1848 is the year of revolution all over Europe.

There are outbreaks in Austria, Belgium, France, Hungary, and Poland, but they are particularly widespread in Germany.

Prussia, the most powerful and militarily the most important of the German monarchies, plays a leading role.

It leads in both the movement for unification and the suppression of radicalism.

Aside from Austria and its Empire, the German-speaking part of Europe at mid-nineteenth century consists of countless sovereignties.

There are six kingdoms&emdash;Baden, Bavaria, Hesse, Prussia, Saxony, and Württemberg; five grand duchies; thirteen duchies and principalities; three free cities; and hundreds of sovereign mini-mini-states.

Many of them are loosely affiliated with the Germanic Confederation, which had been founded in 1815 to replace the ancient and obsolete Holy Roman Empire.
In the confused revolutionary struggles of 1848-49 two main currents cross and clash with each other: (1) internal political reform, including radical demands by workers, and (2) unification of all German states in a national government.

The German problem is really the fundamental question: Who should unite what under which form of government-democratic or autocratic, republican or monarchical?

The foregoing, and the chronology that follows, is drawn primarily from Karl Marx on Revolution, Saul K. Padover, Editor (McGraw Hill, New York, 1971).

Additional material is drawn from Encyclopaedia Britannica's History of Germany.