Fritz Schachermeyr

Fritz Schachermeyr ( born January 10, 1895 in Urfahr in Linz, † December 26, 1987 in Eisenstadt ) was an Austrian historian. Because of his connections with the Nazis and their ideological and racist views Schachermeyr is considered one of the most controversial representatives of his profession in the 20th century.

Life

Fritz Schachermeyr studied from 1914 Classical Studies in Graz, where he met among others, Adolf Bauer in Berlin (with Eduard Meyer) and in Vienna where Adolf Wilhelm became his teacher. His study was from the end of 1915 interrupted by military service in Transylvania, Asia Minor and Mesopotamia, where he developed an interest in the ancient Orient. Schachermeyr graduated 1920 in Innsbruck at Carl Lehmann-Haupt with a dissertation on the relations between Egypt and the Near East. Between 1919 and 1929 he worked in the teaching profession at a girls' high school in Innsbruck. He habilitated in 1928 Etruscan Early History at the University of Innsbruck. Schachermeyr 1931 was appointed Professor of Ancient History at the University of Jena, first as associate professor, in the same year as " personal " Ordinary. An appeal to the Chair Lehmann- Haupt in Innsbruck failed in 1932, probably for financial reasons, as the previous Ordinariate had been converted to an extraordinary professorship. When applying for the successor of Wilhelm Wien in 1934 Josef Keil was preferred, probably because Schachermeyrs Nazi activities.

Schachermeyr initially remained in Jena and was there from October 1934 to March 1936 Dean of the Faculty of Arts. In 1936 he was a full professor at the University of Heidelberg as successor to the 1933 sold for "racial " reasons Eugen Taeubler. In 1941 he moved to the University of Graz. Between 1945 and 1952 Schachermeyr was forced to retire because of his Nazi ideology - from 1946 represented Erich Swoboda Ancient History in Graz - however he was appointed in 1952 as the successor wedge on the chair of Greek history, archeology and epigraphy at the University of Vienna. He became professor emeritus in 1963, but over the chair held until 1970.

Schachermeyr was in the time of National Socialism from a very questionable character and is referred to as basic as "one of the most prominent Nazis among historians ." Since the acquisition of the professorship in Jena in 1931, he started in political activities for the NSDAP and was claims to be a co-founder of the " National Socialist fighting ring, the German Austrians in the kingdom ," whose Gauleiter of Thuringia, he became in 1933. He tried to support the National Socialist movement through lectures and publications, scientific and cultural politics. In 1933 he published in the People's Observer, the party organ of the Nazi Party, an article about " the Nordic leader personality." A reprint of this article, he even sent to the responsible Minister of the Interior for university affairs, Wilhelm Frick. In an accompanying letter he described his current work projects to compose a " test for the foundation of the National Socialist ideology in the spirit of history ." Also in 1933 tried Schachermeyr in a smaller tower, to determine the " tasks of Ancient History in the Nordic world history." In numerous publications the following years he spread Nazi ideas and was doing more than most of his colleagues. The results of his efforts were (even for those days ) sometimes grotesque; so Schachermeyr explained on the assumption that historical greatness is fundamentally connected with membership of the " Nordic race " figures like Pisistratus, or Hannibal in reverse to " Aryans ". Even colleagues assessed his work ambiguous, even those who were close to even the Nazi ideology. So wrote about the Leipzig historian Helmut Berve 1943 Walter Herwig Schuchardt in Freiburg: "For so welcome it is that Schachermeyr among the ancient historians, the ancient breed history adopted with zeal almost the only one, so little reliable seems to me his method, as little its precise formulations and its representation. ". In his Grazer time Schachermeyr cooperated with both the " Ahnenerbe " the SS as well as with the competing " department Rosenberg ".

After 1945 Schachermeyr tried to forget as possible this stage of life, and went not out in his memoirs: he jumps in his inaugural lecture in Jena, which Alexander had the Great on the subject, directly to his Alexander biography he had written after 1945. Following Oswald Spengler Schachermeyr later took the view that it is not race, but culture is the factor that distinguishes man. At least his early work on Greece and the ancient Near East have focused very much emphasized the " Nordic race ".

Schachermeyr researching in the field of Greek antiquity. Especially for the early Greek period (about Minoan and Mycenaean culture ), he made greater contributions and often went there one on the ancient Near Eastern neighbors of the Greeks. So he worked alongside the Greeks with Hittites, Etruscans, and even with Pottery. Since his works before 1945 ( and some even later ), however, were strongly influenced by the Nazi ideology, Schachermeyrs results are often to take with caution and subject to change. His collection of pottery sherds of various, mainly Mediterranean and Near Eastern provenance, one of the largest teaching collections of its kind that has collected on many trips since his student days the researcher, he left the Mycenaean Commission. His published in a revised and expanded version 1973 comprehensive biography of Alexander is still considered an important contribution to research Alexander, with Schachermeyr the "Titan" Alexander certainly looked quite negative.

Schachermeyr was a full member of the Austrian Academy of Sciences and corresponding member of the Heidelberg Academy of Sciences since 1957. From the Universities of Athens ( 1961) and Vienna ( 1984), he was awarded an honorary doctorate. Schachermeyr was awarded the Austrian Cross of Honour for Science and Art, First Class, the Austrian Decoration for Science and Art, the Great Golden Medal with Star for Services to the Republic of Austria, the Medal of Honor of the federal capital Vienna in gold and the Medal for contributions to the field the science of his hometown of Linz. In 1963 he was awarded the Wilhelm Hartel price.

Writings

• Etruscan early history. Berlin, Leipzig, 1929.
• For race and culture in Minoan Crete Carl Winter, Heidelberg, 1939.
• Lebensgesetzlichkeit throughout history. Attempt an introduction to the history, biological thinking. Klostermann, Frankfurt / M. 1940.
• Indo-Europeans and East. Your cultural and political power struggle in ancient times. Stuttgart 1944.
• Alexander the Great. The problem of his personality and his work. Vienna 1973 ( full and expanded version of the book from 1949, and as this is a critical biography of Alexander ).
• Greek history. With special reference to the history of ideas and cultural- contexts. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart 1960.
• Pericles. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart -Berlin- Cologne -Mainz 1969.
• Intellectual history of the time of Pericles. Stuttgart -Berlin- Cologne -Mainz 1971.
• The tragedy of full extension. Die and become in the past. Europe in the grip of the present. Koska, Vienna - Berlin 1981.
• A life between science and art, ed. by Gerhard Dobesch and Hilde Schachermeyr. Vienna, Cologne, Graz 1984.