Verden Blood Court

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As Massacre of Verden , also Verden Blutgericht or massacre of Verden , the execution of 4500 will Saxons at Verden on the Aller on the orders of Charlemagne referred to in the 782nd

Lore

The only tradition of this massacre is the Reichsannals . In the course of the Saxon Wars , the Saxons defeated a Frankish army in the Süntelschlacht in 782 after another uprising . Thereupon Charlemagne went again to Saxony and gathered the Saxon greats at the confluence of the Aller into the Weser. The Saxons gathered there near Verden named Widukind as the originator of the uprising. Karl demanded that the ringleaders be extradited and executed in one day.

"Usque ad quattuor milia D traditi et super Alaram fluvium in loco, qui Ferdun vocatur, iussu regis omnes una die decollati sunt."

In addition, the Saxons had handed over the ringleaders “for execution, 4500; what happened like that ”(“ ad occidendum, quatuor milia quingentas; quod ita et factum est ”).

Research history

Since Wilhelm von Bippen questioned the representation of the Reichsannals in 1889, it has been controversial.

National Socialism

After a scandal at a from a supporter of the Ludendorff movement written Widukind drama that beginning in 1935 with the express approval of Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels in Theater Hagen had been performed, an intense public debate that resulted in a change to the prevailing opinion was. Historians such as Hermann Oncken recognized the propagandistic depiction of the executions in this play as the culmination of allegedly violent proselytizing the ancient Saxons back, emphasized instead "the highly political nature of the measures of Charles" and spoke of the subjugation of Saxony as a necessary precondition for later " colonization of the Slavic area beyond the Elbe ”. It was hardly possible to contradict this whitewashed interpretation of the executions because it was based on the urge to move east , which had been propagated since the end of the 19th century , and because Hitler had announced that he would turn to the east again. The book Charlemagne or Charlemagne , written by eight well-known historians, played an important role in this debate . , which dealt with the executions in the mirror of the Franco-German antagonism and paid tribute to Karl "as a total personality of Germanic-German nature and descent" in order to take him over for Germany. The theologian and church historian Karl Bauer defended Karl in 1937 in his work The Sources for the so-called Carnage of Verden . He saw a copy error in the contemporary sources - instead of decollati (“beheaded”) it had to be delocati, meaning the victims had been “resettled”. There never was a massacre. The liberal pacifist historian Ludwig Quidde also rejected the execution of 4,500 Saxons in his exile in Geneva - based on von Bippen and Heinrich Ulmann : "Charlemagne is not the mass murderer, traditionally the Saxon butcher."

Modern research

In the 21st century, the issue is still controversial among historians. So took Dieter Hägermann that only a few dozen of Saxony by Charlemagne had been executed. Wilhelm Kohl , former head of the State Archives in Münster , took a middle position, suspecting 400–500 beheaded people. On the other hand, Ernst Schubert defended the sources' reports against "mitigating speculations" in the Lexicon of the Middle Ages in 1997 .

Some historians assume a “punitive action dictated by Charlemagne out of revenge or momentary bitterness”, “which hardly affected 4500 Saxons”.

“More than one historian has attempted to downplay Karl's responsibility for the massacre. ... But not a single attempt seems credible. "

- Alessandro Barbero

Controversy over the number of victims

In historical studies, the high number of victims in just one day is sometimes doubted. On the other hand, comparable mass executions, for example of the Danes in England in 1002 at the St. Brice's Day massacre or the 2700 Muslim prisoners at the siege of Acre (1189–1191) , are documented.

See also

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ also the version of the Reichsannals, which earlier research referred to as Einhardsannalen
  2. ↑ Friedrich Kurz (Ed.): Scriptores rerum Germanicarum in usum scholarum separatim editi 6: Annales regni Francorum inde from a. 741 usque ad a. 829, qui dicuntur Annales Laurissenses maiores et Einhardi. Hannover 1895, p. 65 ( Monumenta Germaniae Historica , digitized version ) Cf. Georg Heinrich Pertz u. a. (Ed.): Scriptores (in Folio) 1: Annales et chronica aevi Carolini. Hannover 1826, p. 165 ( Monumenta Germaniae Historica , digitized version )
  3. ↑ Georg Heinrich Pertz u. a. (Ed.): Scriptores (in Folio) 1: Annales et chronica aevi Carolini. Hannover 1826, p. 164 ( Monumenta Germaniae Historica , digitized version ) Cf. Friedrich Kurz (Ed.): Scriptores rerum Germanicarum in usum scholarum separatim editi 6: Annales regni Francorum inde from a. 741 usque ad a. 829, qui dicuntur Annales Laurissenses maiores et Einhardi. Hannover 1895, p. 62 ( Monumenta Germaniae Historica , digitized version )
  4. ^ A b Wilhelm von Bippen: The execution of the Saxons by Charlemagne. In: Deutsche Zeitschrift für Geschichtswwissenschaft 1, 1889, pp. 75–95. ( Full text at Wikisource )
  5. ↑ Votes and judgments: In the matter of Widukind ( Memento from July 11, 2012 in the web archive archive.today ) In: Weisse Blätter. Monthly magazine for history, tradition and state , February 1935 edition
  6. ^ Votes and judgments: Again: Charlemagne! ( Memento from July 11, 2012 in the web archive archive.today ) In: White sheets. Monthly magazine for history, tradition and state , March 1935 edition
  7. ↑ Adolf Hitler: Mein Kampf , "We stop the eternal German migration to the south and west of Europe and look to the country in the east"
  8. ^ Karl Hampe , Hans Naumann , Hermann Aubin , Martin Lintzel , Friedrich Baethgen , Albert Brackmann , Carl Erdmann , Wolfgang Windelband : Karl der Große oder Charlemagne? Eight answers from German historians. Berlin, 1935 122 pp. (Review in History in Science and Education, 5/6/2000 )
  9. ↑ Karl Bauer: The sources for the so-called blood bath of Verden . In: Westfälische Zeitschrift, magazine for patriotic history and antiquity . Pp. 40-73. tape 92 . Regensbergsche Verlagsbuchhandlung, Münster 1937, p. 22 ( PDF, 15 MB [accessed on January 21, 2016]).
  10. ^ Heinrich Ulmann: For the execution of the Saxons 782 . In: Deutsche Zeitschrift für Geschichtswwissenschaft 2, 1889, pp. 156–157. ( Full text at Wikisource )
  11. ↑ Ludwig Quidde: Charlemagne - the Saxon butcher? In: Pariser Tageblatt , Vol. 3, No. 491 of April 17, 1935, p. 4 ( part 1 ) and No. 492 of April 18, 1935, p. 4 ( part 2 ).
  12. ↑ Dieter Hägermann: Charlemagne. Ruler of the west. Berlin 2000, p. 214ff.
  13. ^ Wilhelm Kohl: Comments on the development of the parish organization in old Saxony, primarily in the diocese of Münster. In: Johannes Mötsch (Ed.): An Eifler for Rhineland-Palatinate. Volume 2, 2003, p. 920, note 16.
  14. ↑ Ernst Schubert: Verden, blood bath v. In: Lexicon of the Middle Ages . Vol. 8, 1997, Col. 1500f.
  15. ^ Arnold Angenendt: Tolerance and Violence. Christianity between the Bible and the sword. Münster 2007, p. 387.
  16. ↑ Alessandro Barbero: "Charlemagne. Father of Europe", Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 2007, ISBN 978-3-608-94030-5 , p. 58