Hanover
a northwestern province of Prussia. It borders on the North Sea. Hanover City is the capital. Bremen, a free city, is the natural metropolis and seaport. The principal institution of learning is Gottingen University. The inhabitants are, for the greater part, Lutherans. Prior to 1866 Hanover was an independent kingdom. Through the marriage of an elector of Hanover with a granddaughter of James I, the House of Hanover became connected with the Stuarts of England. At the death of the English queen, Anne, in 1714, George Louis, elector of Hanover, became also George I, king of Great Britain. In 1814 Hanover was raised by the Congress of Vienna to the rank of a kingdom. Three Georges were kings of Great Britain and electors of Hanover. George IV and William IV were kings both of Great Britain and of Hanover. In accordance with a custom known as the Salic law, the crown of Hanover could not be worn by a woman. When Victoria was crowned queen of Great Britain, the crown of Hanover went to the nearest male heir, the duke of Cumberland. In the war between Austria and Prussia, Hanover had the misfortune to side with Austria, the losing side. At the conclusion of peace the little kingdom was incorporated with Prussia. It was in this dual capacity, as a British and a German prince, that George III obtained the German troops that lost his battles in the war with the American colonists. See George; Free Cities; Bremen
Hanseatic (han-se-at'ic) League, a confederation of the northern German towns. The German name for the League was the Hansa, a word meaning union. The Hansa was formed by commercial cities to protect their pack trains from robbers on land, their ships from pirates on sea, and their towns from the oppression of princes. As early as 1241 Hamburg and Lubeck formed an alliance to keep a road open across the neck of land that separates the North Sea from the Baltic. Several small leagues of this sort were merged into the larger one, called the Hansa.
During the fourteenth century it became a powerful confederation. At its height ninety towns in the territory now included in the German empire, the Netherlands, and Belgium, flew the Hansa banner. The league formed commercial treaties with distant peoples, and even enforced its claims by dint of arms. A trading station on the Thames was maintained in London. It was known as the Steel Yard. Like the Hudson Bay Company and the East India Company of later times, the Hansa established distant agencies.
Although the importance of the league was great its organization was never a very close one. The deputies of the various cities assembled at Lubeck to consider questions of general importance. The decrees of this meeting, or diet, had no binding force unless ratified by the merchants in council of the various cities of the league. Naturally enough a general system of weights and measures prevailed throughout the confederacy. The canal system of north Germany was begun under its influence. The great service of the league was the carrying out of its original purpose, the protection of commerce by land and sea. As soon as robbers and pirates had been suppressed and the government of the various princes became more established and powerful, the mission of the league was practically at an end. Jealousies sprang up between the different cities. The large towns aimed to divert trade from the smaller ones for their own advantage. The Thirty Years' War brought the league practically to an end. In 1669 the last diet was held. At the present time there is but one political vestige of the old Hansa. The cities of Lubeck, Bremen, and Hamburg are still independent and form sovereign states of the German Empire.
In their prime the Hanseatic cities were centers of enterprise and culture. Their merchant princes possessed enormous wealth. The old cathedrals, town halls, market places, homes of the merchants, council chambers, wood carving, antique furniture, rich hangings, priceless table-ware, now the admiration of students, date from the period of the Hanseatic League.
Separate articles may be consulted for brief descriptions of the chief cities.