Prussia ,State or Country?

[The Scourge]

Can somebody help me settle an argument.
I say Prussia was a Country in it's own right .
It had it's own monarchy ,it's own currency etc ,but my brother insists it was a State.
So who's right?
And if it's my Brother ,then what's the difference between a State and a Country?

[hotingzilla]

I am not 100% certain. To be a state, you must also be in a confederation or something like that.

Prussia was probably a country, since the war between France and Prussia was called the Franco-Prussian in 1871.

[-Isapostolos-]

Prussia was officially part of the Holy Roman empire, and sometime later leader of the North German confederation.

However, since Prussia had land outside the HRE (east Prussia) it could get an own King and goverment and ignore the emporer mostly. Therefor Prussia really was a country.

[The Scourge]

Thanks for the replys ,and I think you're both right.
But what about the United Kingdom?
Scotland Whales and England are all seen as separate countries.

[fenir]

Prussia was a Country unto itself.

The King of Prussia, Where Prussia itself is not part of the HRE.
However because Prussia had HRE territory, it allowed it to engage in HRE policy and Parliments. But not all HRE concerned Prussia itself. Because Prussian Borders outside the HRE remained outside the Emporers control. Therefore allowing the Prussian King to Keep the HRE not in War, while allowing Prussia to fight the Russians, Swedes, and Austrians.
It later went on to fight Austria for the German speaking Leadership role. Hence the Prussian King became an Emporer. And Austria never joined to HRE.


Hope that helps, if you need any information on it? atleast in more depth, let me know.


fenir

[TheSilverKnight]

I believe that Prussia, for a while, was a vassal state of the King of Poland until 1657/1660, but when it became independent, since Prussia is outside of the HRE, then it could be considered a country. Brandenburg, I imagine, would have to be responsible for loyalty to the HRE, but I'm not sure about that.

[AlexPeters]

Yes, you're right SilverKnight. A brief description of the HRE and it's parts could be found here.

A brief history of Brandenburg/Preussen:

The House of Hohenzollern is ruling the Electorate of Brandenburg (Kurbrandenburg, part of the HRE) and some of the line are also
leading the Teutonic Order.
1515 The Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I. officialy accepts Polands rights on Prussia.
A series of small wars between Poland, Russia, Denmark and the Teutonic Order leads to the defeat of the Order.
Last War with Teutonic Order 1519-1525

Image from: Ostpreussisches Landsmuseum Lueneburg
Albrecht von Hohenzollern (last Grand Master of the Teutonic Order)
transformed the remaining parts (Eastern Prussia) of the Order's terretory to a secular Dukedom of Prussia in 1525

Map of the Order's terretories in 1525

Map of 1525 (includes Kurbrandenburg and the Homeland of the House of Hohenzollern/Zollern)

1618 the rights on Prussia go to the House of Hohenzollern (Brandenburg line) by heritage, but it's still a vassal state under Polish rule.
~1660 after the war between Sweden and Poland (1655-60), Prussia officialy becomes part of the Electorate of Brandenburg under

Image from: Preussen.de
Friedrich Wilhelm 'The Grand Elector' Elector of Brandenburg


Image from: Preussen.de
Friedrich III. Elector of Brandenburg (as Friedrich I. King of Prussia, Grandfather of Friedrich 'The Great')
crowned himself King of Prussia in 1701


Image from: Preussen.de
Wilhelm I. King of Prussia and German Emperor
German Emperor in 1871 (crowned in Versailles after the victory in the Franco-Prussian War):

Image from: Reichspraesident-Friedrich-Ebert-Gedenkstaette

Map of 1871

Alex

P.S. I've edited the post to respect the copyrights. The pictures of paintings are reproductions of the original paintings only (public domain), so i hosted them on my site.

[The Scourge]

H'mmm ,so we were both right ,Oh well.
Those are some very nice maps ,and paintings AlexPeters.

[TinCow]

Thanks for the replys ,and I think you're both right.
But what about the United Kingdom?
Scotland Whales and England are all seen as separate countries.

Are they? Scotland certainly has a better argument since the devolution, but Wales is still still run almost entirely from London. Many Welsh (and pre-devolution Scottish) affairs were handled locally by their own governmental systems, but not in any manner that is colourably different from the traditional roles of a state. Interesting really, because Wales and pre-devolution Scotland could be be considered states and nations, but not countries as I understand the definitions.

[Plantagenet]

Prussia was both a state and a country! Until 1701, it was a state; part of it (March of Brandenburg) belonged to Germany and the other (Duchy of Prussia) to Poland. Although technically the two halves were still separate (ie, "Prussia" only referred to the Duchy) and Brandenburg (as an Electorate) outranked Prussia.

After 1701, it was both state and country; that part of its holdings that fell within the Holy Roman Empire (Brandenburg, Duchies of Cleves & Pomerania, etc.) were still imperial fiefs (held from the Holy Roman Emperor). But the Duchy of Prussia itself was now a Kingdom, free of any feudal ties to Poland.

So after 1701, the King of Prussia was a sovereign monarch "in" Prussia, but as Elector/Margrave of Brandenburg, he was still a vassal of the German Emperor. This lasted until 1806, when the Empire was dissolved. Henceforth, the King of Prussia was no one's vassal for any of his lands.

[The Scourge]

Are they? Scotland certainly has a better argument since the devolution, but Wales is still still run almost entirely from London. Many Welsh (and pre-devolution Scottish) affairs were handled locally by their own governmental systems, but not in any manner that is colourably different from the traditional roles of a state. Interesting really, because Wales and pre-devolution Scotland could be be considered states and nations, but not countries as I understand the definitions.

That's just it TinCow.
This whole argument lead me to the thought ,what is the difference between a state and a country?
And as you rightly point out.There are problems to be considered.
United Kingdom being a good example.

[nokhor]

and where do you fit the idea of Nation in this? my definitions using your previous examples would be the state of Prussia [a militaristic, monarchy] occupied the country of Prussia [which was subdivided into 2 regions, Brandenburg, and the Duchy of Prussia] which was occupied by the German Nation [people with shared culture].

the British state [non-republican democracy] occupies the Country of britain [roughly triangular island east of ireland, can't miss it] with the Nations of English, Scottish, Welsh.

so State is the political expression, Country is the geographical expression, and Nation is the social expression. most of the time, especially in europe, the three mean the same thing.

[AlexPeters]

Well, my two cents:
I think you shouldn't take the fact that a country has been part of the HRE too serious - it has been a loose federation only, the emperor never had direct (as direct as a modern states have) impact on internal affairs. The states that belonged to the HRE battled several times and that happened without intervention of the emperor. I think you could compare it to the EU or even better the UN. They've accepted some kind of pope (in a more secular way) for a overall leading role but his rights and influence ended more or less on the borders of the individual states.
They even allied with differents parties in wars, e.g. Austria, Bavaria vs. Saxony, Brandenburg in the TYW or Austria and Prussia vs. Napoleon and Bavaria.
In my opinion the difference between state and country is mostly depending on its appearance towards other states/countries. That means - a state needs a foreign acceptance to be legitimated as well as some kind of representation (e.g. secretary of state, embassadors).
That also leads to the conclusion that Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland aren't states, only parts of a state. If you call them countries is another discussion, it seems to intend some kind of cultural, social and historical base only (more than a political base).

Alex

[Gregoshi]

FYI Alex (and everyone else):

Your post above with the pictures is excellent, but in the future, I'd discourage you from posting images directly from other sites. This is practice "steals" bandwidth from the site you are linked to. Some web sites don't mind, others do. If they complain to Tosa, we'll have to remove the links, but I doubt this will be necessary as this forum isn't busy enough to generate a lot of hits.

The alternative would be to copy the images and then host them on your own webspace and link to the images there. Of course, if you do this, posting credit for the image source(s) is advisible and appropriate.

Thanks.