1879 in Germany

Events from the year 1879 in Germany.

Incumbents

12 July – The German tariff of 1879 is voted for by a majority of 100 in the Reichstag.
21 June – German chemical company Linde is founded.
31 May – German inventor Werner von Siemens demonstrates the first electric locomotive using an external power source at Berlin.
26 September – Wilhelm Marr founds the Antisemitenliga (League of Antisemites),{{cite book|title=Wilhelm Marr: The Patriarch of Antisemitism|last=Zimmermann|first=Moshe|location=New York; Oxford|publisher=Oxford University Press|page=71}} the first German organization committed specifically to combating the alleged threat to German culture posed by Jews.
7 October – A defensive alliance between Germany and Austria-Hungary is created by treaty.
31 December – Karl Benz produces a two-stroke gas engine.

4 February – Wilhelm von Gayl, German politician (died 1945)
25 February – Julius Falkenstein, German actor (died 1933)
2 March – Johann Viktor Bredt, German jurist and politician (died 1940)
8 March – Otto Hahn, German chemist and pioneer in the fields of radioactivity and radiochemistry (died 1968)
9 March – Agnes Miegel, German poet (died 1964)
10 March – Hans Luther, German politician, briefly Chancellor of Germany (died 1962)
12 March – Alfred Abel, German actor (died 1837)
14 March – Albert Einstein, German-Swiss theoretical physicist who developed the general theory of relativity (died 1955)
27 April – Alfred Roth, German politician and writer (died 1948)
31 May – F.W. Schröder-Schrom, German actor (died 1956)
28 May – Albert Grzesinski, German politician (died 1948)
6 September
Max Schreck, German actor (died 1936)
Joseph Wirth, German politician, former Chancellor of Germany (died 1956)
9 October – Max von Laue, German physicist (died 1960)
28 October – Martin Kirschner, German surgeon (died 1942)
29 October – Franz von Papen, German politician, Chancellor of Germany (died 1969)
1 November – Oskar Barnack, German inventor and German photographer (died 1936)
14 December – Hermann Dietrich, German politician (died 1954)
16 December – Otto Ludwig Haas-Heye, German fashion designer (died 1959)

24 January – Heinrich Geißler, German physicist (born 1814
23 February – Albrecht von Roon, Prussian soldier and statesman, minister of War from 1859 to 1873, (born 1803)
25 February – Karl Wilhelm von Willisen, Prussian general (born 1790)
13 March – Adolf Anderssen, German chess master (born 1818)
4 April – Heinrich Wilhelm Dove, German physicist and meteorologist (born 1803)
11 May – Bernhard Wolff, German newspaper publisher (born 1811)
15 May – Gottfried Semper, German architect (born 1803)
5 June – August Krönig, German chemist and physicist (born 1822)
7 September – George Westermann, German publisher (born 1810)
23 August – Alexander Duncker, German publisher (born 1813)
20 October – Bernhard Ernst von Bülow, German diplomat and politician (born 1815)
1 December – Franz Ittenbach, German painter (born 1813){{Cite CE1913|wstitle=Franz Ittenbach|last=Williamson|first=George Charles}}