The Nazi period is masterfully handled in Germany's first look at its own history since the second World War, writes Derek Scally in Berlin

A landmark exhibition exploring 2,000 years of German history has opened in Berlin after 25 years of heated discussion, and Adolf Hitler doesn't steal the show.

That realisation comes three-quarters of the way through at the sight of the huge globe Hitler used to plan his world domination. The globe, with a bullet-hole from a Soviet soldier's gun through Berlin, is probably the most unholy relic on show. But, displayed here, in a banal setting beside two escalators, it recalls instead the hilarious balloon dance of Charlie Chaplin's "Great Dictator", Adenoid Hynkel.

The exhibition keeps a firm hand on the Third Reich, documenting soberly the Nazi strangulation of the Weimar Republic and seizure of power, showing visitors Nazi uniforms, Nazi propaganda posters and even a first edition of Mein Kampf, still forbidden in Germany. But in the light-flooded halls of the German Historical Museum (DHM), the Nazi era is stripped of its morbid fascination and placed face-to-face with the horror of the Holocaust. Even the pomposity of the Nazis is deflated with subversive humour, as in the letter from a little girl called Emmi to the dictator on September 15th, 1942. "I have nothing but my love to give you," she wrote. "If you still want it, then take it."

The masterly treatment of the 12 years of the Third Reich lifts into the superlative Germany's first look at its own history since the second World War, a courageous attempt to help fill in the post-war blank that is German national identity.

"The museum wants to remind, to be a place not just of shame but of information and critical self-

contemplation. And of the question, 'Who are we?'" says museum director Hans Ottomeyer. "It's like a message in a bottle to future generations."

The exhibition begins with the push of Germanic tribes into European territories occupied by the Celts in 200 BC and through the Roman settlements in Trier, Cologne and Augsburg. A highlight is the iron face-mask of a Roman legionnaire from the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest in 9AD, when Germanic troops stopped the advancement of the Roman Empire east of the Rhine, a moment marked here as the starting point of German history.

The exhibition moves swiftly on to Charlemagne, noting that the founder of the Holy Roman Empire "had five wives and other concubines", a tradition that continues in Germany right through to several prominent members of the last government. Even Cavan man St Killian is honoured as a key figure in the Christianisation of Germany.

"The exhibition is so incredibly light, not heavy at all," says visitor Jürgen Trautheim from Erfurt, inspecting a Papal Bull from 1268. "It's sober without any pomp and shows how Germany and Europe can't be separated."

That is the leitmotif of this exhibition, that, in the words of French historian Marc Bloch, "there is no French or German history, there is just European history". This becomes clear through the second millennium and the exhibits documenting the Reformation and Counter Reformation, the 30 Years' War, the fall of the Holy Roman Empire and the rise of the German Federation of 1814.

Away from the large events there are simple, joyful moments, too, such as the fascinating Augsburger Monatsbilder, four large paintings from 1531 by Jörg Breu, showing the city of Augsburg's busy marketplace in all four seasons.

The museum has assembled a breathtaking variety of exhibits, from the hat Napoleon lost at Waterloo to the uniform of Frederick the Great and even Albert Speer's 1938 model of the unbuilt Great Hall of the People.

Hitler's enormous writing desk is here too, pulled from the ruins of his Reichs chancellery. "Hubris, absolute hubris," says one tut-tutting old man, looking at the desk. "Even Kaiser Friedrich had notions about himself but nothing like this. It just shows the craziness of it all."

The 20th-century section of the museum is busier than the first half, almost too full of exhibits, and the rewarding if exhausting 2,000-year journey ends with a copy of the 1990 unification agreement.

"Germany is one," reads the cover of the document, a fitting end to an exhibition that marks another significant step in Germany being at one with its identity once more.

German History in Images and Testimonials from Two Millennia is at the Deutsches Historisches Museum, Unter den Linden 2 Berlin 10am-4pm daily www.dhm.de 0049-30-203-044-04