Institute for Indo-European Intellectual History

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The Institute for Indo-European Spiritual History (IIG), until March 3, 1941 “Institute for Aryan Spiritual History”, was a department of the “ High School ” inaugurated by Alfred Rosenberg .

Background and beginnings

While Heinrich Himmler's “ Forschungsgemeinschaft Deutsches Ahnenerbe ” had already started work in 1935 and worked very successfully (in 1944 it comprised 40 departments), the “High School”, which only officially opened in 1940, had to struggle with major problems, both in the establishment of institutes and in the establishment Attempt to attract well-known scientists.

The Institute for Indo-European Intellectual History also had great initial difficulties. From 1938 at the latest, the Graecist Richard Harder , who at that time was a full professor in Kiel, was to be the director. The pedagogue and philosopher Alfred Baeumler , who later became the head of the "High School", made contact with him on the part of the Rosenberg Office . At that time the office itself did not have the necessary material and personnel resources, so other resources had to be found. The planning therefore provided for Harder to be appointed to a chair at the University of Munich .

Harder was likely to be tempted by the opportunities presented to him. With the support of the NSDAP, he should be able to tackle and coordinate major research tasks in a wide area ( ancient Orient , pre-Indo-European cultures of the Mediterranean, Indo-European studies , classical antiquity , ethnology of the Germans and Slavs) and to provide the necessary infrastructure. Even before it was officially installed, it laid down the basic principles of the institute's work in a memorandum in April 1940. The work area was defined as Indo-European intellectual history ( history and intellectual history of the individual peoples), with the aim of working out the Indo-European core and its Aryan substance as well as its historical modifications. This should go hand in hand with the exploration of the non-Indo-European, before and after the heyday of the Indo-Europeans . Apparently Harder had in mind a kind of central institute for all ancient studies. The institute should investigate

  1. the conflict between the Indo-European immigrants and the pre-population,
  2. the major Indo-European achievements in Greece ,
  3. the conflicts with the foreign outside world: biological processes of infiltration and foreign infiltration , which in some cases have led to the destruction of culture and ethnicity .

Ideologically, he recognized the superiority of the construct of a race history, but, unlike Rosenberg, he was ready to investigate the non-Indo-European culture beyond the European area.

Harder was even closer to National Socialist linguistic usage in an outline of the research tasks from January 1941 when the budget was registered. He called for a “genuinely racial intellectual history” in the “collection and evaluation of testimonies about racial characteristics, racial instinct, racial consciousness and racial politics among the ancient peoples of Nordic blood.” As research subjects he named the ancient Indian belief in gods, Iranian influences in the religion of Hellenism , and struggle of Greek philosophy against Christianity .

The financial applications were generous, with his staffing ideas (later 18 positions were planned, including 6 professorships), he was not willing to accept reductions in academic research. For individual subjects he suggested z. B. Friedrich Matz , Siegfried Lauffer , Hermann Gundert , Franz Hampl , Herbert von Buttlar , Walter Marg , Friedrich Vittinghoff , Eberhard Otto , Heinrich Otto Schröder .

Harder's appointment remained stuck for a long time in the usual conflict of competencies between ministries, party offices and universities (rector and senate). Since Rosenberg did not have the means, the institute should have the positions of the dissolved Kath.-Theol. Faculty, for which there were also other interested parties. However, factual objections were also raised, especially by the faculty, not against the qualifications of the head of department, but against the wide range of tasks that had to lead to overlaps in research in many places.

Finally the Reich Ministry of Science made the decision . On May 14, 1941, Minister Bernhard Rust issued the call to the Philosophical Faculty of the University of Munich for the subject Classical Philology, combined with the approval “to work at the Institute for Indo-European Intellectual History in Munich, branch of the High School”. The faculty had no choice but to give in. Harder himself was able to make good use of the hybrid position in order to create freedom in his original classical philological activity.

Excavation activity

The plans had always envisaged epigraphic studies and excavations. A stay in Greece was realized in the summer of 1941, financed by the Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg , with topographical, archaeological and epigraphic work taking place in Chalkis and Sparta . Of course, conflicting goals with other bodies could not be avoided, especially with the German Archaeological Institute . Rosenberg's plans for antiquity research, which aimed for results in the sense of racial ideology , interfered with the traditional tasks of the DAI. Harder tried to resolve the conflict, but had to recognize here that Rosenberg's position in the power network was not the strongest. This was also shown in the attempt to expand the area of ​​work to include the Iranian antiquities in the occupied eastern territories. Little was achieved.

At the end of his tenure, eight positions in addition to that of the head of the institute were filled; Employees included the classical philologist Wolf Steidle , the ancient historian Siegfried Lauffer and the Indologist Friedrich Otto Schrader . Faced with the problems of realizing the actual plans, Harder turned more closely to the university and the lecture business. The institute has not carried out any specific research or publications. Harder tried, when he had already largely transferred to the university, some publications, e.g. B. a yearbook "Hellas und das Abendland", which did not get beyond the conclusion of the publishing contract. The so-called “institute letters” were published by sending them to around 100 specialist colleagues, also abroad, as far as possible. Apparently four “letters” with studies by Harder have appeared, of which the essay on Tyrtaios was later included in his “Little Writings”.

literature

  • Volker Losemann : National Socialism and Antiquity. Studies on the development of ancient history 1933–1945 . Hoffmann and Campe, Hamburg 1977 (series Historische Perspektiven 7), ISBN 3-455-09219-5 .
  • Gerhard Schott: Richard Harder, classical philologist, first interpreter of the leaflets of the "White Rose" and the "Institute for Indo-European Intellectual History". In: Elisabeth Kraus (Ed.): The University of Munich in the Third Reich. Essays . Vol. 2. (= contributions to the history of the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München. Vol. 4). Utz, Munich 2006, ISBN 978-3-8316-0727-3 , pp. 413-500.
  • Maximilian Schreiber: Walther Wüst. Dean and Rector of the University of Munich 1935–1945 . (= Contributions to the history of the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich. Vol. 3). Utz, Munich 2008, ISBN 978-3-8316-0676-4 , pp. 166-171 on the institute and Harder.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ G. Schott p. 428.
  2. ↑ G. Schott p. 428, note 63; Complete list in V. Losemann p. 244.
  3. ↑ G. Schott p. 438 with note 109.