952 GERMANY : — PRUSSIA
PRUSSIA.
(Freistaat Preussen.)
Until November 13, 1918, Prussia was ruled by sovereigns who traced their origin to Count Thassilo, of Zollern in Swabia, one of the
fenerals of Charles the Great. His successor, Count Friedrich ., built the family castle of Hohenzollern, near the Danube, in the year 980. A subsequent Zollern, or Hohenzollern, Friedrich III., was elevated to the rank of a Prince of the Holy Roman Empire in 1273, and received the Burggraviate of Nuremberg in fief ; and his great-grandson, Friedrich VI., was invested by King Sigmund, in 1415, with the Margraviate of Brandenburg, and obtained the rank of Elector in 1417. A century after, in 1511, the Teutonic Knights, owners of the large province of Prussia, on the Baltic, elected Margrave Albrecht, a younger son of the family of Hohenzollern, to the post of Grand-Master, and he, turning Protestant, declared himself hereditary duke. The early extinction of the male line of Albrecht brought the province of Prussia by inheritance to the electors of Brandenburg, who likewise adopted Protestantism. In the seventeenth century, the Hohenzollern territories became greatly enlarged by Friedrich Wilhelm, 'the Great Elector,' under whose fostering care arose the first standing army in Central Europe. The Great Elector, after a reign extending from 1640 to 1688, left a country of one and a half million inhabitants, a vast treasure, and 38,000 well-drilled troops to his son, Friedrich I., who put the kingly crown on his head at Konigsberg on January 18, 1701. His successor Friedrich Wilhelm I., after adding part of Pomerania to the possessions of the house, left his son and successor Friedrich II., called 'the Great,' a State of 47,770 square miles, with two and a half millions of inhabitants. Friedrich II. added Silesia, an area of 14,200 square miles ; this, and the large territory gained in the first partition of Poland, increased Prussia to 74,340 square miles, with more than five and a half million inhabitants. Under the reign of Friedrich's successor, Friedrich Wilhelm II., the State was enlarged by the acquisition of the principalities of Ansbach and Baireuth, as well as the vast territory acquired in another partition of Poland, which raised its area to nearly 100,000 square miles with about nine millions of souls. Under Friedrich Wilhelm III., nearly one-half of this State and population was taken by Napoleon ; but the Congress of Vienna not only restored the loss, but added part of the Kingdom of Saxony, the Rhin eland, much of Westphalia, and Swedish Pomerania, moulding Prussia into two separate pieces of territory, of a total area of 106,820 square miles. This was shaped into a compact State of 134,463 square miles, with a population of 22,769,436, by the war of 1866. According to the Constitution of the German Empire which was established in 1871, the King of Prussia was chosen hereditary German Emperor.
On November 13, 1918, Prussia was proclaimed a Republic.
Constitution and Government.
The Constitution, adopted on November 30, 1920, gives a vote to every citizen, male and fomale, over 20 years of age in general, equal, secret, and direct suffrage. Prussia is declared to be a Republic. Besides the Diet
