The Order of the Teutonic Knights of St. Mary's Hospital in Jerusalem (Ordo domus Sanctæ Mariæ Theutonicorum Hierosolymitanorum), or for short the Teutonic Order (Today: German Order), is a German Roman Catholic religious order. It was formed to aid Catholics on their pilgrimages to the Holy Land and to establish hospitals to care for the sick and injured. Its members have commonly been known as the Teutonic Knights, since they also served as a crusading military order during the Middle Ages. The membership was always small and whenever the need arose, volunteers or mercenaries augmented the military forces.
They established the foundation of high culture in eastern european regions (today: Poland, Ukraine and partly Russia).

Minnesang was the tradition of lyric and song writing in Germany which flourished in the 12th century and continued into the 14th century. People who wrote and performed Minnesang are known as Minnesingers (Minnesänger). The name derives from the word minne, Middle High German for love which was their main subject, and an individual song was a minnelied. The Minnesänger were similar to the Provençal troubadours and northern French trouvères; they wrote love poetry in the courtly love tradition in Middle High German in the High Middle Ages.

A region named Germania inhabited by several Germanic peoples has been known and documented before AD 100. Beginning in the 10th century, German territories formed a central part of the Holy Roman Empire that lasted until 1806. During the 16th century, northern Germany became the centre of the Protestant Reformation. As a modern nation-state, the country was first unified amidst the Franco-Prussian War in 1871.

In the philosophy, art, and culture of German-speaking countries, German Romanticism was the dominant movement of the late 18th and early 19th centuries. German Romanticism developed relatively late compared to its English counterpart, coinciding in its early years with the movement known as German Classicism or Weimar Classicism, which it opposed. In contrast to the seriousness of English Romanticism, the German variety is notable for valuing humor and wit as well as beauty.

Germany is historically called "Das Land der Dichter und Denker" (the land of poets and thinkers).

Germany's influence on philosophy is historically significant and many notable German philosophers have helped shape western philosophy since the Middle Ages. Gottfried Leibniz's contributions to rationalism; the establishment of classical German idealism by Immanuel Kant, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling and Johann Gottlieb Fichte; Karl Marx's and Friedrich Engels' formulation of Communist theory; Arthur Schopenhauer's composition of metaphysical pessimism; Friedrich Nietzsche's development of Perspectivism; Martin Heidegger's works on Being; and the social theories of Jürgen Habermas were especially influential.

Germany claims some of the world's most renowned classical music composers, including Ludwig van Beethoven, Johann Sebastian Bach, Johannes Brahms and Richard Wagner.

The Iron Cross (Eisernes Kreuz) was a military decoration of the Kingdom of Prussia, and later of Germany, which was established by King Friedrich Wilhelm III of Prussia and first awarded on 10 March 1813 in Breslau.
The knights of the Ordo Teutonicus and the Ordo Templar use a similar shaped cross on their banners and armors, which is not called Iron Iross.