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Overcoming Kleindeutschland: The Politics of Historical Mythmaking in the Weimar Republic

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 December 2008

Stanley Suval
Stanley Suval
Affiliation:
North Carolina State University at Raleigh
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Extract

When in 1919 Friedrich Meinecke gave the highest priority to a “union with our Austrian brothers,” he was not alone in the historical profession. Implicit in this demand was a new political role for the Austrians that had been scarcely thought possible before 1918. This political conception quite naturally influenced historical writing. “The Anschluss,” wrote Hans Herzfeld, “was one of the strongest forces in Weimar historical thought.” This was true although the acceptance of Anschluss seemed to violate the heretofore preponderant kleindeutsch tradition in German historiography. This paper traces the attempt of these new forces to undermine the old kleindeutsch history.

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Articles
Information
Central European History , Volume 2 , Issue 4 , December 1969 , pp. 312 - 330
Copyright
Copyright © Conference Group for Central European History of the American Historical Association 1969

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References

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24. An interesting series of anti-Austrian statements can be found in the Stresemann Papers, U. S. National Archives Microcopy T-120, Roll Col.U.3. This Roll was filmed by Columbia University. Microfilms of captured German documents will hereafter be cited by Microcopy, Roll, Series, and Frame numbers.

25. Memorandum by Stresemann on conversation with D'Abernon, June 4, 1925; Auswärtiges Amt, T–120/4576/2344/E171648. The same statement was made to the Italian Ambassador and to the German Crown Prince; see Bosdari to Mussolini, Mar. 8, 1925, I documenti diplomatici italiani, series VII, vol. II, 558, and Stresemann to Crown Prince, Sept. 7, 1925, T–120/7318/3168/H159872. The letter to the Crown Prince is discussed in Thimme, Anneliese, “Gustav Stresemann, Legende und Wirklichkeit,” Historische Zeitschrift, CLXXXI (1956), 331ffGoogle Scholar. Karl Dietrich Erdmann believes that Stresemann's anti-Austrianism precluded any serious attempt at Anschluss during his ministry; see “Das Problem der Ost-oder Westorientierung in der Locarno-Politik Stresemanns,” Geschichte in Wissenschaft und Unterricht, VI (1955), 149–50;Google Scholar cf. Höltje, Christian, Die Weimarer Republik und das Ostlocarno-Problem (Würzburg, 1958), pp. 101–103, 127–28.Google Scholar

26. These views were most convincingly propounded by several liberal historians. See Meinecke, , Werke, II, 338,Google Scholar and Delbrück, Hans, Vor und nach dem Weltkriege (Berlin, 1926), P. 418.Google Scholar

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28. Österreich-Deutschland, III (Mar. 1926), 13.

29. Vorwärts (Berlin), Aug. 8, 1925, edition A.

30. See the revisionist works by a Bavarian poet and a displaced architect: Eulenberg, Herbert, The Hohenzollerns (New York, 1929), pp. viiiff.,Google Scholar and Hegemann, Werner, Frederick the Great (London, 1929), pp. 303–13.Google Scholar These works were reviewed in Historische Zeitschrift, CXXXVIII (1928), 604–14, 626–32. For a discussion of these books and their reviews see Hammen, Oscar, “German Historians and the Advent of the National Socialist State,” Journal of Modern History, XIII (1941), 175–77,Google Scholar and Stirk, S. D., The Prussian Spirit (London, 1941), pp. 125–35.Google Scholar

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47. Verhandlungen des Reichstags, CCCCXIV, Anlagen zu den stenongraphischen Berichten, Nr. 3095, p. 9.

48. Amtsblatt des Bayerischen Staatsministeriums für Unterricht und Kultur, LX Nr. 16, Dec. 29, 1926; Amtsblatt des Württembergischen Kulturministeriums, Feb. 18, 1926; Landé, Walter, Richtlinien für die Lehrpläne der höheren Schulen Preussens (Berlin, 1925), p. 65.Google Scholar

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