Hanseatic North Germany

Protestant, maritime, and oriented to the Baltic rather than to Rome. Northern Germany's defining institution was the Hanseatic League, a confederation of trading cities - Lubeck, Hamburg, Bremen, Danzig, Riga and up to two hundred more - that from the twelfth century controlled the commerce of the North and Baltic seas, negotiated as a power with kings, fought its own war against Denmark, and maintained trading posts as far as London and Novgorod. It had no capital, no army of its own and no charter, which is what makes it interesting. The cities that formed it kept a merchant-republican political culture, and several remained free imperial cities into the nineteenth century; Hamburg and Bremen are still German states in their own right. The Reformation took hold early and completely here, and Low German rather than High German was the everyday speech. The region's brick Gothic architecture, built where there was no stone, is distinctive across the whole Baltic. Prussia later absorbed most of it. Lubeck's old town and the Wadden Sea are World Heritage sites. Hamburg is still among Europe's largest ports. The region covers Schleswig-Holstein, Hamburg, Bremen, Lower Saxony and Mecklenburg. Low German is recognised as a regional language with declining numbers of speakers. The Kiel Canal links the North Sea to the Baltic. Hamburg's Speicherstadt warehouse district is a World Heritage site. The Hanse name survives on Lufthansa and on city car registrations. Bremen and Hamburg are the two smallest German states by area. Marzipan from Lubeck is a protected regional product.

• Existed: 1200 CE – present
• Type: Entity