‘Wanderer, kommst du nach Pforta …’: the tension between Classical tradition and the demands of a Nazi elite-school education at Schulpforta and Ilfeld, 1934–45

Roche, Helen

Abstract

This paper explores the tensions which arose when Schulpforta, Germany's leading humanistic boarding school, was forcibly turned into a Nazi elite school (a Nationalpolitische Erziehungsanstalt, or Napola). The time-honoured traditions of Christianity and enlightened humanism previously cultivated at the erstwhile Landesschule zur Pforta (alma mater of Fichte, Ranke and Nietzsche) were swiftly subordinated to the demands of National Socialist ideology. Schulpforta, a former monastic foundation, was radically dechristianised, and the school's Classical curriculum soon served only to emphasise those aspects of Greco-Roman Antiquity which could ‘help the Third Reich achieve its destiny’, portraying the Greeks and Romans as proto-National Socialists, pure Aryan ancestors of the modern German race. The Napola curriculum focused on sport and pre-military training over academic excellence, and contemporary documentary evidence, memoirs and newly obtained eyewitness testimony all suggest that the Napola administration wished to assimilate Pforta with any other Napola. This idea is borne out by comparing the case of Napola Ilfeld, a former Klosterschule (monastery school) with a similar history. By the mid-1940s, Ilfeld had lost almost all connection with its humanistic past. Ultimately, we can see the erosion and Nazification of these schools' Christian and humanistic traditions as exemplifying in microcosm tendencies which were prevalent throughout the Third Reich.

Citation

Roche, H. (2013). ‘Wanderer, kommst du nach Pforta …’: the tension between Classical tradition and the demands of a Nazi elite-school education at Schulpforta and Ilfeld, 1934–45. European Review of History, 20(4), 581-609. https://doi.org/10.1080/13507486.2013.764844

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Jan 7, 2013
• Online Publication Date: Jun 25, 2013
• Publication Date: 2013
• Deposit Date: Nov 22, 2018
• Journal: European Review of History: Revue européenne d'histoire
• Print ISSN: 1350-7486
• Electronic ISSN: 1350-7486
• Publisher: Taylor and Francis Group
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 20
• Issue: 4
• Pages: 581-609
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/13507486.2013.764844
• Public URL: https://durham-repository.worktribe.com/output/1313130