Nueva Germania

Nueva Germania on the map of Paraguay

Nueva Germania is a small village in the rural part of Paraguay, approximately 150 km north of Asuncion. It was founded in 1886 by Bernhard Förster, Elisabeth Förster - Nietzsche's husband, as well as a handful of German settlers.

History

Förster, a known anti-Semite, planned with the founding of Nueva Germania, a kind of refuge for the " Aryan race " in South America to build. The Jena teacher Förster was a representative folkish ideas. From the school service he was released because of militant anti-Semitism '. Prior friends he blusters about the " decay German virtues", for which the Jews were responsible. After the suicide forest ranger, who could not prevent the mixing of the settlers with native Indians, began the decline of the colony.

The German settlers were not prepared for the conditions in South America and did not make it to adapt. The colony fell into hunger and poverty. The remaining descendants of the settlers are always to be found there yet.

Certain propagandistic significance learned the project back in the time of the dictatorship of the German -born Alfredo Stroessner. In recent years, the American conductor David Woodard tried to interest for a " racially pure colony " proposed village. Among other things, it offers guided tours of the area. Is Referred to a house where supposedly Josef Mengele found refuge for several years, and the visit of life circumstances, the descendants of German settlers, who eke out a meager and poor existence in the jungle. The house in which Mengele had allegedly stopped, but was shortly before the arrival of a British camera crew - burned down 1991 - under unexplained circumstances.

Importance is the village in landlocked Paraguay to German history from the fact that Elisabeth Förster - Nietzsche Nietzsche founded the archive after the death of her husband and returning to Germany and was able to exert a certain influence on the intellectual life in Germany.