In the Eighteenth Century, some 300 separate political entities still ruled in Germany, frustrating the efforts of the "Holy Roman" German emperor in Vienna to exercise fully his imperial authority.  Most Germans were still land-bound peasants, who toiled to provide for themselves, and supported a class of noble, ecclesiastical, state and/or town-based lords who compelled them to provide the dizzying array of taxes, tithes, special fees, and personal services that held the social order in place.

In the fifty years prior to 1700, the "national" effort had been expended on recovery from The Thirty Years' War (which ended 1648).  By 1700, commerce had just about recovered and the population levels had returned to those of 1600.  At the end of the war (1648), Germany had perhaps 13,000,000 citizens, and by 1730 it had reached perhaps 20,000,000.  Some of these people had come from outside the Holy Roman Empire, including Swiss, French, Dutch, and Scandinavian immigrants.  The primary cause of the growth was a high fertility rate which overcame the high level of infant mortality and epidemics.  In a few areas, the growth had been so strong that population pressures on the means of production reached unsustainable levels.  This was a factor in the decision of many to emigrate.

Perhaps the memory of The Thirty Years' War was responsible, but the first part of the Eighteenth Century saw a reduction in the number and severity of wars.  This reduced one attrition factor in the population and allowed agriculture to produce more.  The climate improved in the Eighteenth Century and better cereal grains were grown.  Yet another agricultural factor was the shift from grains to potatoes.  Meat in the Eighteenth Century was not an important factor in diets, as it was to become in the next century.

One of the side effects to this over-population was the force on emigration and the creation of a labor force for the industrialization of the Nineteenth Nentury.  The dreaded plague almost died out in the Eighteenth Century, but plenty of other diseases took their toll.
(30 Dec 02)