History glossary
Treaty of Versailles
the 1919 peace treaty with Germany after the First World War.
- Category
- Treaty
- Region
- Europe
- Date range
- 1919
What it means
The Treaty of Versailles ended the war between Germany and the Allied powers. It imposed territorial losses, military limits, reparations, and a war guilt clause on Germany, while also creating new borders and linking peace to the League of Nations.
Related terms
Stories using this term
Nazi Germany
From Weimar collapse to WWII, Nazi Germany imposed totalitarian rule, expansion, and genocide.
Weimar Republic
A fragile democracy marked by crisis and innovation, whose collapse paved the way for Nazi rule.
The First World War
World War I reshaped empires, borders, and societies, setting the stage for World War II.
The Causes of the Second World War
From the flawed peace of 1919 to the invasion of Poland in 1939, this story traces the interlocking causes of the Second World War across two decades of crisis, ideology, and failed deterrence.
The Treaty of Versailles and Its Consequences
From the armistice of November 1918 to Hitler's rise in 1933, this story traces how the Treaty of Versailles — its punishment, its borders, its reparations, and its resentments — helped shape the conditions for a second world war.
The Rise of Adolf Hitler
From the ashes of World War I to the Night of the Long Knives, this story traces the political rise of Adolf Hitler and the collapse of the Weimar Republic.
The French Revolution
From royal debt and social inequality to republic, terror, and Napoleon, the French Revolution dismantled the old order and produced the political ideas of citizenship, rights, and nationalism that defined the modern world.
Napoleon and the Napoleonic Wars
Napoleon turned revolutionary opportunity into continental empire, then lost it in total war that still transformed European politics, states, and nationalism.
