions, whether of books or antiquities, they could not easily present them in the contexts of modern achievements. For this, the multitude of temporary exhibitions, presenting old and new objects side by side, offered another perspective. They also reached audiences unfamiliar with the fixed presentations whether in London or Paris.

examines the period from 1949-1961, the first decade of the GDR. The chapter explores Marxist perceptions of jazz from both sides of the Atlantic that informed socialist-realist doctrine, contextualizing these views in the years before and after Joseph Stalin’s death. During this a newly-formed State Commission for the Arts (STAKOKU) sought to shield German cultural values against supposed American cultural decadence, restrictions that contributed to widespread dissent that peaked in a broader uprising in 1953. Analyzing the East German musical discourse of the 1950s that sought to rehabilitate jazz, this chapter explores its links to the 19th-century tradition of Hausmusik, including the prolific West Berlin jazz scene that sought to attract fans from East Berlin and beyond. Critically, at this time the STASI initiated its surveillance of the jazz scene, recruiting secret informants that proved pivotal in shaping East German jazz life. Ultimately, galvanized by political pressures and rising defections to the West throughout the 1950s, East German leadership responded by building the Berlin Wall. Dividing the city and country sorely impacted the spread of jazz activities, and resulted in the formation of a jazz scene specific to the GDR.

The reception of Brahms’s music beyond his home city of Hamburg began in 1853, when the young composer made his first extended journey and presented his compositions to some of the leading figures of German contemporary music: Robert Schumann, Robert Franz and Franz Liszt. Each reacted to these unpublished works in distinctive ways.

Robert Schumann, with whom Brahms spent the whole month of October in Düsseldorf,was instantly enthralled.

‘Today, my dear wife, née Nissen, successfully delivered a healthy boy. 7th May 1833. J. J. Brahms.’ Thus, on 8 May 1833Johann Jakob Brahms announced the birth of his first son Johannes in the local paper, the Privileged Weekly General News of and for Hamburg (Privilegirte wöchentliche gemeinnützige Nachrichten von und für Hamburg). At a time when such announcements were the exception, this was a clear sign of pride. Johann Jakob Brahms or Brahmst, as he also spelled it, was born on 1 June 1806 in Heide in Holstein, the second son of the innkeeper and trader Johann Brahms, who had moved to Heide from Brunsbüttel via Meldorf. His ancestors were from Lower Saxony. Johann Jakob completed a five-year apprenticeship as a city wait in Heide and Wesselburen, during which he learned the flugelhorn, flute, violin, viola and cello, then standard instruments. In early 1826, the young journeyman began his travels with his certificate of apprenticeship, received in December 1825.

Robert Schumann’s 1853 essay ‘New Paths’ is famous for its prophetic introduction of the young Johannes Brahms to the wider German musical community. In this, his last piece of published criticism, Schumann presented Brahms, then a virtually unknown young composer, as a Messiah-like figure for a nascent musical era, one who would be called to ‘give the highest expression to the times in an ideal manner’ The final sentence of Schumann’s essay has often been overlooked, but it is significant for the glimpse that it offers of the place that he envisioned for Brahms in the future: ‘In every era there presides a secret league of kindred spirits. Draw the circle tighter, you who belong together, that the truth of art may shine ever more clearly, spreading joy and blessings everywhere!’ [see Ch. 31 ‘Germany’].

The reception of Brahms’s music beyond his home city of Hamburg began in 1853, when the young composer made his first extended journey and presented his compositions to some of the leading figures of German contemporary music: Robert Schumann, Robert Franz and Franz Liszt. Each reacted to these unpublished works in distinctive ways.

Robert Schumann, with whom Brahms spent the whole month of October in Düsseldorf,was instantly enthralled.