24 Visuelle Geschichtskultur RALF HOPPADIETZ AND KARIN REICHENBACH (ED.) Staging the Pagan Past Ethnicist History Conceptions and Popular Culture in Central Europe
Bibliografische Information der Deutschen Nationalbibliothek: Die Deutsche Nationalbibliothek verzeichnet diese Publikation in der Deutschen Nationalbibliografie; detaillierte bibliografische Daten sind im Internet über http://dnb.d-nb.de abrufbar. © 2024, Sandstein Verlag, Goetheallee 6, 01309 Dresden Umschlagabbildung: Festival of Slavs and Vikings in Wolin, Poland, 2018. Photo by Jakub T. Jankiewicz, Wikimedia Commons. Gesamtredaktion: Karin Reichenbach Korrektorat: Anja Höfer, Friederike Engel Holst, Landolin Kleinmichel Einbandgestaltung: Sandstein Verlag Gestaltung, Satz, Repro: Sandstein Verlag Druck: FINIDR, s.r.o., Český Těšín www.sandstein-verlag.de ISBN 978-3-95498-835-8 Gedruckt mit Unterstützung des Leibniz-Instituts für Geschichte und Kultur des östlichen Europa (GWZO) e.V. in Leipzig. Diese Maßnahme wird mitfinanziert durch Steuermittel auf der Grundlage des vom Sächsischen Landtag beschlossenen Haushaltes. Der Titel ist als Open-Access-Publikation verfügbar über www.sandstein-verlag.de, DOI: 10.25621/sv-gwzo/VG-24 Dieses Werk ist lizenziert unter der Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial 4.0 Lizenz (BY-NC). Diese Lizenz erlaubt unter Voraussetzung der Namensnennung des Urhebers die Bearbeitung, Vervielfältigung und Verbreitung des Materials in jedem Format oder Medium für nicht kommerzielle Zwecke (Lizenztext: https://creativecommons.org/ licenses/by-nc/4.0/deed.de). Die Bedingungen der Creative-Commons-Lizenz gelten nur für Originalmaterial. Die Wiederverwendung von Material aus anderen Quellen (gekennzeichnet mit Quellenangabe) wie z. B. Schaubilder, Abbildungen, Fotos und Textauszüge erfordert ggf. weitere Nutzungsgenehmigungen durch den jeweiligen Rechteinhaber.
24 Staging the Pagan Past Ethnicist History Conceptions and Popular Culture in Central Europe ED. BY RALF HOPPADIETZ AND KARIN REICHENBACH SANDSTEIN
Contents Ralf Hoppadietz and Karin Reichenbach 7 Introduction: Staging the Pagan Past Ethnicist History Conceptions and Popular Culture in Central Europe 1 Perspectives from Germany Ralf Hoppadietz 13 Of Gods and Ancestors Historical Reenactment and the Long Shadow of Neo-Germanic Paganism Niels Penke 38 Popular Pagans Germanic Culture and Mythology in (Heavy) Metal Hermann Ritter 47 Speculative Stories Entanglements in the Web of Conspiracy Theories, Speculative Fiction, Fantasy Role-Playing, Paganism and Right-Wing Extremism Anna-Lena Heckel and Heike Sahm 59 Newly Told Stories On the Topicality of the Myth of the Germanic Peoples in Children’s and Young Adult Books Hannes Buchmann and Julius Roch 71 Connections and References Between the German Alt-right’s Views of Prehistory and Its Ideology Based on the Example of the Institut für Staatspolitik
2 Perspectives from Poland Philipp Schaab 85 Christianisation as Trauma Aspects of Ethnonationalist Identity Construction Amongst Slavic Neopagan Groups in Poland Mariusz Filip 93 Transformation as Repetition Historicity Among the Pagan Right in Poland Karin Reichenbach 108 Performing Paganism Popular History Practices as Doing Metapolitics in Poland Michał Pawleta 121 The Restaged Past Is a “Dirty Business” The Politicisation of Historical Reenactment in Present-Day Poland Ryan Buesnel 133 Eastern Hate Antisemitism and the Development of Polish Black Metal 3 Perspectives from Hungary Katrin Kremmler 145 “Eurasian Magyars” The Role of Historical Reenactment and Experimental Archaeology in Hungary’s Illiberal Heritage Regime Áron Szele 159 Mythological Ancestry in Hungarian Rock Appendix 171 Contributors 173 Figure Credits
Introduction: Staging the Pagan Past Ethnicist History Conceptions and Popular Culture in Central Europe Ralf Hoppadietz and Karin Reichenbach The Pagan past, as the prehistoric and early medieval time before Christianisation, appears to hold a great fascination. It is evoked in television series about Vikings and barbarians, in computer games transporting players to bygone empires, in comic books depicting adventures of great ancient heroes. This volume examines fields of popular history culture, in which the Pagan past obtains a significance that goes yet beyond that of entertaining leisure activities. The articles collected here centre on the three fields of historical reenactment, ethnic Neopaganism and the black metal music scene, which are framed by further practices and media of history appropriation. In historical reenactment, history enthusiasts simulate a specific event or period of the past, often warrior battles, but also historical ways of life. The reenactment of ancient spiritual life often coincides with Neopagan religiosity as part of Native Faith movements that seek to revive religious tradition from pre-Christian times. This spiritual sphere also finds expression in the often mythically obscured historical references made in black metal music, which has widely embraced Pagan themes and developed subgenres like Pagan, Viking or folk metal. These three strongly overlapping fields of reenactment, Neopaganism and black metal form a setting where we observe how the Pagan past can become a place of longing, a projection screen and an object of identification, a setting in which images of history can ultimately merge seamlessly with radical right-wing mindsets. The volume was inspired by a workshop hosted at the Leibniz Institute for the History and Culture of Eastern Europe (GWZO) entitled “Neo-völkisch Conceptions of History in Popular Appropriations of the Past in Eastern Europe. Modern Paganism – Historical Reenactment – Music Scene”.1 The articles it contains are papers presented at the workshop, updated and expanded by their authors. They are accompanied by a number of additional texts to complement and enhance the volume. The workshop and this book build on previous attempts to describe the politicised entanglement of historical reenactment and its multifarious links to Neopagan religious movements and the black metal music scene for the German context.2 We aimed to explore them in greater depth and place them in a broader, transnational framework. The comparison with other countries shows that the Pagan past is pivotal for many radical rightwing identity projects in Europe, which makes popular cultural formats of its appropriation for political exploitation particularly significant. Close links between circles of reenactors, Neopagans and black metal fans have been evident since the 1990s. It seems that the “Pagan element” not only unites them but feeds a specific understanding of history with a close affinity to far-right ideals, which we set out to examine more closely in this volume. Apart from individuals or groups who are actively involved in the reenactment scene as well as in metal bands or Neopagan groups, the tight-knit relationship between the three spheres is also reflected in the themes, symbols and general aesthetic that they adopt. Ideas about the Pagan past seem to flow through these fields, reinforce each other and find wide audiences at large-scale reenactment events or black metal shows. Without question, there has already been a wealth of academic studies on and investigative research into individual elements of this scene, be this from the perspective of museum education, religious studies or music sociology, each focusing on individual characteristics, social roles and political traits. They are too fragmented and specialised to list them here and all contributions provide insight into the current state of research in their respective areas. Up until now, however, there have been few if any attempts to explore what popular history practices dealing with the Pagan past have in common, what links them, and what makes them appealing and useful for the far right. We therefore saw great promise in focusing on how history is dealt with here, how the past is understood. Hence, this volume
I 8 attempts to examine what images of history are created, what narratives are (re-)produced and to what extent these match up with radical right-wing ideals and how they are being harnessed by corresponding actors, organisations and movements. All the articles thus address the role that the Pagan past plays as a foil for populist to extreme right-wing identity projects and their exploitation for political ends. They demonstrate how reenactment events, black metal concerts and Neopagan discourse produce notions of a pre-Christian past and images of Pagan societies that are grounded in a biologistic and ancestral understanding of “people”. It is this essentially völkisch, or – to use a more internationally compatible term – ethnicist thinking, that seems to lie at the core of their approach to the past, and that enables exclusionary practices of identity and prejudice. Moreover, by conjuring up a supposedly more natural and original way of life than the one we live in today, pre-Christian societies are staged and idealised as heroic ancestors, they thus not only serve as the starting point for the idea of an unbroken ethnic continuum stretching to the present but are also evoked as the antithesis of (post-)modernity. Although this kind of understanding history draws on the nationalist-romanticist and essentialist ideas of the 19th and early 20th centuries, they are often adapted and updated to meet personal convictions and the challenges of the present day. Accordingly, the considered fields of popular engagement with early history display an ambivalent and selective relationship to latest discourses and findings from academic archaeological and historical research. As the individual articles show, the practices of history that are analysed here can and do fulfil political roles by conveying notions of “belonging” and “non-belonging”, by marking conservative ideas of society out as being “original” and “natural” or romanticising violent behaviour and masculine warrior elites. However, the political force that such images of history can build up cannot always be recognised in the form of traditional political activism. Whereas sections of the described milieus openly maintained links with extreme right circles around the turn of the new millennium, they have since shed many of their more obvious political trappings. Whether this is linked to the overarching shift in strategy by the far right, to shun overt racist views and white supremacist fantasies and instead cloak them in concepts of cultural inequality such as ethnopluralism, is one of the questions addressed in this volume. Notions of supposedly natural societies whose culture and way of life were adulterated firstly by Christianity – all too often regarded as a phenomenon with Jewish roots that was introduced “from outside” – and later by society’s ideas of equality and diversity are created in order to lend legitimacy to anti-modern and anti-democratic concepts of life in the present day. In the guise of popular cultural approaches to history, such references to a long national historical tradition and ideals of a ‘natural’ way of life and culture combined with attempts to biologise cultural differences between human societies can be transported right into the midst of society. This is another reason why it is not sufficient to merely look at tangible links, activities or statements with extreme right-wing overtones. The way in which history is staged through public performance and popular media appears innocuous at first and sometimes even playful, so that it often escapes critical reflection due to its pop-cultural nature. However, it is these vivid images that can contribute to easily and unconsciously conveying an understanding of history that reinforces anti-democratic ideologies. The terms “extreme right-wing”, “far-right”, “altright”, etc. that are used in this volume cannot always be separated clearly from one another when zooming in on individual cases. “Far-right” generally refers to political beliefs that lie beyond the conservative right wing, although the boundaries are very blurred. The terms “extreme right” or “extreme right-wing” (in German rechtsextrem) are used in German criminal law as well as in many other contexts (including academic ones) where there are signs of a rejection of democratic principles and a willingness to employ or accept the use of violence to achieve political goals. All too often, however, it is impossible to make a clear assessment. This is because, even when corresponding attitudes are not voiced or explicitly demonstrated by other means, they can still appear as the ultimate consequence of adopting certain ideals. The “alt-right” (in German Neue Rechte, literally “New Right”) generally refers to groupings or movements that set themselves apart from the “old” right, i.e. the traditional fascism of the 20th century in terms of their look and political practices but that preserve precisely its ideas of ethnic and racist exclusion and of radically heteronormative, hierarchical and autocratic models of society that the “old” right espoused. Many societal undertakings that are regarded as traditionally “left-wing”, such as anti-globalisation, ecology
Introduction: Staging the Pagan Past 9 I and even feminism are seized upon and ideologically transformed by the contemporary far right. This has created a situation where conventional classifications of “left” and “right” are becoming increasingly unreliable and traditionally right-wing thinking such as ethnonationalism, antisemitism, the “blood and soil” ideology and anti-queer agendas can only be identified through a closer look behind the scenes. With this in mind, especially here, in the land of mythologised images of history, no claim can be made to precision in distinguishing the meanings of the various dimensions and terminological concepts of “right-wing”. Nevertheless, the authors of the articles offer sufficient context for their case studies to enable the reader to determine which flavour of far-right ideology is involved in their individual examples. The volume aims to contribute to both research and education on the exploitation of early history for farright ideological projects ranging from ultra-conservatism and populist ethnonationalism to extremist racism and antisemitism. In so doing, it hopes to join the various studies, events and publications that have recently addressed topics such as political mediaevalism and the (ab-)use of the Middle Ages3 or those that have dealt in general terms with polarised pasts and contested heritage.4 It wants to expand these approaches by including a perspective on the Pagan past in (broadly understood) popular culture. Reflecting the main topics covered at the preceding workshop, this volume focuses on three countries by way of example – Germany, Poland and Hungary. The decision to concentrate on these countries was made based on the response to the workshop. While the texts on Germany and Poland included here cover broad swathes of the topic, we were only able to reflect some aspects of the situation in Hungary. Nonetheless, they provide an important dimension to the varying extents to which state authorities tolerate, embrace and even impose ethnicist historical narratives. Ralf Hoppadietz’s article opens proceedings for Germany by taking a look at the reenactment scene exploring the long tradition of völkisch Neopagan ideals in the imaginations of pre-Christian societies. It is followed by the ‘folk pagans’ in German black metal described by Niels Penke and their preoccupation with Germanic culture and mythology, which reflect anti-modernist and antisemitic world views. The next contribution by Hermann Ritter shines a spotlight on the links between extreme right-wing fiction, fantasy role-playing and conspiracy narratives. The two final articles in this section dedicated to Germany take a look at books and other writings dealing with pre- and early history and Nordic mythology that reveal obsolete nationalist concepts of history and ideological ties with the German Neue Rechte: Whilst Anna- Lena Heckel and Heike Sahm explain how the legend of the Germanic peoples is being kept alive in children’s and young adult books, Hannes Buchmann and Julius Roch highlight the connection between views of prehistory and völkisch ideology based on the example of the Institut für Staatspolitik. The second section, which is devoted to Poland, starts with Philipp Schaab’s article, that uses the example of selected Neopagan groups to highlight the significance of historical references in ethnonationalist identity construction. In the following contribution, Mariusz Filip explores the period of post-1989 transformation as a major formative phase for Polish far-right Neopaganism. While Filip focuses on the broad spectre of political activism and networking, Karin Reichenbach’s paper discusses whether identifying with the Pagan Slavs influences popular performances of history and exerts a cultural effect in the metapolitical sense. Michał Pawleta then examines various aspects of the politicisation of historical reenactment in present-day Poland. The section on Poland concludes with an article by Ryan Buesnel, which explores antisemitism and radicalism in the growth of Polish right-wing black metal. For Hungary, Katrin Kremmler’s article offers insights not only into the role played by reenactment in the state-sponsored reframing of the country’s early history but also into the re-ordering of archaeology and history within an illiberal system. As the final contribution to this volume, Áron Szele’s article illustrates the importance of mythological ancestry in Hungarian rock music. For the success of this publication, which involved a great deal of effort for us as editors due to occasionally unstable and uncertain academic contract situations, we would chiefly like to thank the Leibniz Institute for the History and Culture of Eastern Europe (GWZO) for funding the preparation of this volume and including it in its Visuelle Geschichtskultur (“Visual Cultural History”) series. The editors of this series, Maren Röger and
1 Perspectives from Germany
Of Gods and Ancestors Historical Reenactment and the Long Shadow of Neo-Germanic Paganism Ralf Hoppadietz ... The fog drifts ominously over the forest as a group of armed men on horseback gradually enter the scene. Accompanied by solemn cosmic music, the camera zooms in closer, and now we are looking into the grim and determined faces of the riders, whose weapons, kit and jewellery are adorned with numerous symbols ... Two groups of well-equipped, heavily armed warriors face off in front of the museum visitors, their shields and standards emblazoned with markings from times gone by. A horn sounds, and the two sides charge fearlessly towards each other, bellowing warlike cries. Sword meets shield, axe clashes against helmet, and a steady stream of fighters fall to the ground while their comrades battle on fiercely ... Hardly any history documentary or archaeological museum nowadays can get by without presenting these kinds of performance, which are often put on or offered by what are known as reenactment troupes. Most museums – certainly, nearly all open-air ones – rely on these programmes of “living history”, while a great many exhibitions open with live performances as a way of teaching history in order to stage events that are as memorable as possible. In addition, TV productions and other media relating to early historical themes regularly include reenactments and hence often contribute to the popularisation of images of the past that are highly specific and mostly one-dimensional (yet all the more impressive for it).1 And the producers of these films benefit not least from the fact that these performers come fully equipped with clothing, weapons and, in some cases, even horses, obviating the need for expensive props. The authors and directors, meanwhile, are primarily concerned with using certain stylistic devices to give the viewer the sense that they are witnessing a reality that is spatially, temporally or socially distant from their own. Fictions of authenticity of this kind, which are key to commercial success, are achieved by aiming for the greatest possible degree of emotionalisation while harnessing the audience’s existing viewing habits. These viewing habits are shaped primarily by TV or streaming series, feature films and the major Hollywood blockbusters as well as by video games. Thus, it is often series such as Vikings or Rome as well as fantasy films like The Lord of the Rings that will determine how plausible depictions of history and prehistory will appear in viewers’ eyes.2 Performances in museums often differ from these film productions in that the reenactment troupes generally act autonomously in front of their audience and these performances are rarely moderated by a scholar. This is especially true of the many archaeological open-air museums out there, most of which get no outside funding and thus have to hold their own as a service provider in both the education and entertainment market.3 As a result, the boundaries between scientifically based findings and pure entertainment are becoming increasingly blurred. “Reenactment” in this context is not to be understood in the sense employed by the radical historicism of Robin George Collingwood within the field of the philosophy of history.4 Rather, reenactment is nowadays generally understood to mean reproducing and recreating events from (pre-)history as faithfully as possible. The aim is to create an image of life at that time by presenting archaeological objects and finds in their original context (as far as possible). Members of these kinds of reenactment troupes appear to promise that the historical events that they portray will create an experience for both spectators and performers that neither archaeological exhibitions nor academic debates are capable of competing with. Most forms of historical reenactment are underpinned by a desire for historical authenticity that lies at the heart of the opportunity to experience history that they offer through their performance. This authenticity is understood as attempting to get as close as possible to a vision of the past that is comprehended as historical reality.5 For the performers, this means striving for the most exact reproduction possible of historical equipment and a faithful imitation of certain
I 14 Perspectives from Germany activities, usually drawing on recent findings from research into pre- and early history. By contrast, little if anything is usually said about how many imaginary additions – an inevitable part of any historical account – have been made. Many reenactment troupes even set out their own rules and regulations in order to back up their claim to offer authenticity through detailed, well- researched performances. For example, the charter of Pax Celtica, an association bringing together various Celt-themed reenactment troupes, had this to say: One important aim of historical representation is to reconstruct the past as faithfully as possible based on scientific findings. Representations based merely on fantasy and intuition run counter to this fundamental principle. Although it is rarely possible to offer a fully true-to-life and authentic historical representation, [...] the unavoidable compromises made as a result must not be discernible [...].6 In general, attempts like this to provide a true-to-life representation of ages in history through the performative media of reenactment and living history are seen as a legitimate way to present and communicate the past. Besides the abovementioned desire for objects that are “authentic” – perhaps “historically accurate” would be a better description – the notion of the authenticity of the subject also comes to the fore in these performances. This type of authenticity refers to the personal experience of the reenactors, i.e. the immersive, physical and sensual experiencing of historical reconstruction and simulation as the fiction of a precise reliving of the past.7 Many reenactors believe that this can be a way of bridging or even eliminating the gap between past and present and thus, that the past can be simulated apparently seamlessly.8 One can distinguish between various forms of reenactment as a basic principle:9 ❚ Reenactment as representation of (pre-)historical military conflicts, markets and/or lifestyles without making reference to a specific event or spatial context. This form of representation is often associated with events run by museums. ❚ Reenactment as representation of a specific (pre-)historical event, often a particular battle, with reference to a specific location. The spatial aspect is especially important here; a lack of accuracy or historical authenticity in terms of the equipment used will be tolerated provided that it is concealed. ❚ Reenactment as representation of the lifestyle, culture and daily life of a particular age in history. The aim is to enable this long-gone world to be experienced by all the senses by handling and making clothes, tools and objects as authentically as possible and by using reconstructed buildings that are as faithful to the originals as possible. This kind of reenactment is often referred to as “living history”, which the folklorist Jay Anderson has attempted to define as “the simulation of life in another time”.10 Another reenactment-related development has been competitive armed combat (wearing armour), such as reenactment combat fighting (RCF), which is increasingly becoming a discipline in its own right as it builds on depictions of fighting moves and attempts to reconstruct historical combat techniques. This is leading to a situation where people are training and fighting according to all manner of different sets of rules (areas of the body where one is permitted to strike one’s opponent, and so on). Invariably, this means that techniques and tactics are developed that will bring success in sporting contests played to these rules but that have no significance whatsoever for historical fights (for which these rules are irrelevant). In view of the close links between the emergence of reenactment and living history on the one hand and that of the archaeological open-air museums on the other, this article sets out to trace this development with the aid of a few examples to serve as highlights, focusing particularly on Oerlinghausen – an example that still exists to this day. Reenactment and open-air museums: a history The earliest examples of reenactment are generally held to be representations of battles that were staged in the 1960s to mark the centenary of the US Civil War (1861– 1865) in the US, where participants wore contemporary clothing and wielded corresponding equipment. During the decades that followed, these were supplemented by depictions of everyday life away from the battlefield in the form of living history.11 As far as Central Europe is concerned, however, we have evidence dating back as far as the early 16th century of performances of events from proto-history. These include the Bavarian/Austrian Fastnachtspiele (“Shrovetide plays”) about Dietrich von Bern and the Wild Huntsman, the show fights in Kriem-
Of Gods and Ancestors 15 I hild’s rose garden in Worms or the rural Hildebrand dramas.12 The sheer scale that such representations could sometimes assume is illustrated by an example from the Munich area, where the Battle of the Milvian Bridge of 312 AD was reenacted by around 1,000 people in 1574.13 In the 17th to 19th centuries, these kinds of staging of episodes from early history generally took place in public gardens, during pageants and in theatres. 1882, for instance, saw a reenactment of prehistoric pile-dwelling communities in the theatre in the Swiss town of Neuchâtel. What made this particular performance remarkable was the fact that it used tools that were exact replicas of original prehistoric finds. Similarly, the performances put on during pageants, such as in Rohrschach on the Swiss side of Lake Constance in 1889, are already being seen as an attempt to link historical presentations with architectural reconstructions.14 This period also witnessed the establishment of the first open-air museums virtually anywhere in Europe, with the oldest example considered to be the rural openair museum founded in Skansen near Stockholm in 1891. Unlike the more recent archaeological open-air museums, these “farmhouse museums” were (and still are) not reconstruction museums in the true sense. Instead, they work with original or relocated buildings dating from the last three to four centuries under the guidance of ethnologists and experts in cultural and regional studies. These museums have been imbued with living history from their very early days.15 One of the earliest examples of extensive planning for an archaeological open-air park featuring living history was published in Graz in 1900 by Guido List,16 but his design never came to fruition. List’s proposal was to rebuild the Roman town of Carnuntum as it was in Late Antiquity together with its imaginary Germanic counterpart, a town called Stillfried. The entire complex was to be filled with both staff and visitors dressed in historical costumes.17 With this complex, List – an Ariosophist – wanted to popularise his ideas of a Germanic way of life together with the Aryanist cosmology and racist “Germanic” religion that he developed (see below) by having it open to the public as well as during solstice celebrations and other large-scale events. Apart from a handful of individual precursors, the first open-air museums containing reconstructed pre- and proto-historic settlements were mainly built in the 1920s and 1930s. In Germany, apart from the famous pile-dweller settlements in Bad Buchau and Unteruhldingen, the first Germanic open-air museums to have archaeological support were established in Oerlinghausen and Lübeck in 1936.18 The open-air museum in Oerlinghausen in North Rhine-Westphalia was founded to mark the town’s 900th anniversary.19 Inspired by archaeological excavations of burial grounds and traces of settlements dating back to different prehistoric and early mediaeval periods, two buildings were reconstructed and presented as Germanic huts. These buildings provided the settings for a theatre production entitled Oerl Bark. Depicting the Saxons as a Germanic tribe and its young leader named Oerl Bark, the play was intended to present a new image of the Germanic peoples, linking them to National Socialist “blood and soil” mythology. The open-air museum was expanded with additional reconstructions of Stone Age and mediaeval buildings in the following year, creating an alleged long-standing Germanic tradition and heritage. The educational programme offered at pre-war Oerlinghausen included a range of different performative and hands-on activities aimed at youngsters in particular. It gave a political fillip to the National Socialists in a region that had hitherto been dominated by the Social Democrats. In the first few decades after 1945, open-air museums were no longer exploited as vehicles for official state policy in Germany given the experience of the preceding years, and, for some time at least, ethnic and historical narratives derived from archaeological data were displayed in a far more cautious manner. Given this restraint, life-size archaeological reconstructions and attempts to breathe new life into museums using historical reenactors did not reappear until the 1960s or 1970s. Having been destroyed towards the end of World War II, Oerlinghausen was thus not rebuilt until 1960, and again in 1978 after a devastating fire. Living history performances are now conducted here too in close consultation with museum staff. Ever since it re-opened, however, repeated attempts have been made by neo-fascist and far-right groups to exploit the museum for their own ends in an obvious attempt to revive pre-war activities there. In 1964, for example, the now-banned organisation Wiking-Jugend (“Viking Youth”) hosted an event in Oerlinghausen at the summer solstice. In 1982, the far-right extremist Juergen Rieger from the organisation Die Artgemeinschaft – Glaubens-Gemeinschaft wesensgemäßer Lebensgestaltung (“Community of one’s kind – faith community for way of life true to one’s nature”, likewise now banned; see below) tried in vain to estab-
I 16 Perspectives from Germany lish his Nordisches Archiv (“Nordic Archive”) in Oerlinghausen. During the 1995 Viking Festival, meanwhile, Harry “Radegeis” Schmidt, a “grandmaster” of the Armanen-Orden (“Armanen Order”; see below), appeared there together with other activists. Far-right extremists from political parties such as the Nationaldemokratische Partei Deutschlands (“Nationaldemocratic Party of Germany”, NPD, now Die Heimat), Die Rechte (“The Right”) and Der III. Weg (“The Third Path”) still attempt to hijack the open-air museum to promote their ideology.20 Two other examples of post-war open-air museums in West Berlin and the former East Germany (GDR) show that experimental archaeology also provided significant impetus for the growth of ancient history reenactments, which became increasingly popular after 1990. In the Düppel district of Berlin, a museum village was founded in 1975 that involved reconstructing a 12th-century settlement that had been excavated by archaeologists. Visitors are shown the mediaeval lifestyle as well as old handicrafts and farming methods in order to create a living image of the Middle Ages.21 Reconstruction work at the excavation site of a Slavic stronghold and putative religious shrine in Groß Raden in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania started in 1982. With the support of the local socialist party committee and the local collective farm, archaeologist Ewald Schuldt managed to rebuild much of the site and display it in an open-air museum despite the objections of the GDR Academy of Sciences. This museum was likewise revived later on with demonstrations of craftsmanship and the past way of life.22 Since the 1980s, many open-air museums in Germany have also had strategies for using living history to present aspects of daily life and the relevant material culture. Open-air museums have more than doubled in number since 2000 and have been joined by countless historical theme parks. This development is often associated with a wave of commercialisation and “eventisation” practices within history education that reflects changing ideas in museum didactics as well as the growing popularity of role-playing games, historical reenactments, medieval markets and TV programmes about history.23 Since the late 1990s, numerous places that are regarded as Germanic, Slavic or Viking as well as other villages and forts have been converted into archaeological reserves or theme parks. Not all of these are publicly funded official institutions; some are private initiatives run by local historical societies, commercial companies or even reenactment troupes themselves.24 Examples include the complex known as Ukranenland – Historische Werkstätten Torgelow (“Land of Ukrani – Historical workshops Torgelow”) in Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania and the Frühmittelalterlicher Königshof – Gervina (“Early mediaeval royal court – Gervina”) in Breitungen in Thuringia as well as the Historisches Dorf – Gannahall (“Historical village – Gannahall”) near Nauen in Brandenburg, which will be looked at in more detail below. At these complexes, visitors acquire knowledge largely by themselves as they go round, meaning that there is no academic “corrective” to counterbalance the representations presented. Yet visitors have the impression that they are at an open-air museum that teaches its knowledge in an academically sound and scientifically watertight way. Criticism of the concept of reenactment Measured against its massive contribution to the production and popularisation of images of history, the critical examination of reenactment as a method for picking up and communicating (ancient) history must be regarded as largely under-represented. As illustrated above, reenactment as a concept is considered capable of practically reliving historical events by replaying them and, in so doing, of gaining a better understanding of life in times past. However, such an assumption hinges on the belief that historical knowledge is based on a practical understanding of the past in the present, yet such an assumption has to be deemed to have been refuted by a series of fundamental insights from the theory of knowledge and the theory of history. Even as early as the 18th century, the historical theorists Johannes Martin Chladenius and Johann Christoph Gatterer highlighted the locational constraints – in terms of space, time and everyday life – affecting the writers of history, which always have a relativising effect.25 The debate over the fiction of history intensified from the mid-20th century onwards. Apart from generally critical viewpoints – which conceptualise perception and knowledge as human constructs controlled by cognitive and social processes with, at most, conditional reference being made to an ontic reality – the main problem for any appropriation of history is that the past can no longer be perceived or physically experienced. Even though remnants from the past, whether
Of Gods and Ancestors 17 I they be archaeological finds or historically preserved evidence of observations, seem to provide a direct connection to the past that can serve as the basis for generating specific ideas about past events, these remnants no longer belong to the past because they are being considered in the present.26 Starting from the notion that any act of perception and cognition is in itself the result of a construct, statements and concepts about the past must be understood as part of the present right from the outset. Rather than the past per se, what they actually reflect is the results of a number of cognitive and social processes in the present concerning questions relating to the past. It must thus follow that, rather than one truth, the potential truth of many histories must be acknowledged. This means that the writing of history is only able to make more or less plausible statements about the past. Within the rational and methodological framework of the historical sciences, the degree of plausibility is determined primarily by the density and proximity of sources, which, when critically analysed, are granted a “right of veto” to rule out invalid concepts of history. This “veto right of the sources” is a concept in the theory of history that assigns the source-critical interpretation of historical remains the role of making historically untrue statements recognisable as such. For one thing, the veto right of the sources limits the number of potential partisan interpretations of history to those that cannot be proved untrue or incorrect through source criticism. For another, it runs counter to a naïve objectivism that holds that historical facts can be understood and presented over time without taking account of the perspectivity of the respective historian in their time.27 This thus makes it impossible to relive the past, and claiming to present authentic historical reconstructions even harbours the risk that “military actions and wars are trivialised and heroised since the reenactment cannot depict the hardships, cruelties, fears, fatal wounds and deaths that are part and parcel of military conflict”.28 In the field of pre- and proto-historic archaeology in particular, these underlying methodological problems are exacerbated by the general lack of both written testimonies and other written sources. It should therefore be obvious that, even if we presuppose the existence of ideal conditions for passing down the material remnants of a specific (past) age, it is still not possible to resolve the dilemma, which is that we in the present do not know how these objects fitted into the culture of the past day to day and thus have no idea about the basic activities performed and routines followed by its people.29 Logically, this must apply all the more to those areas of life that are not necessarily expressed in material terms, such as the thoughts, feelings and beliefs of the people belonging to these cultures. It is precisely the idea of depicting a past era in an authentic fashion and the desire to put this into practice that prompts performances to go beyond merely presenting archaeological or historical sources in order to achieve narrative coherence. As the gaps that exist are filled in the process with narratives and personal convictions whose origins lie in other temporal and cultural contexts, this creates the appearance of totality, which in turn is deemed equal to the “historical truth”.30 Dense representations of this kind can thus easily become the conscious or unconscious expression of one’s own ideological or religious beliefs. This applies in particular to those areas of the reenactment scene that deal with the representation of Celts, Slavs, Vikings and the Germanic peoples,31 where people’s identification with the respective culture often goes well beyond presenting scientific findings in theatrical form. Instead, they attempt to link their own ethnic identity with the culture being portrayed by engineering a connection to their forefathers. It is from this imagined direct ancestry that they quite naturally derive as a matter of course their legitimate entitlement to make valid statements – that are understood as “authentic” – about these past societies. For example, as Heiko Gerull from the reenactment group Ulfhednar, which is related to the abovementioned project Gervina, explained with regard to the Germanic peoples: “I think and feel like my ancestors.”32 Unlike when choosing and producing replicas of historical equipment or clothing, for which the reenactors tend to follow the illustrations and technical details from academic publications as closely as possible, often demonstrating an astonishing amount of knowledge in the process, they largely ignore the academic debate surrounding the cultural history and origin of these archaeological cultures. Instead of falling in line with current research, which argues in favour of a much more complex and nuanced understanding, they stick to academically outdated, oversimplified and romanticising images of ancient societies and the religions that they followed.33 Onto this they project their ideas of an apparently “natural” and “unadulterated” way of life with
Popular Pagans Germanic1 Culture and Mythology in (Heavy) Metal Niels Penke Besides the “hellish” elements of Christianity, no other set of themes is as omnipresent in the various genres of heavy metal as the pandaemonium of “Germanic” or Nordic mythology. Odin, Thor, Fenrir the wolf and the World Serpent, the Valkyries and Einherjar, Yggdrasil, Asgard, or the end of the world in Ragnarök – these are all names and images that appear in numerous band names, in songs or album titles, in lyrics, on record covers or on t-shirts. Metal without all this imagery is hard if not impossible to imagine. The variety and breadth of references to “Germanic” culture and myth is large, as is the scale of the political semantics: from apolitical adaptations and implicit or hidden political semantics through to overt political framings. In her fundamental study of heavy metal, the sociologist Deena Weinstein identified the important role played by “Paganism”, i.e. the entire aggregate of pre-Christian religions in Northern Europe, in the emergence of a list of themes specific to metal.2 It is a long way, historically as well as aesthetically, from the first bands, which initially referred to gods, heroes and artifacts of the “Nordic-Germanic” pantheon only occasionally in their lyrics, to the establishment of dedicated subgenres such as Pagan metal and Viking metal, which define themselves through their exclusive reference to “Pagan” and “Viking”. The procedure that Eric Hobsbawm described as an “invention of tradition” 3 would appear to be decisive here: the narrative design of one’s own past, connected to pictures, symbols, slogans and practices. Where collective memory no longer reaches back to ancient times, and where tradition has broken off and ended a continuum of vivid traditions, imagination sets in, and the narrative begins. Its function is to reconstruct a whole picture from the written records and to enrich the fragmentary patterns by inventing the requisite elements that are missing. In connection with the Germanic tribes in particular, this is a phenomenon that can be traced back to early modern times (the 16th century) and that became most prominent in the Romantic period (early 19th century) but also to the Völkische Bewegung (“Folkist movement”) after 1900 and to National Socialism between the 1920s and 1945. All these kinds of cultural heritage are still being maintained in one context or another. They go together in many of the neo-völkisch attempts to shape a “whole” Germanic culture and to identify themselves as Germanic people or tribes. The main problems facing the proponents remain the same and are what all their ancestors throughout the centuries have experienced: the fundamental problem of “reviving” non-literary cultures whose earliest traditions can only be made accessible through archaeological finds – in the form of objects that are dug up and pictorial monuments that are preserved – and through descriptions penned by others, especially Roman authors. Thus the primary, “authentic”, historical phase can only be reconstructed via foreign descriptions, while the first written testimonies come in the 8th century in the Old High German period – after Christianisation, in other words. This means that alternative strategies are needed. One of them is to make the at-once tangible and abstract appeal to the “common blood” of all Germanic tribes and their ancestors, which is supported by the assumption of a “spiritual” kinship, a kind of eternal Volksgeist in the tradition of Herder.4 Another strategy involves accentuating the “realness” and “trueness” of those identity designs that have to be confirmed repeatedly through performance and rhetoric. Tacking “Germanic”, i.e. the supposedly “own” stories and traditions, enables a completely different personal reference to be made to the material than in the case of Satanism or mere fantasy. What “Vikings” and “Teutons” offer is significantly broader due to the number of diffuse historical references involved. In addition to the idealistic identification with allegorical figures representing “good” and “evil”, there is one that enables people to make the historical and ethnic connection at the same time, i.e. to
Popular Pagans 39 I fantasise about the geographical reference as “bloodbased” descendants in a line of tradition understood as a community of descent shared with one’s ancestors. And, with the aim of updating one’s former enemies and counter-images at the same time in the positive identity designs for one’s own people (Volk). This kind of Volk, as an idealised and idealising concept, is always connected with origin, with the roots of tribes that inhabit particular areas – in contrast to the unspecified identities of “modern” life that are linked to urban living, mobility and multi-culturalism, plurality and hybridity. Volk opposes the centres of modern society by placing emphasis on the “periphery”, on rural areas – in both space and time. The contemporary world is juxtaposed with past periods in history: pre-mediaeval, mediaeval or (at the very least) the Romantic era. This premise means that Volk always describes an interrelationship between certain spaces, people and the cultural matrices inscribed in all of them. This triad is what constitutes a Volk and, in the aggressive notion of a völkisch conception, a complex of racism and antisemitism. Three main patterns can be discerned in the metal subcultures when one deals with Norse mythology and Germanic history. The naïve staging of – or as – Vikings for purely entertainment purposes that comes with the retelling of the old stories of gods and heroes and a politically unintentional use of these “cultural icons” can be interpreted under the heading of “Carnival” as understood by Mikhail Bakhtin.5 The more ambitious appropriations that care about authenticity and seek out historical lines of tradition can be understood as “neo-Romantic”. There are also bands and musicians who convey content that goes beyond the merely aesthetic and that voices political claims and demands with many elements in common with (neo-)Nazism. Metal is not the only domain where these modes of appropriation are part of the usual practices, however; they can be observed in literature or new-religious movements too.6 In all of these categorisations, falling back on one’s “own” history and a “true”, “un-alienated” culture has strong identity-forming powers, which always creates a positive self-image of the actors. Attributes of strength and health go hand in hand with a stereotypical imagery that consistently serves to elevate the “Siegfried type”, the blond beast, to the ideal (and certainly does not always intend or desire the implications). In combination with a diffuse sense of anti-modernism, hostility towards civilisation and praise of a rural, subsistence- based way of life, some foes are always implied and are portrayed as being close at hand. What, then, is the counterpart to the supposedly “Germanic” virtues, their healthy people and their martial spirit? Vikings and the Germanic peoples in the history of heavy metal It all starts with Led Zeppelin’s Immigrant Song (1970) from their album Led Zeppelin III.7 This song deals with the Norman invasion of Britain and enjoyed relative popularity throughout the history of heavy metal, even though the band made no claim to be Vikings themselves. But it was a start nonetheless and, a few years later, the Canadian Jon Mikl Thor appeared with his “carnivalesque” portrayals of the eponymous Norse god of thunder (from 1973 onwards). Thor is further proof that Northern European history and mythology were already points of reference during metal’s formative phase. Compared to later appropriations, their discussion remained superficial and was merely one theme amongst many. Moving into the 1980s, when the internationally established genre of heavy metal was entering a crucial process of differentiation into various subgenres and national scenes with their own structures and traditions, a whole host of bands were making reference to the Norse pantheon. Several bands named after Wotan, Odin, Thor or Asgard appeared. The first person to identify himself as a Viking was Swedish guitarist Yngwie Malmsteen, who released the song I’m A Viking in 1985.8 This song features a Viking’s fantasies of looting and murder in a kind of role-playing poetry. The American band Manowar can be cited as a prime example of no less prominence, not least due to the lyrics of their songs Gates of Valhalla (1983), Blood of My Enemies (1984) and Thor (The Powerhead) (1984, from the album Sign of the Hammer, whose title also references the god Thor or, more accurately, the hammer Mjolnir that he wielded), which draw from the stock of Norse mythology. Unlike most of the other bands mentioned, Manowar’s prominence and influence on the entire metal culture gives it a relevance that surpasses that of the others. This can also be seen in the band’s martial aesthetic, which is expressed in its lyrics and on its album covers. This subtly varies constantly recurring motifs of massive battles and mighty warriors.
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MTMyNjA1