Artaman League

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
Part of a series on
Nazism
Organizations
History

Final solution
Ideology
Politicians
Ideologues
Literature
Religion
Outside of Germany
Lists
Related topics

The Artaman League (

völkisch movement committed to a Back-to-the-land–inspired ruralism, founded in 1923. Active during the inter-war period, the League became closely linked to, and eventually absorbed by, the Nazi Party
.

Etymology

The agrarian

racial purity, Hentschel founded his own group, the Mittgart Society, in 1906. The word Artamanen compounded art and manen, Middle High German words meaning "agriculture man" and indicating Hentschell's desire to see Germans retreat from the decadence of the city in order to return to an imagined idyllic rural past.[1]

Origins

The Artaman League had its roots in the overall

German race would regenerate itself and ultimately prevail over its neighbours and the diabolical Jews who were intent on injecting putrefying agents into the nation's blood and soil".[2]

Development

Blut und Boden' (blood and soil) in Goslar
, 1937

Although Hentschel had developed his ideas before World War I, the Artaman League first formed in 1923.

anti-Slavism.[4] This völkisch movement believed that the decline of the Aryan race could only be halted by encouraging people to abandon city life in favour of settling in the rural areas in the east.[5] Whilst members wished to perform agricultural labour as an alternative to military service, they also saw it as part of their duty to violently oppose Slavs and to drive them out of Germany.[6] The concepts were combined in the figure of the Wehrbauer, or soldier-peasant.[7] Accordingly, the League sent German youth to work on the land in Saxony and in East Prussia in an attempt to prevent these areas being settled by Poles.[5] To this end 2000 settlers were sent to Saxony in 1924 – both to work on farms and to serve as an anti-Slav militia.[4] They also gave classes on the importance of racial purity and the Nordic race, and on the corrupting influence of city living and of Jews.[8]

Like many similar right-wing youth movements in Germany, the Artaman League lost impetus as the Nazi Party grew. By 1927, 80% of its membership had become Nazis.[9] The League had disappeared by the early 1930s, with most of its membership having switched to the Nazis.[6]

Nazi links

Heinrich Himmler in 1945

As the situation deteriorated in the late 1920s, some of the Artamans were drawn deeper into politics, and engaged in a holy war against their enemies: liberals, democrats, Free-Masons and Jews.[10] Eventually many members of the Artaman League turned to Nazism. Heinrich Himmler was an early member and held the position of Gauführer in Bavaria. Whilst a member of the League, Himmler met Richard Walther Darré and the two struck up a close friendship, based largely on Darré's highly developed ideological notions of blood and soil to which Himmler was attracted.[4] The Artaman vision would continue to have a profound effect on Himmler who, throughout his time as Reichsführer-SS, retained his early dreams of a racially pure peasantry.[11] Himmler was also close to his fellow member Rudolf Höss and would later advance him in the Schutzstaffel due in part to their history in the Artaman League.[12] The small league was dismantled and incorporated into the Hitler Jugend in October 1934 as the Nazi youth movement gained strength.[10]

Legacy

The development of a number of environmentalist groups and projects in Germany with extreme right wing politics has recently gained media attention. Since the 1990s, far-right environmentalists have taken advantage of cheap farmland made available by the post-Cold War

Aryan supremacy
and ecological harmony.

References

  1. ^ a b Peter Padfield, Himmler: Reichs Führer-SS, Cassell & Co, 2001, p. 37.
  2. ISBN 1-932595-11-2
    .
  3. ^ Heinz Höhne, The Order of the Death's Head: The Story of Hitler's SS, Penguin Books, 2000, pp. 46-47
  4. ^ a b c Höhne, The Order of the Death's Head, p. 47
  5. ^ a b Anthony Read, The Devil's Disciples, Pimlico, 2004, p. 159
  6. ^ a b Louis Leo Snyder, Encyclopedia of the Third Reich, Wordsworth, 1998, p. 12
  7. ISBN 0-7868-6886-4
  8. ISBN 0-7868-6886-4
  9. ISBN 0-7868-6886-4
  10. ^ a b LePage, Jean-Denis, The Hitler Youth, 1922-45: An Illustrated History (London: MacFarland, 2009), p. 17
  11. ^ Höhne, The Order of the Death's Head, p. 48
  12. ^ Richard J. Evans, The Third Reich in Power, Penguin Books, 2006, p. 84
  13. ^ a b Connolly, Kate (28 April 2012). "German far-right extremists tap into green movement for support". The Guardian. Retrieved April 29, 2012.
  14. ^ Pfaffinger, Von Christian (April 3, 2012). "Braune Bio-Kameradschaft". Der Spiegel. Retrieved April 29, 2012.
  15. ^ Thiele, Von Christian & Marlene Weiss (April 13, 2012). "Unterwanderung des Biolandbaus durch Rechtsextreme: Idylle in Grün-Braun". Süddeutsche Zeitung. Retrieved April 29, 2012.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Artaman_League&oldid=1218088238"