THE NIBELUNG MYTH IN LINGUISTICS AND CULTURE OF GERMANIC PEOPLES

2021 ◽  
Vol 2 (101) ◽  
pp. 47-58
Author(s):  
SERGEI A. ZHILIUK
Keyword(s):  
Social History ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
German Society ◽  
Cultural Development ◽  
13Th Century ◽  
Nazi Ideology ◽  
The Third Reich ◽  
History Of Europe ◽  
The 19Th Century

The Lay of the Nibelungs is a prominent literature work dating back to the early 13th century. It is a result of almost 10 century evolution of the material going back into the early Middle Ages. The material was also used by other Germanic peoples for development of Scandinavian sagas, Faroese and Danish ballads. The texts representing the story of the Nibelungs mark different stages of social and cultural development of the relevant Germanic peoples and are of a special interest for the historians dealing with the social history of Europe. The Lay of the Nibelungs, however, content not only contemporary features, like courteous rituals, but also archaic ones deriving from ancient lays and tales which are left unknown to us. The 19th century saw growing influence of the myth of the Nibelungs on German society with de La Mott Fouquet and Wagner creating the most eminent works updating the ancient lay. In the 20th century the Nibelungs-mentality shaped some aspects of Nazi ideology and was widely discussed by the leaders of the Third Reich.

scholarly journals Helmuth Plessner and The Delayed Nation

2020 ◽  
Vol 50 (1) ◽  
pp. 128-140
Author(s):  
Joachim Whaley
Keyword(s):  
Social History ◽  
Middle Ages ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
German History ◽  
Avant Garde ◽  
The Social ◽  
The Holocaust ◽  
The Third Reich ◽  
Post War ◽  
The 1960S

Helmuth Plessner’s The Delayed Nation was a key text in the Sonderweg narrative that dominated the writing of German history from the later 1950s to the mid-1980s: the idea that the disaster of the Third Reich and the Holocaust could be explained in terms of Germany’s problematic path to modernity since the Middle Ages. The book had originally been published under a rather prolix title in Zurich in 1935 when Plessner was an émigré in the Netherlands. It made little impact then, and only attracted attention from 1959 under a short title which seemed to capture the essence of the emerging left-liberal view of the disastrous course of German history. The more accessible title in reality masked an extremely complex book which did not sit easily with the social history preoccupations of the avant-garde of post-war German historians. Plessner’s history was a narrative of intellectual degeneration that placed philosophy at the heart of the German problem. Plessner’s book can only be fully understand in relation to his own philosophical and political concerns in the 1920s. Its impact in the 1960s and after derives almost entirely from its suggestive and eye-catching title.

Alma Mater Studiorum. O genezie i początkach uniwersytetów

2017 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
pp. 9-22
Author(s):  
Marek Maciejewski
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Canon Law ◽  
18Th Century ◽  
Ancient Greece ◽  
Roman Law ◽  
Institutions Of Higher Education ◽  
13Th Century ◽  
New Era ◽  
Conducting Research ◽  
The 19Th Century

The origin of universities reaches the period of Ancient Greece when philosophy (sophists, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, stoics and others) – the “Queen of sciences”, and the first institutions of higher education (among others, Plato’s Academy, Cassiodorus’ Vivarium, gymnasia) came into existence. Even before the new era, schools having the nature of universities existed also beyond European borders, including those in China and India. In the early Middle Ages, those types of schools functioned in Northern Africa and in the Near East (Baghdad, Cairo, Constantinople, cities of Southern Spain). The first university in the full meaning of the word was founded at the end of the 11th century in Bologna. It was based on a two-tiered education cycle. Following its creation, soon new universities – at first – in Italy, then (in the 12th and 13th century) in other European cities – were established. The author of the article describes their modes of operation, the methods of conducting research and organizing students’ education, the existing student traditions and customs. From the very beginning of the universities’ existence the study of law was part of their curricula, based primarily on the teaching of Roman law and – with time – the canon law. The rise of universities can be dated from the end of the Middle Ages and the beginning of modernity. In the 17th and 18th century they underwent a crisis which was successfully overcome at the end of the 19th century and throughout the following one.

scholarly journals Le délicat problème des restes humains en archéologie

2019 ◽  
Vol 2 (3) ◽  
pp. 206-209
Author(s):  
Philippe Charlier
Keyword(s):  
Human Remains ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
The Third ◽  
Nazi Ideology ◽  
Interdisciplinary Perspective ◽  
Political Problem ◽  
The Face ◽  
The Third Reich ◽  
The City ◽  
Archaeological Excavations

The problem I am interested in is above all that of the biomedical management of human remains in archaeology, these ancient artifacts “unlike any other”, these “atypical patients”. In the following text, I will examine, with an interdisciplinary perspective (anthropological, philosophical and medical), how it is possible to work on human remains in archaeology, but also how to manage their storage after study. Working in archaeology is already a political problem (in the Greek sense of the word, i.e., it literally involves the city), and one could refer directly to Laurent Olivier’s work on the politics of archaeological excavations during the Third Reich and the spread of Nazi ideology based on excavation products and anthropological studies. But in addition, working on human remains can also pose political problems, and we paid the price in my team when we worked on Robespierre’s death mask (the reconstruction of the face having created a real scandal on the part of the French far left) but also when we worked on Henri IV’s head (its identification having considerably revived the historical clan quarrel between Orléans and Bourbon). Working on human remains is therefore anything but insignificant.

scholarly journals Een protestantse Flamenpolitik? Otto Bölke - dominee, heemkundige, Jongvlaams propagandist

2013 ◽  
Vol 72 (4) ◽  
pp. 303-327
Author(s):  
Winfried Dolderer
Keyword(s):  
Middle Ages ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
Local History ◽  
World War ◽  
Far Right ◽  
National Socialist ◽  
The First World War ◽  
The Third Reich ◽  
Political Radicalism ◽  
First World

De Duitse dominee Otto Bölke (1873 – 1946) was geboren en werkzaam op de Fläming, een streek ten zuidwesten van Berlijn die in de middeleeuwen door inwijkelingen onder meer uit Vlaanderen en Nederland was gekoloniseerd. De vermeende Nederlandse afkomst van zijn voorouders heeft hem levenslang geïntrigeerd en aangezet tot een intense heemkundige bedrijvigheid alsmede een vroegtijdige belangstelling voor de Vlaamse beweging. Vanuit die belangstelling ontbolsterde Bölke zich tijdens de Eerste Wereldoorlog tot propagandist van de Flamenpolitik. Hij was betrokken bij een netwerk van Duitse sympathisanten van de meest radicale, Jongvlaamse variant van het activisme. De stichting van België kwam voor hem neer op een ‘verovering’ door de franstaligen; de Belgische staat noemde hij een ‘fabriek’ tot Romanisering van de Germaanse bevolking. Met Domela Nieuwenhuis maakte Bölke begin 1917 in Berlijn kennis. Domela leefde in onmin met het burgerlijke bezettingsbestuur, maar beschikte over Duitse vrienden in militaire evenals uiterst rechtse annexionistische kringen aan wie hij tot op het laatst verknocht bleef, De talrijke protestantse dominee's in dit netwerk waardeerden niet alleen de Nederlandse ambtsbroeder, maar evenzeer zijn politiek radicalisme dat strookte met hun eigen antidemocratisch conservatisme. Bölke toonde na de oorlog belangstelling voor het Vlaams nationalisme en kwam uiteindelijk in nationaalsocialistisch vaarwater terecht. Hij was een typische vertegenwoordiger van een Duits-nationaal protestantisme dat uit het keizerrijk doorgroeide tot in het Derde Rijk. ________ A Protestant Flamenpolitik (Flemish policy)? Otto Bölke – protestant pastor, expert on local history, propagandist of the Young FlemishThe German pastor Otto Bölke (1873 – 1946) was born and worked in the Fläming, a region southwest of Berlin, that had been colonised during the Middle Ages by immigrants from areas including Flanders and the Netherlands. The supposed Dutch origin of his ancestors intrigued him throughout his life and inspired his profound interest in local history as well as his early interest in the Flemish Movement.During the First World War that interest turned Bölke into a propagandist of the Flamenpolitik. He was involved in a network of German sympathizers of the most radical Young Flemish version of the activism. He considered the foundation of Belgium the equivalent of a ‘conquest’ by French speakers. He described the Belgian state as a ‘factory for romanising the Germanic population.’ Bölke made the acquaintance of Domela Nieuwenhuis in Berlin at the beginning of 1917. Domela was at odds with the civilian occupying administration but had German friends at his disposal in military as well as far right circles favouring annexation, to whom he remained attached until the end. The numerous Protestant pastors in this network valued not only their Dutch colleague, but also his political radicalism that reflected their own antidemocratic conservatism.  After the war Bölke was interested in Flemish nationalism and finally ended up in the National Socialist arena. He was a typical representative of a German national Protestantism that evolved from the Empire to the Third Reich.

Rituals of Humiliation

2021 ◽  
pp. 46-64
Author(s):  
Edward B. Westermann
Keyword(s):  
National Socialism ◽  
Social Power ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
German Society ◽  
Concentration Camps ◽  
Symbiotic Relationship ◽  
Abusive Behavior ◽  
The Third ◽  
Killing Fields ◽  
The Third Reich

This chapter evaluates the significance of ritual and symbolism to the construction and manifestation of power under National Socialism. It underlines the importance of practices such as the mammoth party rallies at Nuremberg, the universal displays of the swastika on flags, pins, and armbands and the ubiquitous use of “Heil Hitler” as the standard greeting of the Third Reich under the Nazi regime. The chapter also contends that the creation of Nazi power was accomplished in no small measure by the use of ritual, and, in fact, ritual in the Third Reich served as an expression of “social power” that extended into virtually all aspects of German society. These celebratory events of Nazi power involved daily acts of verbal or physical humiliation of Jews, communists, and socialists, as well as organized and exemplary episodes of abusive behavior. Ultimately, the chapter studies the symbiotic relationship between violence, competition, and male comradeship and how it became manifest in the actions, rituals, and celebratory practices of Nazi paramilitary organizations through acts of humiliation by SS and policemen on the streets, in the concentration camps, and in the killing fields.

Health Reform and Race Hygiene: Adventists and the Biomedical Vision of the Third Reich

1996 ◽  
Vol 65 (3) ◽  
pp. 425-440 ◽  
Author(s):  
Roland Blaich
Keyword(s):  
Health Reform ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
German Society ◽  
Domestic Sphere ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Third Reich ◽  
Nazi Era ◽  
The Church

German Seventh-day Adventists entered the Nazi era with apprehension. As a foreign sect which resembled Judaism in many respects, Adventists were particularly threatened by a society based on the principle of völkisch racism. Yet the new state also had much to offer them, for it held the prospect of new opportunities for the church. The Nazi state banished the scourge of liberalism and godless Bolshevism, it restored conservative standards in the domestic sphere, and it took effective steps to return German society to a life in harmony with nature—a life Adventists had long championed.

Breaking Out of the Bourgeois Home: Domestic Melodrama

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura Heins
Keyword(s):  
Nuclear Family ◽  
Third Reich ◽  
Family Structures ◽  
Traditional Family ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Core ◽  
Nazi Ideology ◽  
The Family ◽  
The Third Reich

This chapter examines the domestic melodrama and argues that it was used by the Nazis in a genre-contradictory manner to effect a departure from the nuclear family, in accordance with the antibourgeois antipathies of the regime's leadership. It contends that Nazi films, far from universally reinforcing traditional family structures, actually profit from an undermining of sexual taboos—the ultimate goal being an increased level of efficiency of production and reproduction. Seemingly prohibited desires actually formed the core of Nazi film melodramas; just as fascist Germany's “leading man” found the family largely unattractive, so did the imaginary of its cinema. Filmmakers in the Third Reich preferred to offer images of the dissolution of the family rather than images of harmonious familial units, and the domestic melodrama in particular reveals the highly conflicted attitude of Nazi ideology and policy regarding bourgeois morality, marriage, and motherhood.

scholarly journals The concept of “musical degeneration”: From fin-de-siècle pesimism to the nationalsocialist rule

2012 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
pp. 237-252
Author(s):  
Maja Vasiljevic
Keyword(s):  
Third Reich ◽  
History Of Ideas ◽  
Richard Wagner ◽  
Medical Terminology ◽  
The Third ◽  
German Speaking ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Third Reich ◽  
The 19Th Century ◽  
The Given

The paper follows the discursive path of one of the dominant, and yet forgotten, terms in the history of ideas - that of ?degeneration.? The richness of uses and various illuminations of the term, as well as its discursive dispersion and blurring, can be seen from the mid 19th until the first decades of the 20th century. The term was almost inescapable in studies of thinkers from various fields starting in the middle of the 19th century, it was successfully adopted from French, Italian and British medical terminology into the art discourse of modern European societies. By focusing on music, the given term became permanently tied to thinking about relations of music and society in the German-speaking world. In a complex discursive development of the term, the author necessarily made certain choices, paying special attention to the Austro-Hungarian psychologists, Max Nordau who carried the concept of ?degeneration? from the medical to the art (and music) sphere. The debate regarding the ?degeneration of music,? was developed chronologically, starting from the Second Reich (being the time in which one of the most controversial composers lived, Richard Wagner). While Wagner developed a theory of ?degeneration? and its overcoming through ?regeneration,? he was still considered ?degenerated.? The given example reveals the complexity of the problem we face when we study the concept of ?degeneration of music.? The consideration is completed with a glance at the life of ?degenerated? musicians and music during the Weimar Republic, that is, their interpretation in the Third Reich.

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