The Greatest Human Being That Has Ever Lived!
Alexander Von Humboldt - Most latin american countries made him an honorary citizen, Cuba and Mexico were first. What Humboldt, Germany, and the German people have done will serve the entire planet for the next 10,000 years. Go to wikipedia free encyclopedia and learn about The Grimm Brothers, Brothers Grimm, Snow white, Sleeping beauty, Cinderella, The Frog Prince, Hansel and Gretal, ETC.
The German people as a nationality have done more then any other people on this planet. There are 65 million Germans in America. Why do we keep saying that they're bad? Barbarians!
Friedrich Bayer- Founder of Bayer Asprin - 1863
Robert Alexander Schumann - 1810
Johann Ernst Bach II
Johann Ludwig Bach
Go to wikipedia - there are 21 Bach's
Johann Sebastian Bach
Richard Wagner - 1813
- John Jacob Bausch (1830–1926), co-founder of Bausch & Lomb, makers of contact lenses and Ray-Ban sunglasses
- Friedrich Bayer (1825–1880), founder of what would become Bayer, chemical and pharmaceutical company
- Paul Carl Beiersdorf (1836–1896), founded Beiersdorf AG manufacturers of Nivea, Eucerin, etc.
- Amalie Auguste Melitta Bentz (1873–1950), invented the coffee filter and started Melitta, manufacturers of coffee, paper coffee filters, and coffee makers.
- Karl Benz (1844–1929), inventor of the gasoline-powered automobile, co-founder of the automobile manufacturer Mercedes-Benz
- Maximilian Delphinius Berlitz (1852–1921), founded Berlitz Language Schools
- Carl Bertelsmann (1791–1850), founder of Bertelsmann AG, subsidiaries include Random House and BMG.
- Johann Adam Birkenstock, in 1774 founded Birkenstock shoe company
- Robert Bosch (1861–1942), industrialist, engineer and inventor, founder of Robert Bosch GmbH
- Hugo Boss (1885–1948), fashion designer, founder of Hugo Boss AG
- Max Braun (1883–1967), founded Braun GmbH, makers of electric shavers and trimmers, Oral-B products, thermometers, blood pressure monitors, coffee makers and other home appliances.
- Adolphus Busch (1839–1913), co-founder of Anheuser-Busch brewing company.
- Adolph Coors (1847–1929), started the Adolph Coors Company brewery, now part of MillerCoors.
- Gottlieb Daimler (1834–1900), inventor and engineer, founder of Daimler Motoren Gesellschaft, now Daimler-Benz AG
- Adolf Dassler (1900–1978), founder of sportswear company Adidas
- Rudolf Dassler (1898–1974), founder of PUMA sportwear company
- Friedrich Engelhorn (1821–1902), founder of BASF, the largest chemical company in the world
- Kaspar Faber (1730–1784), founded Faber-Castell, one of the world's largest manufacturers of pens, pencils, other office supplies, art supplies, high-end writing instruments and luxury leather goods.
- Friedrich Krupp (1787–1826), steel manufacturer and founder of the ThyssenKrupp AG, one of the world's largest steel producers.
- Henry Lomb (1828–1908), co-founder of Bausch & Lomb
- Oscar Ferdinand Mayer (1859–1955), founded the processed-meat firm Oscar Mayer.
- Georg(e) Merck (1867–1926), founder of Merck & Co.
- Heinrich Meyerfreund, founder of Garoto, a chocolate company in Brazil
- Carl Miele (1869–1938), founder of Miele, a manufacturer of high-end domestic appliances (praised by Steve Jobs for their design), commercial equipment and fitted kitchens.
- Frederick Miller (1824–1888), born as Friedrich Eduard Johannes Müller, he founded the Miller Brewing Company in 1855
- Richard Hellmann (1876–1971), founded Hellmann's Mayonnaise
- Johann Peter Henckels, founder of (Zwilling) J.A. Henckels, one of the largest and oldest manufacturers of kitchen knives, scissors, cookware and flatware
- August Horch (1868–1951), founded Audi automobile company in 1909
- Karl Kellner, founded Ernst Leitz GmbH, which later became Leica Camera AG, Leica Geosystems AG, and Leica Microsystems AG, producing cameras, geosurvey equipment, and microscopes.
- Adam Opel (1837–1895), founder of the automobile company Adam Opel AG
- Werner Otto (1909–2011), founder of Otto GmbH, now Otto Group, the world's largest mail order company.
- Ferdinand Porsche (1875–1951), designer and founder of Porsche
- Karl Friedrich Rapp (1882–1962), co-founder of Rapp Motorenwerke GmbH, which later became BMW AG.
- Paul Reuter (1816–1988), pioneer of telegraphy and news reporting, founder of Reuters news agency
- Hans Riegel Sr.(1893–1945), founder of Haribo, the biggest manufacturer of gummi and jelly sweets in the world.
- Ernst Christian Friedrich Schering (1824–1889), founded Schering AG a research-centered pharmaceutical company.
- Fritz Sennheiser (1912–2010), founded Sennheiser Electronic GmbH & Co. KG, specializing in high fidelity products.
- Werner von Siemens (1816–1892), inventor, founder of Siemens, largest Europe-based electronics and electrical engineering company.
- J.S. Staedtler, in 1835 founded Staedtler Mars GmbH & Co. KG, one of the world's leading suppliers of writing, artist, and engineering drawing instruments.
- Henry E. Steinway (1797–1871), founder of the piano company Steinway & Sons.
- Franz Ströher (born c. 1854), in 1880 founded Wella AG, one of the world’s leading cosmetics suppliers.
- August Storck-Oberwelland, in 1903 founded Werther's Sugar Confectionery Factory, now August Storck AG, manufacturers of Werther's Original, Riesen, merci,
- Carl von Thieme,(1844–1924), founder of Allianz AG, a global financial services company
- Ferdinand von Zeppelin (1838–1917), inventor of the Zeppelin, founded the Zeppelin Airship company
- Carl Zeiss (1816–1888), maker of optical instruments, founded Carl Zeiss AG
- Franz Aepik
- Ralf Altmeyer
- Hermann Anschütz-Kaempfe
- Ludwig Aschoff
- Richard Baerwald
- Martin Beneke
- Roland Benz
- Ernest Beutler
- Peter Beyer
- Heinrich Ernst Beyrich
- Wilhelm von Bezold
- William Blandowski
- Paul Richard Heinrich Blasius
- Jens Blauert
- Max Bodenstein
- Harald von Boehmer
- Armin von Bogdandy
- Friedrich Boie
- Max Born
- Carl Bosch
- Johann Friedrich von Brandt
- Magnus von Braun
- Wernher von Braun
- Ernst Wilhelm von Brücke
- Franz Ernst Bruckmann
- Friedrich Burmeister
- Abraham Buschke
- Karin Büttner-Janz
- Jean Cabanis
- Sethus Calvisius
- Franz Ludwig von Cancrin
- Joseph Carlebach
- Ernst Boris Chain
- Otto Detlev Creutzfeldt
- Rudolf Criegee
- Theodor Curtius
- Daniel Dahm
- Max Delbrück
- Otto Diels
- Gerhard Domagk
- Nikolai Eberhardt
- Christian Gottfried Ehrenberg
- Paul Ehrlich
- Manfred Eigen
- Albert Einstein
- Bernhard Eitel
- Paul Erman
- Johann Christian Polycarp Erxleben
- Adam Karl August von Eschenmayer
- Andreas von Ettingshausen
- Leonhard Euler
- Peter Finke
- Horst Feistel
- Salomon Franck
- Joseph Fraunhofer
- Reinhard Furrer
- Carl Friedrich Gauss
- Johannes Gehrke
- Hanns Bruno Geinitz
- Christian Ludwig Gersten
- Friederich Golz
- Albrecht von Graefe
- Arnold Graffi
- Peter Griess
- Heinz Haber
- Otto Hahn
- Willy Hartner
- Hartmut Heinrich
- Wilhelm Heinrich Heintz
- Werner Heisenberg
- Jochen Heisenberg
- Martin Heisenberg
- József Károly Hell
- Maximilian Hell
- Gustav Hellmann
- Hermann von Helmholtz
- Friedrich Gustav Jakob Henle
- Johann Friedrich Wilhelm Herbst
- Gustav Herglotz
- Grete Hermann
- Richard Hesse
- Johann F. C. Hessel
- Franz Hillenkamp
- Diederich Hinrichsen
- Fritz Hofmann
- Robert Hübner
- Alexander von Humboldt
- Klaus Hurrelmann
- Engelbert Kaempfer
- Elisabeth Kalko
- Franz Josef Kallmann
- Immanuel Kant
- Michael Karas
- Friedrich August Kekulé von Stradonitz
- Oskar Kellner
- Frieder Kempe
- Wolfgang von Kempelen
- Franz Kessler
- Johannes Kepler
- Uwe Kils
- Athanasius Kircher
- Siegfried Knemeyer
- August Köhler
- Georges J. F. Köhler
- Heinz Kohnen
- Joseph Gottlieb Kölreuter
- Ralph von Königswald
- Wladimir Köppen
- Wilhelm Körner
- Ulrich Kortz
- Max Kramer
- Christian Ferdinand Friedrich Krauss
- Stefan Krauter
- Bernt Krebs
- Herbert Kronke
- Adolph Kussmaul
- Heinrich Lamm
- Rolf Landauer
- Günther Landgraf
- Dieter Langbein
- Karl Christian von Langsdorf
- Grigori Ivanovitch Langsdorff
- Rüdiger Lautmann
- Gottfried Leibniz
- Walter Liebenthal
- Justus von Liebig
- Rainer Liedtke
- Herbert Lochs
- Adolf Loewy
- Johann von Löwenstern-Kunckel
- Niklas Luhmann
- Hermann Lux
- Michael Maestlin
- Herbert Mataré
- Kurt Mendelssohn
- Friedrich Sigmund Merkel
- Daniel Gottlieb Messerschmidt
- Helmut Metzner
- Viktor Meyer
- Hermann Minkowski
- Achim Müller
- Johannes Peter Müller
- Salomon Müller
- Hermann von Nathusius
- Heinrich Edmund Naumann
- Rudolf Nebel
- Hans E. J. Neugebauer
- Georg von Neumayer
- Bernd Noack
- Hugo Obermaier
- Heinrich Olbers
- Volker Oppitz (scientist)
- Max Planck
- Theodor Peckolt
- Richard Friedrich Johannes Pfeiffer
- Johannes Plendl
- Kurt Plötner
- Julius Plücker
- Ingo Potrykus
- Ernst Pringsheim, Jr.
- Wolfgang Prinz
- Karl Ramsayer
- Eberhard Rees
- Jens Reich
- Ralf Reski
- Berthold Ribbentrop
- Ronald Richter
- Ferdinand von Richthofen
- Nikolaus Riehl
- Walter Rogowski
- Ludwig Roth
- Arthur Rudolph
- Hans Sachs (serologist)
- Kazem Sadegh-Zadeh
- Karl Ludwig Fridolin von Sandberger
- Monika Schäfer-Korting
- Valentin Scheidel
- Harald Schering
- Claus Schilling
- Hermann Schlegel
- Gotthilf Heinrich von Schubert
- Ulrich S. Schubert
- Karl Schwarzschild
- Gerhard Schwehm
- Johann Salomo Christoph Schweigger
- Walter Seelmann-Eggebert
- Johann Andreas Segner
- Meinolf Sellmann
- Friedrich Sellow
- Johann Silberschlag
- Eduard Simon
- Samuel Thomas von Sömmerring
- Frank Steglich
- Karl Stetter
- Erwin Stresemann
- Michael Succow
- Reinhard Süring
- Kurt Tank
- Bernhard Tessmann
- Torsten Zuberbier
- Gottfried Reinhold Treviranus
- Rudolf Virchow
- Hans Vogel (scientist)
- Gerhard Vollmer
- Peter Wagner (Social theorist)
- Albert H. Walenta
- Otto Heinrich Warburg
- Alfred Wegener
- Friedrich Wegener
- Arthur Wehnelt
- Heinrich Welker
- Guenter Wendt
- Gregor Wentzel
- Richard Wilhelm
- Hans Winkler
- Johannes Winkler
- Friedrich Wöhler
- Nathanael Matthaeus von Wolf
- Theodor Wolf
- Rüdiger Wolfrum
- Johann Zahn
- Eberhard Zwicker
These Singspiele were comedies mixing spoken dialogue and singing, influenced by the similar genres of the ballad opera in England and the opéra comique in France. Often having sentimental plots and extremely simple music, Singspiele were no match for contemporary opera serias in artistic sophistication. Yet at the end of the 18th century a composer who would change all this would emerge: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart.
The Baroque era
The birth of German opera
The world's first opera was Dafne by Jacopo Peri, which appeared in Florence in 1598. Three decades later Heinrich Schütz set the same libretto in a translation by the poet Martin Opitz, thus creating the first ever German-language opera. The music to Schütz's Dafne is now lost and details of the performance are sketchy, but it is known to have been written to celebrate the marriage of Landgrave Georg II of Hessen-Darmstadt to Princess Sophia Eleonora of Saxony in Torgau in 1627. As in Italy, the first patrons of opera in Germany and Austria were royalty and the nobility, and they tended to favour composers and singers from south of the Alps. Antonio Cesti was particularly successful, providing the huge operatic extravaganza Il pomo d'oro for the imperial court in Vienna in 1668. Opera in Italian would continue to exercise a considerable sway over German-speaking lands throughout the Baroque and Classical periods. Nevertheless, native forms were developing too. In Nuremberg in 1644, Sigmund Staden produced the "spiritual pastorale", Seelewig, which foreshadows the Singspiel, a genre of German-language opera in which arias alternate with spoken dialogue. Seelewig was a moral allegory inspired by the example of contemporary school dramas and is the first German opera whose music has survived.
Opera in Hamburg 1678–1738
Another important development was the founding of the Theater am Gänsemarkt in Hamburg in 1678, aimed at the local middle classes who preferred opera in their own language. The new opera house opened with a performance of Johann Theile's Der erschaffene, gefallene und aufgerichtete Mensch, based on the story of Adam and Eve. The theatre, however, would come to be dominated by the works of Reinhard Keiser, an enormously prolific composer who wrote over a hundred operas, sixty of them for Hamburg. Initially, the works performed in Hamburg had all been on religious themes in an attempt to ward off criticisms by Pietist church authorities that the theatre was immoral, but Keiser and fellow composers such as Johann Mattheson broadened the range of subject matter to include the historical and the mythological. Keiser drew on foreign operatic traditions, for instance he included dances after the model of the French tradition of Lully. The recitative in his operas was always in German so the audience could follow the plot, but from Claudius in 1703 he began to include arias in Italian which allowed for florid vocal display. The hallmark of the Hamburg style was its eclecticism. Orpheus (1726) by Telemann contains arias in Italian setting texts taken from famous Handel operas as well as choruses in French to words originally set by Lully. Hamburg opera might also include comic characters (Keiser's Der Carneval von Venedig of 1707 has them speaking in the local Lower Saxon dialect), marking a great contrast to the elevated new style of opera seria as defined by Metastasio. Yet the immediate future belonged to Italian opera. The most famous German-born opera composer of the era, Handel, wrote four operas for Hamburg at the beginning of his career but soon moved on to write opera seria in Italy and England. In 1738, the Theater am Gänsemarkt went bankrupt and the fortunes of serious opera in German went into decline for the next few decades.
Opera seria and the growth of the Singspiel
The other leading German composers of the time tended to follow Handel's example. This was because the courts of the various German states favoured opera in Italian. In 1730 the chief proponent of opera seria, the Italian librettist Metastasio, took up residence as the imperial poet in Vienna. Johann Adolf Hasse wrote operas in Italian for the court of the Elector of Saxony inDresden. Hasse also wrote operas for the court of Frederick the Great in Berlin, as did Carl Heinrich Graun. The king himself supplied the libretto for Graun's Montezuma, first performed in 1755.
Deprived of aristocratic patronage, opera in German was forced to look to the general public to survive. This meant theatrical companies had to tour from town to town. The Singspiel became the most popular form of German opera, especially in the hands of the composer Johann Adam Hiller. Hiller's 1766 reworking of the Singspiel Die verwandelten Weiber was a landmark in the history of the genre, although his most famous work would be Die Jagd (1770).Abel Seyler, the Swiss-born director of the Seyler theatrical company, was noted as a proponent of German opera, commissioning operas by Hiller, Georg Anton Benda, Anton Schweitzer and other composers.
Composers writing after World War II had to find a way of coming to terms with the
destruction caused by the Third Reich. The modernism of Schoenberg and Berg proved attractive to young composers, since their works had been banned by the Nazis and were free of any taint of the
former regime. Bernd Alois Zimmermann looked to the example of
Berg's Wozzeck for his only opera Die Soldaten (1965), and Aribert Reimann continued the tradition of expressionism with his Shakespearean Lear (1978). Perhaps the most versatile and internationally
famous post-war German opera composer is Hans Werner Henze, who has produced a series of
works which mix Bergian influences with those of Italian composers such as Verdi. Examples of
his operas areBoulevard Solitude, The Bassarids (to a libretto by W. H. Auden) and Das verratene Meer. Karlheinz Stockhausen set off in an even more avant-garde direction with his enormous
operatic cycle based on the seven days of the week, Licht (1977–). Giselher Klebe created an extensive body of work in the operatic genre based on literary works. Other leading composers still producing operas today include Wolfgang Rihm and Olga Neuwirth.
The Classical era
As music moved into the Classical era in the late 18th century, most German-born composers still avoided writing opera in their own language. The great figure of the early Classical period was Christoph Willibald von Gluck but his pioneering reforms were directed at Italian and French opera, not the German repertoire. In 1778, Emperor Joseph II attempted to change this state of affairs by establishing a German-language opera troupe, the National Singspiel, at the Burgtheater in Vienna. The experiment was short-lived and the troupe was dissolved in 1783, yet the previous year it had produced one undoubted success withDie Entführung aus dem Serail by the young Mozart. Goethe immediately recognised the quality of the piece, declaring "it knocked us all sideways". In the following years commercial theatres sprang up in Vienna offering German-language opera. The impresarioEmanuel Schikaneder had particular success with his Theater auf der Wieden on the outskirts of the city. In 1791, he persuaded Mozart to set one of his libretti, The Magic Flute. This proved to be no ordinary Singspiel. Though the traditional farcical elements remained, Mozart added a new seriousness, particularly in the music for Sarastro and his priests. Even more than Die Entführung, theMagic Flute pointed the way forward for future German opera.
Beethoven and Fidelio
The greatest German composer of the next generation, Beethoven, seized on The Magic Flute's blend of domestic comedy and high seriousness for his only opera,Fidelio, the story of a devoted wife who saves her husband from political imprisonment. The years following the French Revolution of 1789 had been some of the most turbulent in European history. In Fidelio, Beethoven wanted to express the ideals of that Revolution: liberty, equality and fraternity. He was also inspired by contemporary French works, particularly the "rescue operas" of Luigi Cherubini. Beethoven was arguably not a natural composer of opera and, althoughFidelio was premiered in 1805, it was not until 1814 that he produced its final version. Nevertheless, Fidelio is widely regarded as a masterpiece and is one of the key works in the German repertoire.
German Romantic opera
In the early years of the nineteenth century, the vast cultural movement known as Romanticism began to exert an influence over German composers. The Romantics showed a keen interest in the Middle Ages as well as German folklore. The fairy tale collections of the Brothers Grimm and the rediscovered Medieval German epic the Nibelungenlied were major sources of inspiration for the movement. There was also often a quest for a distinctively German identity, influenced by the new nationalism which had arisen in the wake of the Napoleonic invasions. Romanticism was already firmly established in German literature with writers such as Tieck, Novalis, Eichendorff and Clemens Brentano. One of the most famous German Romantic authors,E.T.A. Hoffmann, was also a music theorist and a composer in his own right and in 1816 he produced an opera, Undine, in Berlin. Another important early Romantic opera was Faust by Louis Spohr (also 1816). Both Hoffmann and Spohr took the basic form of the Singspiel as their starting point but began to group the individual numbers into extended scenes. They also employed "reminiscence motifs", recurring musical themes associated with characters or concepts in the opera, which would pave the way for Wagner's use of the leitmotif.
The major breakthrough in the history of German Romantic opera was Der Freischütz by Carl Maria von Weber, premiered in Berlin on 18 June 1821. Weber resented the Europe-wide dominance of the Italian operas of Rossini and wanted to establish a uniquely German style of opera. He turned to German folk songs and folklore for inspiration; Der Freischütz is based on a tale from the Gespensterbuch("Book of Wraiths") of Apel and Laun concerning a marksman who makes a pact with the Devil. Weber's strong point was his striking ability to evoke atmosphere through orchestral colour. From the very first bars of the overture, it is obvious we are in the primeval forests of Germany. The highlight of the opera is the chilling Wolf's Glen Scene in which the hero Max makes his deal with the Devil.Der Freischütz was immensely popular, not only in Germany, but throughout Europe. Weber never really achieved his full potential as an opera composer due to his early death from tuberculosis and his poor choice of libretti. His major German opera after Der Freischütz, Euryanthe (1823), suffers from a particularly weak text and is rarely staged nowadays. Yet Euryanthe marks another important stage in the development of serious German opera. Weber completely eliminated spoken dialogue, producing a "through-composed" work where the distinction between recitative and aria is becoming blurred. Its lessons would not be lost on future composers, most notably Richard Wagner.
Other composers of the time
Weber's most important successor in the field of Romantic opera was Heinrich Marschner, who further explored the Gothic and the supernatural in works such as Der Vampyr (1828) and Hans Heiling (1833). On the other hand, it was with comic opera that Albert Lortzing scored his biggest successes. The popularity of pieces such as Zar und Zimmermann continues in Germany today, though Lortzing's operas are rarely staged abroad. Though he began in Germany, Giacomo Meyerbeer was more famous for his contributions to Italian and (especially) French opera. He fused elements from all three national styles into his conception of grand opera, which had an important influence on the development of German music, including Wagner's early works. Other notable operas of the time include Die lustigen Weiber von Windsor (1849) by Otto Nicolai and Martha (1847) by Friedrich von Flotow. Later came Peter Cornelius (Der Barbier von Bagdad, 1858), Hermann Goetz (Der Widerspänstigen Zähmung, 1874) and Karl Goldmark (Die Königin von Saba, 1875).
Mention should be made of two great composers of the era who wrote their major works in other genres yet also composed operas: Franz Schubert and Robert Schumann. Schubert wrote over a dozen operas, mostly in the Singspiel style. Hardly any were performed during the composer's lifetime. Schumann only wrote one opera, Genoveva, first staged in Leipzig in 1850. Though praised by Liszt, it failed to win lasting success. The verdict on both these composer's operas has generally been that, though they contain excellent music, they have too many dramatic weaknesses to be acclaimed as great stage works.
Richard Wagner was one of the most revolutionary and controversial composers in musical history and his innovations changed the course of opera, not just in Germany and Austria but throughout Europe. Wagner gradually evolved a new concept of opera as a Gesamtkunstwerk (a "complete work of art"), a fusion of music, poetry and painting. His earliest experiments followed the examples set by Weber (Die Feen) and Meyerbeer (Rienzi), but his most important formative influence was probably the symphonic music of Beethoven. Wagner believed his career truly began with Der fliegende Holländer (1843). Together with the two works which followed, Tannhäuser and Lohengrin, this has been described as the "zenith of German Romantic opera". Yet these were merely a prelude to even more radical developments. In his mature dramas, Tristan und Isolde, Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg, Der Ring des Nibelungen and Parsifal, Wagner abolished the distinction between aria and recitative in favour of a seamless flow of "endless melody". He greatly increased the role and power of the orchestra, creating scores with a complex web of leitmotifs; and he was prepared to violate accepted musical conventions, such as tonality, in his quest for greater expressivity. Wagner also brought a new philosophical dimension to opera in his works, which were usually based on stories from Germanic or Arthurian legend. Finally, Wagner built his own opera house at Bayreuth, exclusively dedicated to performing his own works in the style he wanted.
Late Romantic opera
Wagner's innovations cast an immense shadow over subsequent composers, who struggled to absorb his influence while retaining their own individuality. One of the most successful composers of the following generation was Engelbert Humperdinck, whose Hänsel und Gretel (1893) still has an assured place in the standard repertoire. Humperdinck turned back to folk song and the tales of the Brothers Grimm for inspiration. Yet, though Hänsel is often viewed as the ideal piece for introducing opera to children, it also has extraordinarily sophisticated orchestration and makes great use of leitmotifs, both tell-tale signs of Wagner's influence.
Richard Strauss was heavily influenced by Wagner, despite his father's efforts to the contrary. By seventeen, he was unimpressed with Tannhäuser, Lohengrinand Siegfried but absolutely entranced by the other three pieces of the Ring and Tristan und Isolde. Although in his early years he was more famous for his orchestral tone poems, Salome (1905) and Elektra (1907) quickly established his reputation as Germany's leading opera composer. These two operas stretched the tonal music system to its breaking point. The highly chromatic music featured harsh dissonances and unresolved harmonies. This, paired with the gruesome subject matter, looked forward to expressionism. Elektra also marked the beginning of Strauss's working relationship with the leading Austrian poet and playwright Hugo von Hofmannsthal, who would provide another five libretti for the composer. With Der Rosenkavalier of 1910, Strauss changed direction, looking towards Mozart and the world of the Viennese waltz as much as towards Wagner. Modernist critics accused him of "selling out", but Rosenkavalierproved an immense success with audiences around the world. Strauss continued to ignore critical fashion, producing the mixture of farce and high tragedy ofAriadne auf Naxos, the complex allegory of Die Frau ohne Schatten, the domestic dramas of Intermezzo and Arabella, and the mythological Die ägyptische Helena and Daphne. Strauss bid farewell to the musical stage with Capriccio of 1942, a "conversation piece" which explores the relationship between words and music in opera.
Other late Romantics
Other composers styled "late Romantic", such as Franz Schreker (Der ferne Klang, 1912; Der Schatzgräber, 1920), Alexander von Zemlinsky (Eine florentinische Tragödie, 1917; Der Zwerg, 1922) and Erich Korngold (Die tote Stadt, 1920) explored similar territory to Strauss's Salome and Elektra. They combined Wagnerian influences, lush orchestration, strange harmonies and dissonances with "decadent" subject matter reflecting the dominance ofExpressionism in the arts and the contemporary psychological explorations of Sigmund Freud. All three composers suffered persecution and eclipse under the Nazis, who condemned their works as entartete Musik ("degenerate music"). Hans Pfitzner was another late Romantic post-Wagnerian, albeit of a more conservative stripe. His major opera Palestrina (1917) makes the case for tradition and inspiration rather than musical modernism.
The heyday of operetta
In the late nineteenth century, a new, lighter form of opera, operetta, became popular in Vienna. Operettas had immediately attractive tunes, comic (and often frivolous) plots and used spoken dialogue between the musical "numbers". Viennese operetta was inspired by the fashion for the French operettas of Jacques Offenbach. Der Pensionat (1860) by Franz von Suppé is generally regarded as the first important operetta in the German language, but by far the most famous example of the genre is Die Fledermaus (1874) by Johann Strauss. Franz Lehár's The Merry Widow (1905) was another massive hit. Other composers who worked in this style include Oscar Straus and Sigmund Romberg.
Modernism: the Second Viennese School
Following the example of Wagner, Richard Strauss, Zemlinsky and Schreker had pushed traditional tonality to the absolute limits. Now a new group of composers appeared in Vienna who wanted to take music beyond. Operatic modernism truly began in the operas of two composers of the so-called Second Viennese School, Arnold Schoenberg and his acolyte Alban Berg, both advocates of atonality and its later development (as worked out by Schoenberg), dodecaphony. Schoenberg's early musico-dramatic works, Erwartung (1909, premiered in 1924) and Die glückliche Hand display heavy use of chromatic harmony and dissonance in general. Schoenberg also occasionally used Sprechstimme, which he described as: "The voice rising and falling relative to the indicated intervals, and everything being bound together with the time and rhythm of the music except where a pause is indicated". Schoenberg intended Moses und Aron as his operatic masterpiece, but it was left unfinished at his death.
The two operas of Schoenberg's pupil Alban Berg, Wozzeck and Lulu (left incomplete at his death) share many of the same characteristics described above, though Berg combined his highly personal interpretation of Schoenberg's twelve-tone technique with melodic passages of a more traditionally tonal nature (quite Mahlerian in character). This perhaps partially explains why his operas have remained in standard repertory, despite their controversial music and plots.
1918–1945: Weimar Germany, Inter-war Austria and the Third Reich
The years following World War I saw German and Austrian culture flourishing in spite of the surrounding political turmoil. Late Romantic composers were still at work alongside the avowed modernists Schoenberg and Berg. The Italian-born Ferruccio Busoni ploughed an individual furrow, attempting to fuse Bach and the avant-garde, Mediterranean and Germanic culture in his music. He never lived to finish his most significant opera Doktor Faust (1925). Paul Hindemith began his operatic career with short, scandalous pieces such as Mörder, Hoffnung der Frauen("Murder, Hope of Women") before turning to Bach, as Busoni had done. Hindemith saw Bach-inspired "neo-classicism" as a way of curbing the excesses of late Romanticism. Cardillac(1925) was his first work in this vein. Hindemith was also interested in putting contemporary life on the stage in his operas (a concept called Zeitoper), as was Ernst Krenek whose Jonny spielt auf (1927) has a jazz violinist as its hero. Kurt Weill reflected life in Weimar Germany in a more overtly political way. His most famous collaboration with Bertolt Brecht, The Threepenny Opera (1928), was both a scandal and an immense box-office success.
Adolf Hitler's assumption of power destroyed this thriving operatic scene. Ironically, after the burning of the Reichstag in 1933, the German seat of the government was moved to theKrolloper, the state opera house in Berlin which, under the adventurous directorship of Otto Klemperer, had seen the premieres of many innovative works of the 1920s, including Hindemith'sNeues vom Tage. Now Hindemith responded to the advent of the Third Reich with his chief work Mathis der Maler, a portrait of an artist trying to survive in hostile times. It received its premiere in Zürich in 1938, since all performances of Hindemith's music had been banned in Germany the previous year. In 1940, Hindemith left Switzerland for the United States, joining a transatlantic exodus of composers which included Schoenberg, Weill, Korngold and Zemlinsky. Schreker had died in 1934, having been dismissed from his teaching post by the Nazis; other composers, such as the promising Viktor Ullmann, would perish in the death camps. Some opera composers, including Carl Orff, Werner Egk and the ageing Richard Strauss, remained in Germany to accommodate with the new regime as best they could.
LIST OF GERMAN INVENTORS AND DISCOVERERS
- Ernst Abbe: Invented the first refractometer, and many other devices. Donated his shares in the company Carl Zeiss to form Carl-Zeiss-Stiftung, still in existence today.
- Franz Carl Achard: Developed a process to produce sugar from sugar beet. Built the first factory for the process in 1802.
- Robert Adler: Invented a better television remote control.
- Konrad Adenauer: Invented soya sausage (1916; "Kölner Wurst") and, together with Jean and Josef Oebel, [coarse] wholemeal bread (1917; Kölner Brot).
- Wilhelm Albert: Invented the wire rope 1834.
- Alois Alzheimer: Psychiatrist who discovered Alzheimer´s disease, a degeneration of the brain in old age.
- Hermann Anschütz-Kaempfe: Invented the gyrocompass in 1907.
- Manfred von Ardenne: Self-taught researcher, applied physicist and inventor. Inventor of television among other things. 600 patents in fields including electron microscopy, medical technology, nuclear technology, plasma physics, and radio and television technology.
- Martin Leo Arons: Mercury-vapor lamp together with Peter Cooper Hewitt.
- Leopold Auerbach: Discovery of Plexus myentericus Auerbachi, or Auerbach's plexus.
- Max Abraham: Physicist. Worked as Max Planck's assistant for three years. Developed theories on electrons.
- Karl Ernst von Baer: Discovered mammal ovum.
- Ralph Baer: Inventor of the first home video game console.
- Hermann Bahlsen: The butter cookie was invented over 100 years ago by Hermann Bahlsen. Since then, the company has been one of the leading trendsetters in the industry for factory-produced sweet cakes and cookies as well as new technologies.[a]
- Albert Ballin: Father of modern cruise ship travel
- Heinrich Band: Developed a musical instrument and called it Bandoneon in 1846. It is used in most tango orchestras until today.
- Oskar Barnack: The father of the first mass marketed 35mm camera and Leica.
- Heinrich Anton de Bary: Father of Phytopathology, the science of plant diseases and modern Mycology. Coined the word symbiosis in 1879.
- Wilhelm Bauer: Inventor and engineer, who built several hand-powered submarines.
- Adolf von Baeyer: Chemist. Synthesized indigo, discovered the phthalein dyes, and investigated polyacetylenes, oxonium salts, nitroso compounds (1869) and uric acid derivatives (1860 and onwards) including the discovery of barbituric acid (1864). Nobel laureate 1905.
- Hans Beck: Inventor of the toy Playmobil.
- Georg Bednorz: physicist, discovered high-temperature superconductivity in ceramics, shared the 1987 Nobel Prize in Physics.
- Martin Behaim: Inventor of the first globe of the world (Erdapfel) between 1491 and 1493.
- Alexander Behm: Inventor of echo sounding. The patent was granted in 1913.
- Fabian Gottlieb von Bellingshausen: Navigator and Exporer. Discovered the land mass of Antarctica on January 28, 1820.
- Hans Bethe: Nuclear physicist and Nobel laureate in physics 1967. During World War II, he was head of the Theoretical Division at the secretLos Alamos laboratory which developed the first atomic bombs.
- Emil Adolf von Behring: Discovered the diphtheria antitoxin. It was the world's first cure for a disease (1891). He was awarded history's first Nobel Prize in Physiology of Medicine in 1901.
- Melitta Bentz: Inventor of the coffee filter, 1908.
- Karl Benz: Father and inventor of the gasoline-powered automobile, 1885, and pioneering founder of automobile manufacturing.
- Albrecht Ludwig Berblinger: Inventor of the spring prosthesis and hang-glider (1811).[b]
- Emil Berliner: He is best known for developing the disc record gramophone.
- Gerd Binning Physicist. Design of the scanning tunneling microscope (STM) with Heinrich Rohrer. Nobel laureate 1986.
- Johann Elert Bode Discovered the Titus-Bode Law
- Ludwig Bölkow: Aeronautical pioneer. Was instrumental in the development of the Me 262, developed a new rotorhead concept for helicopters.
- Max Born: Physicist and mathematician. Groundbreaking work in quantum mechanics. Nobel laureate 1954 with Walther Bothe. His Ph.D. student Delbrück, and six of his assistants (Fermi, Heisenberg, Goeppert-Mayer, Herzberg, Pauli, Wigner) went on to win Nobel Prizes. His Ph.D. student J. Robert Oppenheimer led the project to develop the atomic bomb.
- Manfred Börner: Physicist. Developed the first working fiber-optical data transmission system in 1965. Received a patent for an "electro-optical transmission system utilizing lasers".
- Carl Bosch: Chemist and Nobel laureate, discovered the processes of industrial high pressure chemistry.
- Robert Bosch: He invented, engineered and launched various innovations for the motor vehicle.
- Walther Bothe: Nuclear physicist, who shared the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1954 with Max Born.
- Johann Friedrich Böttger: He was generally acknowledged as the inventor of European porcelain although more recent sources ascribe this toEhrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus. Böttger is still credited with developing the manufacture of porcelain in Europe.
- Karlheinz Brandenburg: Inventor and audio engineer; father of audio compression format MPEG Audio Layer 3, more commonly known as MP3.
- Karl Ferdinand Braun: Inventor of the CRT oscilloscope in 1897
- Wernher von Braun: The preeminent rocket engineer of the 20th century. Developed the V-2 rocket for Germany. Built Saturn V rocket in USA which put man on the moon.
- Robert Bunsen: Chemist who developed the Bunsen burner, and with Gustav Kirchhoff he discovered caesium (1860) and rubidium (1861).
- Wilhelm Busch: Caricaturist, painter and poet; father of comics.
- Christian Friedrich Ludwig Buschmann: Pioneer and promoter of the harmonica.
- Adolf Busemann: Discovered the effect of swept wing for modern aircraft in 1935.
- Adolf Butenandt: Discovered primary female sex hormones. Shared the Nobel Prize in Chemistry with Leopold Ruzicka in 1939.
- Georg Cantor: Mathematician, discoverer of the set theory (1870s), which has become a fundamental theory in mathematics.
- Carl von Clausewitz: The father of modern military theory.
- Justus Claproth: Jurist and inventor of recyclable paper and deinking.
- Manfred Curry: German American yachtsman, developed the cam cleat used on sailboats to easily and quickly secure a rope, discoverer of the pseudoscientific phenomenon of "geomagnetic lines" called the Curry Grid.
- Gottlieb Daimler: He invented the first high-speed petrol engine and the first four-wheel automobile, also the first internal combustion motorcycle, theReitwagen.
- Adolf "Adi" Dassler: Sports shoes with and without spikes. (Adidas).
- Rudolf Dassler: First sport shoes with screw-in shoe spikes, 1949. (Puma).
- Hans Georg Dehmelt: Physicist. Co-developed the non-magnetic quadrupole mass filter which laid the foundation for what we now call an ion trap. Shared the Nobel Prize in 1989.
- Max Delbrück: German–American biophysicist. He won the Nobel prize for discovering that bacteria become resistant to viruses (phages) as a result of genetic mutations.
- Johann Christoph Denner: Woodwind instrument maker, inventor of the clarinet.
- Johann Friedrich Dieffenbach: Pioneer of skin transplantation and cosmetic surgery.
- Ernst Dickmanns: Developer of the first driverless car
- Rudolf Diesel: Inventor of the diesel engine 1893.
- Christian Doppler: Discovered the Doppler effect.
- Walter Robert Dornberger: Co-inventor of the V-2 rocket.
- Karl Drais: Inventor of the bicycle and typewriter (1821) among other things.
- Peter Ferdinand Drucker: Invented the science of modern management.
- Paul Ehrlich: Scientist in the fields of hematology, immunology, and chemotherapy, and Nobel laureate. Developed an effective treatment against syphilis.
- Albert Einstein: Father of Theoretical Physics, inventor and discoverer.
- Ludwig Elsbett: Developed new concepts for Diesel engines which drastically enhanced effiency.
- Evaristo Conrado Engelberg: Inventor in 1885 of a machine used to remove the husks from rice and coffee, the Engelberg huller
- Hugo Erdmann: Chemist who discovered, together with his doctoral advisor Jacob Volhard, the Volhard-Erdmann cyclization. In 1898 he was the first who coined the term noble gas (the original noun is Edelgas in German).
- Daniel Gabriel Fahrenheit: Physicist and engineer who invented the alcohol thermometer (1709), the mercury thermometer (1714), and a temperature scale now named after him.
- Gerd Faltings: mathematician known for his work in arithmetic algebraic geometry, Fields Medal in 1986 for proving the Mordell conjecture.
- Wilhelm Emil Fein: Invented the electrically-driven hand drill in 1895.
- Artur Fischer: Invented the (split) wallplug made of plastic in 1958.
- Hermann Emil Fischer: Discoveries in chemistry.
- Franz Fischer and Hans Tropsch: Invented a process in 1925 to turn coal into synthesis gas, and still further into liquid hydrocarbons. The process is a key component in modern gas to liquids processes.
- Irmgard Flügge-Lotz: She worked on what she called "discontinuous automatic control," which laid the foundation for automatic on-off aircraft control systems in jets.
- Werner Forssmann: Performed the first human cardiac catheterisation. Shared the Nobel Price for Medicine 1956
- Joseph von Fraunhofer: Discovery of the dark absorption lines known as Fraunhofer lines in the Sun's spectrum, and for making excellent optical glass and achromatic telescope objectives.
- Gottlob Frege: He is generally considered to be the father of analytic philosophy. Had influence on Carnap, Russell, and Wittgenstein
- Otto Frenzl: Aeronautical pioneer, developed the area rule in 1943, a design technique for airfoils used to reduce an aircraft's drag at transonic and supersonic speeds. Later it was independently developed again by Richard T. Whitcomb in 1952.
- Sigmund Freud: Neurologist who became known as the founding father of psychoanalysis.
- Nikolaus Friedreich: Discovery of Friedreich-Auerbach disease (together with Leopold Auerbach) among other things.
- Friedrich Fröbel: Pedagogue, who laid the foundation for modern education. He created the concept of the kindergarten.
- Klaus Fuchs: Theoretical physicist
- Hermann Ganswindt: Inventor and spaceflight scientist, whose inventions (such as the dirigible, the helicopter, and the internal combustion engine) are thought to have been ahead of his time.
- Johann Carl Friedrich Gauss: German mathematician and physical scientist who contributed significantly to many fields, including number theory, statistics, analysis, differential geometry, geodesy, geophysics, electrostatics, astronomy and optics. Sometimes referred to as "the Prince of Mathematicians".
- Hans Geiger: Inventor of the Geiger-Müller counter. Further improved by Walther Müller.
- Heinrich Geißler: Inventor of the Geissler tube.
- Reinhard Genzel: Astrophysicist, he and his group were the first to track the motions of stars at the centre of the Milky Way and show that they were orbiting a very massive object, probably a supermassive black hole.
- Walter Gerlach: Physicist who co-discovered spin quantization in a magnetic field, the Stern-Gerlach effect.
- Heinrich Göbel: Inventor of the first light bulb in 1854.
- Kurt Gödel: Important discoveries in math and logic, such as the incompleteness theorems
- Maria Goeppert-Mayer: Physicist. Nobel laureate in Physics 1963 for proposing the nuclear shell model of the atomic nucleus together with J. Hans D. Jensen. The unit for the two-photon absorption cross section is named the Goeppert-Mayer (GM) unit.
- Peter Carl Goldmark: Engineer who was instrumental in developing the long-playing (LP) microgroove 33-1/3 rpm vinyl phonograph disc.
- Heinrich Greinacher: German-Swiss physicist. He is regarded as an original experimenter and is the developer of the magnetron and the Greinacher multiplier; Cockcroft-Walton-Generator in 1914.
- Brothers Grimm: Academic pioneers of philology, linguistics, and storytelling. Worked together on the most comprehensive dictionary of the German language Deutsches Wörterbuch. Jacob Grimm: Philologist and linguist. Described first what is know known as Grimm's law, the first scientific research into sound change in 1822.
- Walter Gropius: Pioneer of modern architecture. Founder of the Bauhaus. First modern industrial building designed in 1910.
- Peter Grünberg: Physicist. Discovered giant magnetoresistance with Albert Fert. The discovery is used in gigabyte hard disk drives for computers. Nobel laureate 2007.
- Heinz Guderian: The father of modern mechanized warfare, inventor of the Blitzkrieg strategy.
- Otto von Guericke: Groundbreaking research into air pressure. Invented the vacuum pump in 1650.
- Johannes Gutenberg: Inventor of the technology of printing with movable type in 1439. The first book so printed was the Gutenberg Bible, one of the most beautifully executed printed books ever produced.
- Fritz Haber: German chemist and Nobel laureate who pioneered synthetic ammonia and chemical warfare.
- Theodor W. Hänsch: Physicist, developed laser-based precision spectroscopy further to determine optical frequency extremely accurately. Nobel laureate in 2005.
- Otto Hahn: German chemist and Nobel laureate who pioneered the fields of radioactivity and radiochemistry. Considered to be "the father of nuclear chemistry" and the "founder of the atomic age". Discovered many isotopes, Protactinium and nuclear fission.
- Harald zur Hausen: Virologist, discovered the role of papilloma viruses in the development of cervical cancer. His research made the development of a vaccine against papilloma possible, which will drastically reduce cervical cancer in future. Nobel laureate 2008.
- Henry J. Heinz: Tomato ketchup and fifty six other things.
- Werner Heisenberg: Theoretical physicist who made fundamental contributions to quantum mechanics. Discovered a particle's position and velocity cannot be known at the same time. Discovered atomic nuclei are made of protons and neutrons.
- Rudolf Hell: Inventor of the first fax machine (Hellschreiber).
- Richard Hellmann: Hellmann's (Blue Ribbon) Mayonnaise, 1905.
- Hermann von Helmholtz: Discovered the principle of conservation of energy.
- Peter Henlein: Inventor of the portable watch.
- Friedrich Wilhelm Herschel (William Herschel): Discovered the planet Uranus and infrared radiation among other things.
- Heinrich Hertz: Physicist, Discoverer of electromagnetic/radio waves.
- Otto "Rambo" Herzog: First use of the Carabiner in mountain climbing which substantially enhanced security for mountaineers.
- Victor Francis Hess: Discovered Cosmic rays. Also won the Nobel Prize.
- David Hilbert: Influential Mathematician, discovered and developed a broad range of fundamental ideas in math.
- Albert Hofmann: German-Swiss; Discovered the chemical properties of chitin and lysergic acid diethylamide.
- Felix Hoffmann: Isolated acetylsalicylic acid, a painkiller marketed under the name Aspirin (Bayer), 1897. In some English speaking countries marketed under the name disprin.
- Herman Hollerith: a German American statistician who developed a mechanical tabulator based on punched cards
- Gottlob Honold: Inventor of the spark plug and the modern internal combustion engine, as well as headlights.
- Horten brothers: Designed some of the most advanced aircraft of the 1940s, including the world's first jet-powered flying wing, the Horten Ho 229.
- Christian Hülsmeyer: German inventor of the Telemobilskop, a radio-based detector of remote objects; a 1904 precursor of radar.
- Alexander von Humboldt: Naturalist and explorer. His quantitative work on botanical geography was foundational to the field of biogeography.
- Wilhelm von Humboldt: Originator of the linguistic relativity hypothesis.
- J. Hans D. Jensen: nuclear physicist, proposed the nuclear shell model, shared 1963 Nobel Prize in Physics.
- Hugo Junkers: Pioneer of all-metal aircraft construction with the Junkers J 1 (1915–16).
- Donald J. Kessler - Astrophysicist, known for developing the Kessler syndrome.
- Hermann Kemper: Invented the magnetic levitation train. Patent granted in 1934.
- Johannes Kepler: Discovered the laws of planetary motion.
- Wolfgang Ketterle: German-American physicist who developed an "atom laser", amongst other breakthroughs. Nobel laureate 2001.
- Erhard Kietz: Pioneer discoverer of video technology.
- Gustav Kirchhoff: Discovery of the principles upon which spectroscopy is founded.
- Martin Heinrich Klaproth: Discovered the element Uranium.
- Klaus von Klitzing: physicist, known for discovery of the integer quantum Hall effect, 1985 Nobel Prize in Physics.
- Ludwig Knorr: Chemist, who together with Carl Paal, discovered the Paal-Knorr synthesis, and the Knorr quinoline synthesis and Knorr pyrrole synthesis.
- Robert Koch: Physician, discoverer, inventor and Nobel Prize winner. He became famous for isolating Bacillus anthracis (1877), the Tuberculosis bacillus (1882) and the Vibrio cholera (1883) and for his development of Koch's postulates.
- Arthur Korn: Inventor involved in development of the fax machine, specifically the transmission of photographs or telephotography, known as theBildtelegraph.
- Max Kramer: Aircraft engineer. Developed the first operational guided bomb in 1942/43. This first smart bomb was radio controlled and joy-stick operated.
- Julius H. Kroehl: Inventor and engineer, who built the first functioning submarine in the world.
- Herbert Kroemer: Physicist, shared the Nobel Prize in Physics 2000 for developing semiconductor heterostructures used in high-speed- and opto-electronics.
- Werner Krüger: Developed the Krueger flap, a lift enhancement device in modern aircraft wings in 1943.
- Alfred Krupp: Pioneer in metal casting and metal working process and procedures.
- Adam Johann von Krusenstern: Navigator and explorer, led the first Russian expedition to circumnavigate the earth.
- Dietrich Küchemann: Aeronautical pioneer, developed wings for supersonic speed, such as delta wings as used in the Concorde.
- Eugen Langen: Entrepreneur, engineer and inventor, involved in the development of the petrol engine and the Wuppertal monorail.
- Max von Laue: Discoveries regarding the diffraction of X-rays in crystals.
- Ernst Lecher: He is remembered for developing an apparatus— "Lecher lines"—to measure the wavelength and frequency of electromagnetic waves.
- Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz: Philosopher known for discovering the mathematical field of calculus and coherently laying down its basic operations in 1684.
- Georg Christoph Lichtenberg: German scientist credited with the development of the electrophorus.
- Justus von Liebig: German chemist who made contributions to agricultural and biological chemistry.
- Otto Lilienthal: Father of Aviation and first successful aviator. Main discovery was the properties and shape of the wing.
- Carl von Linde: Engineer who, among other things, developed refrigeration and gas separation technologies.
- Walter Linderer: Father of the airbag.
- Alexander Lippisch: Pioneer of aerodynamics, his most famous design is the Messerschmitt Me 163.
- Ernst Mach: Discovered many effects of high speed projectiles; the Mach number is dedicated to his memory.
- Georg Hans Madelung: Academic and aeronautical engineer; a participant in the development of the Junkers F.13.
- Karl Marx: Political economist and philosopher, who defined the political/economical background of capitalism and discovered the mechanics ofMarxism. His ideas still influence the world we now live in.
- Wilhelm Maybach: Together with Gottlieb Daimler the first gasoline-powered motorcycle, power-engined boat and later, 1902, the Mercedes car model.
- Ottomar von Mayenburg: Inventor of "Chlorodont", the first commercial brand of toothpaste.
- Lise Meitner: Nuclear physicist, who, together with Otto Frisch, provided a theoretical account of nuclear fission.
- Julius Lothar Meyer: With Mendeleev he developed the periodic classification of the elements in order of their atomic weight.
- Gregor Mendel: Discoveries in genetics. Mendel demonstrated that the inheritance of certain traits in pea plants follows particular patterns, now referred to as the laws of Mendelian inheritance. First published in 1865.
- Ottmar Mergenthaler: Inventor who has been called a second Gutenberg because of his invention of the Linotype machine.
- Rudolf Mössbauer: physicist, discovered Mössbauer effect, shared Nobel Prize in Physics 1961.
- Johannes Peter Müller: Discoveries in physiology.
- Thomas Nast: The German American "Father of the American Cartoon".
- Walther Nernst: Inventor of the Nernst lamp and Nobel laureate 1920 in Chemistry.
- Karl Nessler: Inventor of the permanent wave.
- Emmy Noether: Mathematician. Groundbreaking contributions to abstract algebra and theoretical physics. Considered by many as the most influential woman in the history of mathematics.
- Hermann Oberth: Pioneer of rocket science and discoverer of the Oberth effect.
- August Oetker: Pharmacist. He was the first to sell baking powder in small packets to households instead of bakeries (as others before him) and thus made it the popular product we know today.
- Hans Joachim Pabst von Ohain: The modern jet engine in 1933, patented in 1936. Frank Whittle had developed a similar concept independently in 1928/1929.
- Wilhelm Ostwald: Numerous discoveries and inventions in chemistry and other areas.
- Nikolaus August Otto: Inventor of the first internal-combustion engine to efficiently burn fuel directly in a piston chamber.
- Wolfgang Paul: Physicist. Co-developed the non-magnetic quadrupole mass filter which laid the foundation for what we now call an ion trap. Shared the Nobel Prize in 1989.
- Hans von Pechmann: Chemist, renowned for his discovery of diazomethane in 1894. Pechmann condensation and Pechmann pyrazole synthesis.
- Fritz Pfleumer: Inventor of magnetic tape for recording sound. He builts the world's first practical tape recorder, called Magnetophon K1.
- Max Planck: Physicist, Scientist. He is considered to be the founder of the quantum theory, and one of the most important physicists of the twentieth century.
- Robert Wichard Pohl: In 1938, together with Rudolf Hilsch, built first functioning solid-state amplifier using salt as the semiconductor.
- Ludwig Prandtl: First to explain the boundary layer and its importance for drag and streamlining in aircraft in 1904. He established and headed the Aerodynamische Versuchsanstalt in Göttingen, now Max Planck Institute for Dynamics and Self-Organization. During his tenure the first wind tunnel in Germany was built here, thereby establishing a specific design for wind tunnels (Göttingen type).
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- Johann Philipp Reis: Inventor of the first phone transmitter in 1861, he also invented the term Telephone.
- Ralf Reski: Moss bioreactor (1998)
- Paul Julius Freiherr von Reuter: Communications pioneer.
- Fritz Reiche: was a student of Max Planck and a colleague of Albert Einstein,who was active in, and made important contributions to the early development of quantum mechanics including co-authoring the Thomas-Reiche-Kuhn sum rule
- Bernhard Riemann: Mathematician, who made lasting contributions to analysis, number theory, and differential geometry.
- Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen: Physicist and discoverer of x-rays/Röntgen rays (8 November 1895), this earned him the first Nobel Prize in Physics in 1901.
- Arthur Rudolph: Rocket engineer who, together with Wernher von Braun, played a key role in the development of the V-2 rocket.
- Ernst Ruska: Physicist, developed the first electron microscope in 1933. Nobel laureate 1986.
- Arthur Scherbius: Developed the mechanical cipher machine Enigma. Patent granted in 1918.
- Friedrich Albert Moritz Schlick: was a German philosopher, physicist and the founding father of logical positivism and the Vienna Circle.
- Heinrich Schliemann: Father of archaeology, among other things he discovered Homeric Troy.
- Hugo Schmeisser: Developed the first modern assault rifle StG 44 in 1942.
- Bernhard Schmidt: Discovered major improvements to the telescope.
- Paul Schmidt (inventor): Developed since 1928 his idea of a new drive, the "pulsating incineration", also used in the V-1 flying bomb (engine was called "Argus-Schmidtrohr"); pulsejet was a development by Schmidt.
- Christian Friedrich Schönbein: Professor Schönbein is credited with four scientific advances: Ozone, Gun cotton, Collodion and Fuel cell
- Johann Lukas Schönlein: Professor of medicine, he discovered among other things the parasitic cause of ringworm or favus (Achorion Schönleinii).
- Otto Schott: Inventor of borosilicate glass. Donated his shares in the company Carl Zeiss to form Carl-Zeiss-Stiftung, still in existence today.
- Walter H. Schottky:played a major early role in developing the theory of electron and ion emission phenomena, invented the screen-grid vacuum tube and the pentode.
- Marx Schwab: Silversmith, invented coining with the screw press around 1550.
- Theodor Schwann: Discovery of properties of cells in animals.
- Alois Senefelder: He invented the printing technique of lithography in 1796.
- Friedrich Sertürner: First to isolate morphine from the opium poppy in 1803/1804, discovering morphine.
- Philipp Franz von Siebold: Physician and naturalist, detailed description and collection of the Japanese flora and fauna. Introduced Western medicine to Japan and opened a medical school.
- Ernst Werner von Siemens: Dynamo, pointer telegraph that used a needle to point to the right letter, first electric elevator, trolleybus.
- Arnold Sommerfeld: Theoretical physicist who pioneered developments in atomic and quantum physics.
- Jack Steinberger: German-American-Swiss physicist, co-discovered the muon neutrino, shared 1988 Nobel Prize in Physics.
- Georg Wilhelm Steller: Chief naturalist on Vitus Bering's expedition during which Alaska was discovered (1741) and pioneer of Alaskan Natural History. Steller's sea cow (now extinct) was named after him.
- Otto Stern: Nobel laureate; contributed to the discovery of spin quantization in the Stern-Gerlach experiment with Walther Gerlach in 1922.
- Heinrich Stölzel: Developed the valve for brass instruments which is used today in 1818. Friedrich Blühmel had made a similar development independently at the same time.
- Horst Ludwig Störmer: German-American physicist. Shared the Nobel Prize in 1998 for the discovery of a new form of quantum fluid with fractionally charged excitations.
- Levi Strauss: The German American father of blue jeans.
- Eduard Suess: Discoveries in geology.
- Ehrenfried Walther von Tschirnhaus: He is considered to have been the inventor of European porcelain.
- Dietrich "Diedrich" Uhlhorn: Engineer, mechanic and inventor, who invented the first mechanical tachometer (1817), between 1817 and 1830 inventor of the Presse Monétaire (level coin press known as Uhlhorn Press) which bears his name.
- Abraham Vater: Professor of anatomy; Ampulla of Vater.
- Richard Vetter: Developed the most fuel efficient condensing boiler for heating systems in 1980. Used in many houses in Europe.
- Rudolf Virchow: "Father of modern pathology"; numerous discoveries in the area of medicine.
- Hans Vogt: Invented sound-on-film (idea 1905) together with Jo Engl and Joseph Massolle, first sound-on-film for the public on 17 September 1922 in Filmtheater Alhambra, Berlin, Germany.
- Woldemar Voigt (often: Waldemar Voigt): Physicist, who taught at the Georg August University of Göttingen. He worked on crystal physics, thermodynamics and electro-optics. He discovered the Voigt effect in 1898.
- Waldemar Voigt (aerospace engineer): Chief designer at Messerschmitt's Oberammergau offices and pioneer of the Me 163 and Me 264, project leader of the development of Me P. 1101, Me P. 1106, Me P. 1110, Me P. 1111, Me P. 1112 and Me P. 1116.
- Jacob Volhard: Chemist who discovered, together with his student Hugo Erdmann, the Volhard–Erdmann cyclization.
- Martin Waldseemüller: Cartographer, used the name "America" on his map Universalis Cosmographia in honour of the Florentine explorer Amerigo Vespucci. The map was drawn at St. Die in 1507 and it was the first time "America" was used on a map.
- Otto Wallach: Chemist who researched, amongst others, alicyclic compounds. Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1910.
- Hellmuth Walter: Engineer who pioneered research into rocket engines and gas turbines.
- Felix Wankel: Inventor of the Rotary Motor.
- Max Weber: Discovered the mass effects of capitalism and modernity.
- Wilhelm Eduard Weber: Inventor of the first electromagnetic telegraph together with Carl Friedrich Gauss.
- Alfred Wegener: He is most notable for proposing continental drift in 1912
- Gustav Weißkopf: Aviation pioneer - Worlds First Motorized Flight: August 14, 1901.
- Clemens Alexander Winkler: Chemist who discovered the element germanium in 1886.
- August Wöhler: Investigated fatigue phenomena in the behavior of materials
- Friedrich Wöhler: The first to synthesise urea. Wöhler is regarded as a pioneer in organic chemistry.
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- Hermann Zapf: Pioneer of computer typography and creator of many well known typefaces.
- Carl Zeiss: Pioneered glass casting and allied procedures and processes for high quality optics.
- Ferdinand Graf von Zeppelin (1838–1917): Inventor of the airship named after him. Start of the airship LZ1 in 1900.
- Karl Zimmer: Discovered the effects of ionizing radiation on DNA in 1935.
- Konrad Zuse: Inventor of the first functional program-controlled Turing-complete computer in 1941, and the first high-level programming language Plankalkül in 1942.
- The Bahlsen cookie tradition was started by Hermann Bahlsen (1859-1919) in 1888. Bahlsen, originally from Hannover, worked as a sugar merchant in Great Britain, where he learned about the English cakes. In 1889 he founded the Hannoversche Cakesfabrik in Hannover. He broke away from his competitors by selling cookies in packages rather than individually. In 1891he developed what was to become Germany's most well-known brand-name cookie: the Leibnitz-Cakes - a butter cookie named after the Philosopher Gottfried Wilhelm Leibnitz from the city of Leipzig. Bahlsen was a pioneer in both marketing and production. He used innovative advertising techniques: in 1898 he installed an illuminated poster (the second one in Germany) at the Postdamer Platz in Berlin showing the Leibnitz-Cakes as an ideal travel snack. Likewise, Bahlsen was the first in Europe to implement an assembly-line. Bahlsen also had an impact on the German language. In 1911 he created the word "Keks" as a translation for the English word "Cakes." He used this new word in his business name, changing it to H. Bahlsens Keks-Fabrik Hannover. At the same time, he changed the name of his butter cookie to Leibnitz-Keks. The word Keks (plural: Kekse) was added to the German dictionaries the same year.
- Albrecht Ludwig Berblinger (1770-1829), known as the "Flying Tailor of Ulm", started with flight experiments in Ulm, Germany, in the early 19th century. He gained experience in downhill gliding with a maneuverable airworthy semi-rigid hang-glider and then attempted to cross the Danube River at Ulm's Eagle's Bastion on the 31st of May 1811. The tricky local winds caused him to crash and he was rescued by fishermen, making him the first survivor of a water immersion accident of a heavier-than-air manned "flight machine". Though he failed in his attempt to be the first man to fly, Berblinger can be regarded as one of the significant aviation pioneers who applied the "heavier than air" principle and paved the way for the more effective glide-flights of Otto Lilienthal (1891) and the Wright Brothers (1902). Less known are Berblinger's significant contributions to the construction of artificial limbs for medical use, as well as the spring-application in aviation. His invention of a special mechanical joint was also used for the juncture of the wings of his "flying machine". Because of his worthwhile contributions to medicine and flight, in 1993 the German Academy of Aviation Medicine named an annual award for young scientists in the field of aerospace medicine in his honor.
- http://worldwide.espacenet.com/publicationDetails/biblio?locale=de_EP&CC=GB&NR=131402 Improvements in the Composition and Manufacture of Sausage Meat and the like; Patent
- http://depatisnet.dpma.de/DepatisNet/depatisnet?window=1&space=menu&content=treffer&action=pdf&docid=AT000000074310B&Cl=2&Bi=1&Ab=&De=2&Dr=&Pts=&Pa=&We=&Sr=&Eam=&Cor=&Aa=&so=desc&sf=vn&firstdoc=0&NrFaxPages=2&pdfpage=2Patent; page 2
- John M. Barry, The Great Influenza; The Epic Story of the Deadliest Plague in History (New York: Penguin Books, 2005) 70.
- Renouf, Edward (1901-02-15). "Noble gases". Science 13 (320): 268–270. Bibcode:1901Sci....13..268R. doi:10.1126/science.13.320.268.
- Christian Friedrich Schönbein (18 October 1799 - 29 August 1868)
- History of coin pressing
- Boyne, Walter J.; Museum, Space (1980). Messerschmitt Me 262 : arrow to the future. Washington D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press. p. 117. ISBN 978-0-87474-276-3.
Claire Loewenfeld, born Lewisohn in Berlin, Germany (27 September 1899 – 20 August 1974) was a nutritionist and herbalist who worked inEngland during and after the Second World War promoting the importance of good nutrition, most notably rosehips from Britain's hedgerows as a source of vitamin C. She studied at Maximilian Bircher-Benner's clinic in Zurich, Switzerland, and worked as a dietician at Great Ormond Street Hospital for Sick Children in London, where she developed a fruit and vegetable diet for the treatment of coeliac disease.
Loewenfeld was the founder of Chiltern Herb Farms in England, one of the earliest producers of high-quality dried herbs, and was one of the first members of the Soil Association. She wrote a number of books about nutrition, including Britain's Wild Larder: Fungi (1956), Herb Gardening(1967) and Everything you should know about your food (1978).
Claire was born in Belin, Germany. Her parents were Arthur and Jeanette (née Jacobi) Lewisohn. She married Günther Emmanuel Loewenfeld (November 1895–January 1984) on 5 July 1921. They continued to live in Berlin in the period followng their marriage. Both Claire and Günther were from Jewish families, however, Günther was brought up in the Protestant faith. Between 1923 and 1925 they spent their weekends with friends Fritz and Lily Pincus in a rented house, in Glienicke, on the outskirts of Potsdam. In 1925 the Loewenfelds and Pincuses moved out of Berlin to adjacent rented properties which they shared on the Küssel, a peninsula jutting out into Lake Templiner in a rural district of Potsdam. Both husbands commuted to Berlin to work. By 1931 Claire and Günther had two children, Peter and Verena, likewise the Pincuses had two children. Both couples also had their relatives living with them from time to time and as more living space was needed they decided to buy their respective properties enlarging and linking them. Das Haus auf dem Küssel (The House on the Küssel) as it had become known was redesigned, to include both shared areas and private quarters, by a well-known Potsdam architect, Stephan Hirtzel. Another close friend of both families, Paul Tillich, a German-American Protestant theologian wrote a dedication on the inauguration of their new home entitled, (in English), Space and Time in Dwelling. The Loewenfeld and Pincuses' house soon became a meeting place for Tillich and his circle of German intellectuals until Tillich, whose writings brought him into conflict with the Nazi movement, was subsequently forced into exile in the U.S.
During early 1936 the Loewenfelds travelled to Syria and Palestine where they witnessed at first-hand the initial stages of the Arab uprising against British mandate and Jewish immigration. They spent the summer of 1936 near Cortina in the Italian Dolomites where they met Tillich who was on a European lecture tour. In Tillich's diary an account of their time in Palestine records:
"While in Palestine, Claire and Guenther were in constant danger of their lives. Once, the only thing that saved them was their Arab guide saying they were German Nazis. Hitler is the big man with the Arabs. Mussolini gives them money to spite the British." 
From 1937 Claire and Lily's home in the Küssel provided a refuge for Jewish children, whose parents had been arrested or had been abandoned and were homeless. Claire's family continued to live in Germany until the latter part of 1938 when they left Potsdam due to the increasing likelihood of arrest. The Loewenfelds had made arrangements in advance for their belongings to be transported to England and for their children to be evacuated to an English boarding school, St Christopher School, Letchworth, Hertfordshire. Meanwhile Günther joined relatives in England and Claire travelled first to Switzerland before rejoining her husband in early 1939. The family settled in rural Buckinghamshire in 1941.
During her time in Berlin in the 1920s Claire worked at an institute "providing slides and illustrations" for a university. In late 1938 Claire Loewenfeld studied at the Maximilian Bircher-Benner's clinic in Zurich, Switzerland obtaining a special diploma in nutrition. During the Second World War, she worked at the Great Ormond Street Hospital for Sick Children in London, England as a dietician. While there she specialised in the treatment of coeliac disease and successfully developed a new diet to treat it, based on Bircher-Benner's recipes, involving raw vegetable and fruit juice; she was also involved in longitudinal comparative studies assessing various treatments for the condition.
During the war, Loewenfeld wrote to The Times and the British Medical Journal about the negative impact the shortage of fresh fruit and vegetables was having on the nation's health, and advocated the collection and distribution of rose hips from the hedgerows, as they provided "our highest home-grown source of Vitamin C". As a result a leaflet she had prepared called Wild Rose Hips in War Time. Their Collection, Preparation and Use on how to exploit rose hips was immediately in huge demand. Over 18000 leaflets were sent by Claire to individuals as well as being widely distributed to schools and hospitals. In response, the government organised a nationwide initiative to collect roadside rose hips which, with the help of the Women's Institutes, were processed into syrup for babies and children. This was the first of several leaflets; there were an additional three under the title Wild Plants and Herbs, and three more grouped together under the heading Wild Fruits and Berries which were also distributed with the assistance of the newsagent WH Smith.
After the war, Claire set up Chiltern Herb Farm in Buckland Common, Buckinghamshire, with her husband, who before the war had practiced as an attorney and later had become a landscape architect. Her experience of using dried herbs to treat sick children during the war had made her aware that the standard preparation techniques resulted in material of poor nutrional value. Experimentation led to methods for producing dried herbs of higher quality which coincided with an increasing demand in Britain for such culinary products. She also gave lectures and demonstrations, and wrote and collaborated on several books about healthy eating, herb gardening, and cooking with herbs and spices, some of which were also translated into German, Dutch and Spanish. She was a vegetarian  and also promoted the benefits of Birchermüesli, or müesli as it is better known, which she learned the health benefits of while training at the Bircher-Benner Clinic. She translated into English the book by Ruth Bircher which also contained the original recipe for the cereal food (Bircher 1961). She was one of the first members of the Soil Association, advocating freshly prepared food and campaigning against the processing of food and addition of chemicals. Claire was also a member of the women's volunteer organisation, Soroptimist International.
Claire Loewenfeld died on 20 August 1974, and is buried at St Lawrence's Church, Cholesbury, Buckinghamshire, near where she lived, alongside her husband Gunther Loewenfeld's cousins,Margaret Lowenfeld and Helena Wright née Lowenfeld.
- Britain's Wild Larder – Nuts. Faber and Faber, 1957. ASIN B000Q9DOS0
- Britain's Wild Larder – Fungi. Faber and Faber, 1957. ASIN B0000CJC09
- Herb Gardening. Faber and Faber, 1970. ISBN 0-571-09475-9
- Everything You Should Know About Your Food. Faber and Faber, 1978. ISBN 0-571-11256-0
- with Beck, Philippa. The complete book of herbs and spices. David & Charles, 1974. ISBN 0-7153-7656-X
- ______________. Herbs for Health and Cookery. Macmillan, 1978. ISBN 0-330-25336-0
- with Bosanquet, Patience and Beck, Philippa. Britain's Wild Larder. David & Charles, 1970. ISBN 0-7153-7971-2
- (trans.) Bircher, Ruth. Eating Your Way to Health: the Bircher-Benner approach to nutrition. Faber and Faber, 1961. ISBN 0-571-06984-3