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'Carpathian Germans' (, Slovak: ''Karpatskí Nemci''), sometimes simply called Slovak Germans (German: ''Slowakeideutsche''), is the name for a group of German language speakers on the territory of present-day Slovakia. The term was coined by the historian Raimund Friedrich Preindel, and is also sometimes used to refer to Germans in the Carpathian Ruthenia.
Germans settled in Slovakia from the 12th to 15th centuries, mostly after the Mongol invasion of 1241, though there were probably some isolated settlers in the area of Bratislava earlier. The Germans were usually attracted by kings seeking specialists in various trades, such as craftsmen and miners. They usually settled in older Slovak market and mining settlements. The main settlement areas were in the vicinity of Bratislava (German: ''Pressburg'') and some language islands in the Spiš and the Hauerland. The settlers in the Spiš region were known as ''Zipser Sachsen'', or Spiš Saxons. Until approximately the 15th century, the ruling classes of most Slovak cities consisted almost exclusively of Germans.

The Carpathian Germans were, as the Slovaks, subjected to strong Magyarization policies in the latter half of the 19th and the beginning of the 20th century (Slovakia was part of the Kingdom of Hungary from around the 12th century).
During the First Czechoslovak Republic (1918-1938), Carpathian Germans had a specific political party, the Zipser deutsche Partei (1920-1938) of Andor Nitsch, who was elected from 1925 to 1935 on a common Hungarian-German list for parliamentary elections. In 1929, another party, more nationalist-oriented, was formed in Bratislava, the Karpathendeutschen Partei, which made a common list at the 1935 parliamentary elections with the Sudeten German Party, whose leader Konrad Heinlein became its head in 1937 with Franz Karmasin as deputy. In 1935, both parties obtained a seat in both parliamentary assemblies. In 1939 the KdP was renamed Deutsche Partei with as führer Franz Karmasin, who had become in October 1938 state secretary for German Affairs in the Slovak Tiso government^{[1] [2] [3]}.
The status of Slovak Republic as a client state of Nazi Germany during World War II made life difficult for Carpathian Germans at the war's end. Nearly all remaining Germans fled or were evacuated by the German authorities before the end of World War II. Most Germans from the Spiš evacuated to Germany or the Sudetenland before the arrival of the Red Army. This evacuation was mostly due to the initiative of Adalbert Wanhoff and the preparations of the diocese of the German Evangelical Church, between mid-November, 1944, and January 21, 1945. The Germans of Bratislava were evacuated in January and February of 1945 after long delays, and those of the Hauerland fled at the end of March, 1945. The Red Army reached Bratislava on April 4, 1945.
After the end of war a third of the evacuated or fugitive Germans returned home to Slovakia. However, on August 2, 1945, they lost the rights of citizenship, as did the Sudeten Germans in the Czech area and the Hungarians in the south of Slovakia (see First Vienna Award), by Beneš decree no. 33, and they were interned in camps (German: ''Sammellager'') in Bratislava-Petržalka, Nováky, and in Handlová. In 1946 and 1947, about 33,000 persons were expelled from Slovakia by the Potsdam Agreement, while around 20,000 persons were entitled to remain in Slovakia due to special circumstances. Indeed, out of approximately 128,000 Germans in Slovakia in 1938, by 1947 only some 20,000 (15.6% of the pre-war total) remained.
In 2004 there were fewer than 6,000 Germans in Slovakia. They have enjoyed equal rights, however, since the Velvet Revolution (1989). The Carpathian German Homeland Association exists now to maintain traditions. The most prominent member of this group is the former Slovak president, Rudolf Schuster.

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Sources

1. Herta Brydon, Limbach - Geschichte und Brauchtum eines deutschsprachigen Dorfes in der Slowakei bis 1945, 1991
2. Dr. Thomas Reimer, Carpathian Germans history
3. Ondrej Pöss, Geschichte und Kultur der Karpatendeutschen, Slowakisches Nationalmuseum - Museum der Kultur der Karpatendeutschen, Bratislava, Bratislava/Pressburg, 2005