German Society for Celtic Studies

The German Society for Celtic Studies (DGKS) was a German institute founded in December 1936 with research on Celtology . It belonged to the Indo-European seminar at Berlin University . From the beginning it was set up as a contact point between the German Celtologists and the SS . Immediately after it was founded, SS-Obergruppenführer Werner Best and the Association for the Research Association of German Ahnenerbe became cooperative members. During his time as de facto interior minister, Best was able to carry out German national propaganda . In addition, the work of the institute was embellished ideologically: For example, it was said in reports from the Reich : “The old, only linguistically oriented research should be supplemented by research on racial biology and customs .”

Important founding members were Helmut Bauersfeld , Gerhard von Tevenar , Hans Otto Wagner , Adolf Mahr and Helmut Clissmann . After the beginning of the Second World War, some members of the DGKS were given special tasks in the field of defense and the Foreign Office , especially in the Benelux countries and in northern France. In the course of its existence, the cooperation between the DGKS and the Ahnenerbe became ever closer. One of the central figures was Ludwig Mühlhausen (1888–1956), who had been honorary professor for Celtology at the University of Hamburg from 1928–1936 and from the beginning of 1940 also worked with Leo Weisgerber for international radio propaganda. At a Celtology congress in Wernigerode in early September 1941, he spoke out in favor of the continuation and "use of the humanities in war". In June 1942 Mühlhausen became head of a newly founded "teaching and research facility for Celtic folk research" in the ancestral heritage of the SS.

literature

Joachim Lerchenmueller: "Keltischer Sprengstoff": a study of the history of science on German Celtology from 1900 to 1945 . Niemeyer, Tübingen 1997. ISBN 3484401427 .

Web links

Reiner Luyken: " Celtology: About the amalgamation of science and National Socialism " in: The time of July 19, 1996

swell

↑ Heinz Boberach (Ed.): Messages from the Reich. The secret situation reports of the SS Security Service, Vol. II, Hersching 1984, page 917.
↑ on the early connections of these scientists to the defense and security service of the Reichsführer SS (SD) see Joachim Lerchenmueller: "Keltischer Sprengstoff": a study of the history of science on German Celtology from 1900 to 1945 . Niemeyer, Tübingen 1997. ISBN 3484401427 , pp. 384-385; See also footnotes in the Wikipedia article Olier Mordrel
↑ Christopher Hutton: Linguistics and the Third Reich: Mother-tongue Fascism, Race and the Science of Language , Routledge, 2002; Page 128.
^ Frank-Rutger Hausmann , Elisabeth Müller-Luckner (ed.): The role of the humanities in the Third Reich, Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag, 2002; Page 149 ff.

[1] Heinz Boberach (Ed.): Messages from the Reich. The secret situation reports of the SS Security Service, Vol. II, Hersching 1984, page 917.

[2] the early connections of these scientists to the defense and security service of the Reichsführer SS (SD) see Joachim Lerchenmueller: "Keltischer Sprengstoff": a study of the history of science on German Celtology from 1900 to 1945 . Niemeyer, Tübingen 1997. ISBN 3484401427 , pp. 384-385; See also footnotes in the Wikipedia article Olier Mordrel

[3] Christopher Hutton: Linguistics and the Third Reich: Mother-tongue Fascism, Race and the Science of Language , Routledge, 2002; Page 128.

[4] Frank-Rutger Hausmann , Elisabeth Müller-Luckner (ed.): The role of the humanities in the Third Reich, Oldenbourg Wissenschaftsverlag, 2002; Page 149 ff.