“Sotto Il Segno Dell'aquila”. Sacrari E Cimiteri Di Guerra Tedeschi
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NUMERO 4 - giugno 2012 Andreina Maahsen-Milan Assistant Professor at the Uni- versity of Bologna, she currently teaches Sustainable Design and Un- derstanding of Architectural Quality. Main topics: Urban and morpho- typological studies, planning design for urban regeneration. She is author of many essays and articles on urban architectural topics and on relation- ships between settlements construc- tion and cultural identity. “Sotto il segno dell’Aquila”. Sacrari e cimiteri di guerra tedeschi (1911-1945). “Under the sign of the Eagle”. German war memorials and cemeteries (1911-1945) Wilhelm Kreis (1873-1955) fu un celebre architet- Wilhelm Kreis (1873-1955) was a prominent ar- ideological cornerstones of the second half of the to e un noto professore. Pur mantenendosi ambi- chitect and prestigious professor. He directed and 19th century. guamente ai margini dell’attività politica, diresse conditioned choices while being ambiguously on e condizionò scelte importanti e dominò la scena the margins of political activity, he dominated the dell’architettura tedesca per quasi cinque decadi. architectural scene for almost five decades. Kreis Kreis prese parte come architetto e maestro ai più took part in and to a certain extent directed, as importanti eventi nell’architettura e nell’urbanisti- architect and master, part of major events in ar- ca che coinvolsero le maggiori città tedesche fino chitectural and urban planning that involved the alla caduta del Terzo Reich. Con Bonatz, Behrens, biggest German cities up to the fall of the Third Tessenow, Kreis può essere considerato una delle Reich. Together with Bonatz, Behrens, Tessenow, guide più influenti della cultura architettonica tede- Kreis can be considered one of the most influential sca, profeta della spiritualità tedesca e guardiano and unparalleled leaders in German architectural Parole chiave: sacrari militari tedeschi; cimiteri di dei valori della Germanicità inizialmente rappre- culture - prophet of spirituality and watchman of guerra; Wilhelm Kreis; castelli funebri; mausolei sentati dal Regime prussiano e poi dal Terzo Reich. values from Deutschtum, initially embodied by militari; giorno della rimembranza Il suo contributo – miscelando forme e temi presi the Prussian Reich, and subsequently by the Third dalla tradizione storica – solo parzialmente lo qua- Reich. His contribution – combining themes and Keywords: German war memorials; war cemeteries; lifica come una figura ancora legata ai principali shapes taken from historical tradition – only par- Wilhelm Kreis; totenburg; military mausoleums; day of assi ideologici della seconda metà del secolo XIX. tially qualifies him as a figure still linked to the remembrance http://in_bo.unibo.it NUMERO 4 - giugno 2012 “Under the sign of the Eagle” Andreina Maahsen-Milan PREMISE In the 20th century, heroic exaltation is sum- hood in the sacrifice required by war. Its use In the complex picture of 20th century archi- marised in Horace’s line: “Dulce et decorum and abuse, particularly in relation to regres- tecture, an important role was played by sa- est pro patria mori” and goes hand in hand sive ideology, lasted well beyond the brink of cred and monumental architecture. Provid- with the progressive detachment from com- World War II1: it is clear that the rhetoric of ing a bond and a continuity with the ancient mon pietas. The semantic change of “perir the language is projected into art and archi- tradition of tanatorial cult and celebrations, pugnando” takes place at a time when ar- tecture as a cultural mediator for masses. highlighting some original aspects, resuming chitecture turns from a collective, dramatic This device, created in well defined socio-cul- investigations in this field, after such archi- event into individual sacrifice, from tragic tural élites, is widely reverberated through tecture has been collectively removed and ordinariness to an extreme national identity. civil society thanks to the repeated use of forgotten, means finding a new equilibrium This event sanctions the transition in the certain lexical and iconic syntagms. A pen- and awareness of man’s finiteness, within a “management of death” from a religious etration and persuasion gradually transmit- broader and more articulated cultural per- to a civil level: the bodies and the memory ted by passwords, resulting in the creation spective. When examining shapes and roles of killed soldiers ‘belong’ to the Nation. No of aesthetical, philosophical subcultures re- of war cemeteries our thought goes to their wonder that British poet Wilfred Owen, who inforcing group identities. In this way we can instrumental use by governments and dicta- died during World War I, polemically quoted explain the success of the death|war combi- torships. this ode, to highlight deception and false- nation in the youth world, more attracted and http://in_bo.unibo.it 242 NUMERO 4 - giugno 2012 “Under the sign of the Eagle” Andreina Maahsen-Milan fascinated by the logical traps of conservative the late, romantic period and its impact as detachment from the salvific idea of science radicalism and nationalism than adults. It is heroischer Nihilismus on active generations and human progress. evident that ‘terrible’ and therefore sublime between the end of the 19th century and the These associative words recall and postulate events – as explained by Carlo Mazzantini 2- first decades of the 20th century. the “fight between Blood and Soil resulting are only and always implemented in Defence At the beginning of the 20th century new re- in a sort of rooted animality and humanity”7. of the Nation for the safety and prosperity of quests and claims calling for change were Such vision – that will be diffused and repeat- future generations: in brief, Honour, Beauty. intertwined with movements pressing for a ed – like a mantra – already in the early 1920s ‘return to the soil’. The imperative “Zurück expressed sacralisation (and cult) of death in 1.“EARTH, FIRE, AIR” auf die Scholle” rather than “Kehrt zur Na- the military world as a perceptive, intensified, 1.1 Heroic nihilism: onset and consequences tur zurück!”3 advocated by Lebensreformer4 simultaneous experience totally subtracted This essay examines themes and issues that up to the dawn of World War I, gradually led from individuals. go way back in time in European experience to Spengler’s theory5: the syntagm Blut und Marinetti’s cry in the Futurist Manifesto stig- and memory, but that still impregnate and Boden [Blood and Soil] acquired such a per- matizes, in a single line, the social and genre condition individual perception in relation to vasive and effective meaning that it resulted emancipation process8 through the exaltation collective cultural identity. They refer to the in the well-known Nazi phraseology6, and on of the “War, the world’s only hygiene”. These guidelines that supported the heroic cult in both sides of the Alps marked a progressive ideas were later echoed in Berlin’s artistic- http://in_bo.unibo.it 243 NUMERO 4 - giugno 2012 “Under the sign of the Eagle” Andreina Maahsen-Milan Fig. 1-Tower of Silence, Mumbai fire and soil with the impurity of the (ingraving from: “True Stories of the burnt body, it was therefore impos- Reign of Queen Victoria”, Cornelius sible to use cremation. This custom Brown, 1886). was maintained among popula- Fig. 2 - Zoroastrian Tower of Si- tions of the steppe, according to lence in the Iranian province of the ritual of the so-called ‘Funeral Yazd, [Wikipedia]. The “Towers of of the Sky’ (Himmelbestattung), Silence” [Dakhmah], an institution also called ‘Funeral of the Sun’ typical of Zoroastrism, originally (Sonnebestattung.] consisting of 10m high wooden Fig. 3 - Chilpyk, Tower of Silence scaffoldings to support a platform (Turm der Stille), I century A.D. subject to strong winds, where the Fig. 4 - Giovanni Crupi (1849- dead were left to be eaten by vultu- 1925), Heroon at Girgenti res. The sacrality of Zoroastrianism (Agrigento),Tomb of Theron (shot: prohibited any contamination of 1900). literary environments of Herwarth Walden (1879-1941) – organizer of Erster Deutscher Herbstsalon (1913) – who accepted and dis- seminated in Germany these founding, iconic principles9. 1.2 War and death, between aestheticism and vitalism The complex phenomenon of the political- cultural picture cultivating and managing the national myth of the heroic death, also im- plies the special reform of its “management” . The collective event is turned into a mass action, aimed at removing any pain or suffer- ing. Military death is abstract, projected into a ‘mythical’ dimension – subject to manipula- http://in_bo.unibo.it 244 NUMERO 4 - giugno 2012 “Under the sign of the Eagle” Andreina Maahsen-Milan From left to right: tion and propaganda – valid for both authori- Fig. 5, a, b, c - The German im- perial eagle Reichsadler and de- tarian and democratic regimes. velopment of the heraldic symbol: This is testified by the events that in France, (a) William’s Era (1890-1918), (b) Italy and in the rest of Europe supported the Weimar Republic, (c) Third Reich. creation of Military Memorials and the Tomb The predator, looking to its left and of the Unknown Soldier10 since 1920. In Ger- not to its right shoulder, (symbol of the Nation) was used to symbolise many the analogue Grabmal des unbekannt- the Nazi Party. en Soldaten has been located since 1930 in Fig. 5, d, e, f, g - The Reichsadler the space inside the Neue Wache (K.F. Schin- from: Wilhelm Kreis, 1911; Ludwig kel | H. Tessenow), Berlin. Gies,1937; Robert Scheibe, 1937; The decorative painting and plastic art fol- Arno Brecker, 1940. lows a precise ideological programme: the atrocities of the battlefield, suffering inside the trenches, tortures in the Feldlazarett must not be evoked. Only young, indomitable men, whose serene faces revealed a «certain http://in_bo.unibo.it 245 NUMERO 4 - giugno 2012 “Under the sign of the Eagle” Andreina Maahsen-Milan final victory» could be portrayed. 1.3 Anthropological-cultural recovery and re- vival In the course of the “Short Century”11 the recovery of the neo-pantheistic Land/Na- ture combination, intended as a primary el- ement of life, is confronted with the Judaic – Christian tradition.