The Impact of the Napoleonic Wars on the Evolution of German Nationalism

Cílem bakalářské práce je analýza vlivu napoleonských válek na vývoj německého národního hnutí v letech 1806?1815. Práce je vypracována na základě dostupné literatury v českém, anglickém, francouzském a německém jazyce. Jsou použity metody analýzy, kompilace a komparace.Katedra filozofieObhájenoThe goal of this work is to explain the impact of the Napoleonic Wars on the evolution of the German national movement in the early 19th century. As it attempts to prove, Napoleon?s dominance over Central Europe was a crucial impulse for the genesis of German nationalism. The work is based upon published German documents as well as scholar literature written in Czech, English, French and German. The rise of modern nationalism is generally connected with the crisis of self-identity and the dissociation from the others. Both exactly happened when, first, the old structure of the Holy Roman Empire was destroyed owing to Napoleon?s aggressive policy and a considerable number of Germans had to face new socio-political situation and, second, the same Germans suffered from the Napoleonic hegemony with negative political, economic and social impacts on their lives. At that very moment some members of intellectual, artistic, political and military circles started to advocate the idea of German nation that, as they argued, was connected by mutual language, culture, history, customs and enemy: Napoleonic France. As they further claimed, the Germans were to join their forces, forget the political heterogeneity of Germany divided into small German states and fight arm in arm against the French. The final goal was to be, according to the majority of the German patriots, the freedom of their German homeland and, according to a considerable number of them, a political unity of Germany. This German national movement won the supporters of all social classes and fully revealed itself after Napoleon?s defeat in Russia at the end of 1812. During the following year, the so-called Wars of Liberation began and the patriotic wave touched the whole of Germany. The thousands of German volunteers went to fight against the French, some of them with the desire not only to free Germany but also to see it united at the end. This state of affairs was caused by the years of oppression which made the people more inclined to adopt the ideas of German national movement. Though the number of ?German nationalist? cannot be overestimated for the period around 1815, the seed had already been sowed and gradually gained more and more supporters among German people. At this nation-building process the remembrance of the Wars of Liberation ? and important chapter of German collective memory ? played a significant role