Fontane hoped to make readers aware of the beauty of Brandenburg, but also of its history in the context of Prussia, both because an awareness of history would be necessary for them to not neglect, for example, a plain-looking but significant castle or the uninteresting-looking site of the Battle of Fehrbellin, but also because he hoped to increase awareness of and affection for historical personages. Initially, he hoped to illuminate the humanity of historic personages rather than writing only of battles and statecraft, and thereby to rouse readers to affection, even love; however, the army being central to Prussian history, by the time he wrote the foreword to the second edition of Volume 1, he had realised that the achievements of the Prussian army must be an ever-present part of the story.