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Fill-in-the-Map #1 - Prelude to World War One

Complete each sentence in the text with the correct Country, War or important person to uncover the events that led to the breakout of the Great War!
This symbol denotes an important historical personality.
This symbol denotes a War.
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Lindwyrm
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Last updated: January 4, 2026
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First submittedDecember 13, 2025
Times taken33
Average score65.2%
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Prelude to WWI
At the dawn of the 20th century Europe found itself in a precarious situation.
Six Great Powers and their alliances dominated the continent,
in a fragile state of balance, called "the Concert of Europe", to
avoid any single Country gaining too much power for itself.
This delicate scenario (as it was at the end of the 19th century)
was the masterwork of Chancellor Otto von Bismarck,
who played other Powers against each other to his own benefit.
 
Along with his own Country, Germany, only unified in 1871, he
managed to secure an alliance with two other Great Powers, Italy
which fought at Prussia's side in the Bruderkrieg of 1866, and
Austria-Hungary, a declining Empire which faced rising tensions
due to the various nationalities inside their borders which demanded
independence, seemingly only held together by the austere figure of
their aging Emperor, Franz Joseph.
 
The other main European Alliance was the so-called "Dual Entente"
between France, one of the very few republics on the continent,
rancourous after its defeat during the Franco-Prussian War, and
Russia, which featured the highest population in Europe, impressive
year-by-year economic growth and limitless resources, but also an
authoritarian and corrupt government under tsar Nicholas II.
 
The remaining Power was the United Kingdom, a tired titan, standing
on a throne that increasingly felt uncomfortable: it owned the greatest
Empire the world had ever known but chose "splendid isolation" over
mainstream European affairs, only swearing to uphold the balance of
power in the continent, for example by defending the independence
of smaller Countries, like Belgium, against the hunger of bigger rivals.
These Great Powers carved the world into colonies, protectorates and
Dominions, armed themselves with the most advanced military technology
(such as planes, machine guns and Dreadnoughts) and looked at each
other with suspicion, knowing that each crisis, each slip meant one step
closer to the possibility of a Great War, tilting the balance irreparably.
 
And the crises came. For example, in the Sultanate of Morocco, where
French and German ambitions clashed for a protectorate over the Arab
monarchy, during the Fashoda incident, which nearly saw the breakout
of a war between France and their rivals over the Channel, or with the
humiliating defeat of Russia in their 1905 war against Japan, which
almost saw the rise of a socialist revolution in the Empire.
 
Yet, the tipping point would come from the Balkan Peninsula, the powder-keg
of Europe.
The Ottoman Empire, sometimes referred as the "sick man" of
the continent, had lost most of its European territory during the
Balkan Wars (1912-1913) and was on the verge of collapse.
Meanwhile, these newly independent countries, such as Bulgaria or
Albania were politically unstable and influence upon them was bitterly
contested between the other Great Powers: another big incident in the
region would have been enough to spark a chain reaction that
would have plunged Europe into a bloody Great War.
 
Sure enough, on the 28th of June 1914, a Bosnian nationalist assassinated
in Sarajevo Archduke Franz Ferdinand, leading Austria-Hungary to launch
an ultimatum to Serbia, which was believed to be the real mastermind of
the plot, followed by a direct invasion of the small Kingdom. Rapidly, this
escalated into the July crisis, which forced Russia and their western ally
France to enter the war, followed by, over the course of less than a year,
all other Great Powers.

The world was irreparably changed...
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7 Comments
baptistegorce
+4
Level 57
Dec 13, 2025
Great one! Sometimes a bit too novelised but that's what make the text pleasant to read. And finally someone on this site that understood that WW1 was not just the consequence of the assassination but a much older, deeper et bigger problem.
Lindwyrm
+2
Level 82
Dec 14, 2025
I cut a whole bunch of stuff, the text was already too long.
NEGeo
+3
Level 65
Dec 14, 2025
No Italian invasion of Libya?
Lindwyrm
+3
Level 82
Dec 14, 2025
I wanted to add that and a whole bunch of other stuff, but it would've been too long
NEGeo
+2
Level 65
Jan 4, 2026
Fair enough.
BautyArg
+1
Level 52
Dec 16, 2025
i'd use more vertical padding
Lindwyrm
+1
Level 82
Dec 16, 2025
There's no need? The text looks spaced adequately to me
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