Karl Helm

Karl Hermann Georg Helm ( born May 19, 1871 in Karlsruhe, † September 9, 1960 in Marburg ) was a German germanistischer and skandinavistischer medievalist, folklorist and scholar of religion.

Life and work

Karl Helm studied German philology and history in Heidelberg, Freiburg im Breisgau, inter alia, with Hermann Paul and in Leipzig. In Heidelberg, obtained his doctorate in Wilhelm Braune in 1895 with a thesis on the rhythm short couplets of the 16th century. In 1899 he habilitated at the University of Giessen in gasoline Behaghel with a dissertation on the literature of the German Teutonic Knights and received in 1904 as an associate professor. Würzburg University, he moved in 1919, in 1920 at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University Frankfurt am Main, 1921 at the University of Marburg as professor of Altgermanistik. There officiated helmet 1929/30, as rector, and held even after his retirement in 1936 continued until 1958 lectures.

Throughout his life belonged helmet politically conservative nationalist circles, only 1919, he was short for two months a member of the German Democratic Party. Later he turned to the German National People's Party, without ever having to become a member. His political attitude he showed in public by several explanations of university teachers on various subjects of the imperial period to the Nazi dictatorship. In 1915 he signed the so-called Seeberg address, 1919 a statement on the peace negotiations at Versailles. In the mid twenties, a statement followed to school, legal matters. 1932 helmet signed a call for elections of university teachers in favor of Franz von Papen. After the " seizure of power", he was a dean of the Faculty of Philosophy in Marburg in November 1933 with nearly a thousand signatories to the commitment of the professors at German universities and colleges to Adolf Hitler and the Nazi state. Helmet was since 1933 a member of the local agency of the National Socialist Cultural Community in Marburg, but never a member of the Nazi Party.

As teachers were Helms focuses German literature from the early beginnings to the 16th century, especially in the Middle High German courtly seals Walther von der Vogelweide and Wolfram von Eschenbach, the epic and the drama of the Old High, - and Middle High German period. In the linguistic area, he taught next to the Old High German and Middle High German grammar, the Norse, or Old Icelandic, and especially the Gothic grammar. Among the literary and linguistic lectures was the focus of the Germanic religious history and archeology.

William Brown was for Karl Otto Behaghel helmet next to the main scientific orientation, so that he continued in this position the standard works, the Old High German grammar, Old High German reading book and the Gothic grammar.

Helms research carried out over the Old and Middle High German language and literature to folklore and Germanic religious history and archeology, as well as classical philology. The research on folklore was 1901 Helmet justify the " Hessian Association of Folklore " with contributions appeared in the Encyclopaedia of German superstition and in the body of the Association. The time -related " germanentümelden " pseudo-scientific and professional scholarly writings, the Nazi ideological backgrounds had later helmet was skeptical over and insisted on a differentiated approach to the sources methodical way of working.

In his research on Germanic religious history, he worked out the development of the earliest time with all the differences of the Germanic tribes and overlays up to the aftermath following the adoption of Christianity. The early Germanic peoples, he was able to demonstrate on the basis of archaeological finds on the basis of general religious studies, including an overall view of the North Germanic circumstances it was no longer possible due to old age. Helms Old Germanic religious history applies not only by the Dutchman Jan de Vries is still a standard work in the literature.

Significant students Helms Ernstalbrecht Ebbinghaus, who took over the editorship of textbooks Brown, Karl Bischoff, Hans Kuhn, Nechama Leibowitz, Eduard Neumann and Jost Trier.

Awards

• Brothers Grimm Prize of the University of Marburg (1943 )
• Honorary Member of the Modern Language Association of America (1959 )