Family research · Hub · Phase 4 of the world atlas
Flags of the German Lands
One country that has been governed as two, three, and once even four separate pieces within living memory — traced here as two real regions, western and eastern Germany, that merge and split on this map exactly when they did in real life. Austria crosses over from the Habsburg hub, sharing a government with Germany twice: loosely from 1815 to 1866, and completely (if brutally) from 1938 to 1945.
Below is one real, traced map showing who actually governed each piece at six points between 1815 and today. Both countries now have their own full flag timelines — Austria's in the Habsburg hub, Germany's own ten-entry page linked above and below.
Reading the tags
Confederal union — loose league of sovereign states
Empire / republic — unified sovereign German state
Nazi Germany — totalitarian one-party state
Cold War West — NATO-aligned democracy
Cold War East — Soviet-aligned one-party state
Modern republic — today's reunified/sovereign state
A real, traced map — actual borders, not schematic shapes, with Germany itself split into its real western and eastern halves so the Cold War division shows up as an actual border, not just a caption. Drag the slider or press play.
Borders here are data, not decoration. Western and eastern Germany only show a solid line between them when they were actually governed apart — which is most of this map's own history, not the exception. Austria's border with Germany does the same: solid almost throughout, then completely gone for the seven years of the Anschluss.
Two new panels, piloted here first: the column on the left shows real, documented waves of immigration into Germany for that era (not every era has one — some eras were dominated by emigration out instead, and 1938–45 is left honestly blank, since that era is defined by forced deportation, not migration). The column on the right shows any outside power actually conquering or occupying part of the map that era, distinct from the self-governing German states shown on the map itself.
1815
Migration in
German Confederation
Conquerors
Real traced borders (simplified). Poland, Czechia, and Switzerland shown faint for context only — Poland and Czechia are tracked in full in the Former Yugoslavia hub's Balkan map and the Habsburg Lands hub respectively.
Try: drag slowly from 1815 to 1866 and watch the west–east German line stay dissolved — both halves in the same loose Confederation, Austria included. Then 1871: the line stays dissolved as the two halves unify into the German Empire, but Austria pulls away for the first time, excluded from the new state on purpose. Jump to 1938 and watch all three regions — west, east, and Austria — merge into a single color at once, the only moment on this map when that happens. Then 1949: the same three regions split three ways simultaneously, the sharpest break on the whole map. Finally 1990: west and east dissolve back into one Germany, while Austria stays its own color, exactly as it still is today.
About this atlas
This is the fourth phase of a family-research project tracing the flags that flew over the lands our ancestors came from, close enough to paint accurately — correct colors, correct proportions, correct dates. Former Yugoslavia came first, then the Habsburg lands; Germany follows because its own east-west split is the clearest possible demonstration of this atlas's central idea — that a border is real only when two governments actually ruled apart, and a map should show that directly rather than describe it in a caption.
A full Germany flag timeline, with paint-ready color specs for all ten eras, now lives on its own page — linked above and in the roadmap below. Austria's own timeline already lives in the Habsburg Lands hub. The map above simplifies well over a century of shifting alliances, occupations, and divided sovereignty into six snapshots — useful for orientation, not a substitute for the detail the dedicated Germany page carries.
More of the atlas
This hub is one region in a larger set. See the other phases here: