Thank you for your very interesting comment, Ryan. It contains so many valuable details for me. “Bavaria” in my article is more of a metaphor, this imagined house could be anywhere - for example in Mecklenburg or Hanover. It will need some editing.

I am unfortunately not a supporter of the theory that Germans are an artificial term. I believe that Germans are quite real. Otherwise we would have to admit that Russians, Ukrainians and Belarussians (all Eastern Slavs) are also artificial terms. Meanwhile, Ukrainians exist and are quite successful today in resisting Russian aggression. The differences between Russian and Ukrainian are comparable to the differences between Bavarian and Berlin dialects of German. It is therefore necessary to recognize the existence of the Germans, bearing in mind that it is a more political (but also cultural) union. Your analogies with 19th century Russian history are very interesting, and I would support many of them.