The serpent of German evil by Charles Levene
Title
The serpent of German evil by Charles Levene
Description
A sword stands firmly struck through a snake, on whose head a Jewish star is marked, and from whose body various words appear. The Swasitka is at the center of the image.
Creator
NSDAP
Source
German Propaganda Archive. See: https://www.bytwerk.com/gpa/posters1.htm
Publisher
Dr. Robert D. Brooks
Date
September 1930
Format
Jpeg
Language
German
Type
Propoganda Image
Analysis
A crucial component to the success of Nazi propoganda activity was the party’s ability to portray a simple—albeit distorted—moral and economic landscape to a suffering Germany. To do so, they had to both account for the diverse causes of German problems and suggest their unique ability to solve them. This piece of propaganda concisely demonstrates key elements of the historical narrative of decay and prosperity that the National Socialists fed their followers; it also displays their methodology of doing so in an excessively racial, optical, and violent manner.
At the top of the image is a Swastika, against a rectangular shape whose edges resemble splattered blood. Only the party’s name, and the word Liste read on the upper half of the photo. On the bottom half, a dagger nearly as large as the snake’s body is firmly stabbed through the animal’s head. Words branch outward: “Versailles, unemployment, war guilt lie, Marxism, Bolshevism, lies and betrayal, inflation, Locarno, Dawes Pact, Young Plan, corruption, Barmat, Kutisker, Sklarek, prostitution, terror, civil war” (Dr. Robert D. Brooks).
The poster, displayed in September of 1930, summarizes the turbulence of the preceding decade—defeat in World War I, a Versailles treaty that stripped Germany of over 10% of its land and inflicted reparations, and the establishment of a democratic Weimar government. By the time of the Reichstag election in 1930, Hitler had attracted a following both for his 1923 failed coup and for Mein Kempf (1925), a work of nationalistic, manly rhetoric; there Hitler began to develop his ideology that wartime surrender was a betrayal to those who had suffered gas attacks and machine gun barrages. In his study of Nazi activity in Northeim, Allen has shown that even to those who were mostly unaffected by the depression reverberating across the globe, fear of unemployment was a force for radicalization, and few political groups were as willing to embrace extremism and violence as the Nazis. Their campaign called for traditionalism, a renewed moral consciousness embracing religious values and conventional institutions; their message, carried forth largely by young German men, was aimed at war veterans and the middle class. Accordingly, across Germany party members organized spectacles of festivals and conferences, where they called for “fervent patriotism and avid militarism” (Allen, 35).
The concise list of words on the poster demonstrates the categorical connections essential to the National Socialist ideology. Economic decay and inflation are not only problems in themselves, the National Socialists held, but also symptoms of a wider moral decay. To fuel this message, the Nazis cited the names Barmat, Kutisker, Sklarek, three merchant Jews who were involved in a 1925 scandal. Reich President Ebert and top Social Democrats were publicly accused of being bribed by Jews in pursuit of bribery and fraudulent loans (Geyer, 211). In September of 1930, the Democratic Socialists successfully maintained a strong majority in the Reichstag. But the Nazis saw, Allen has noted, a countrywide “meteoric rise” (Allen, 40). At least in Northeim, they gained support largely from disaffected, new voters, attracted to their shows of strength.
Just as the list of words summarizes the National Socialists’ diagnosis of German ills, a subtle detail of the poster reflects a goal of the NSDAP. It is noteworthy that, though the tip of the weapon is planted into a Jewish star, it is unclear whether the animal already carried the symbol, or if the knife was used, in the first place, to carve it. Indeed, the latter seems more probable. After all, the star is not only etched in red but also loses shape at its bottom, as its sixth point ceaselessly blends into a stream of blood pouring from the snake; the edge of the knife also appears parallel to the line that would comprise part of the star.
Before 1933, the total population of Jews in Germany was around 500,000, less than 1% of the total population (Bloch, lecture 10). Bergen has pointed out that in “appearance, habits of daily life, or language (Bergen, 19), European Jews were largely indistinguishable from their neighbors. And Nazi ethnic cleansing laws would certainly later apply to other minorities—including disabled people—but here the party importantly portrays the Jews not as merely inferior but rather as dangerous, the mythological symbol of cunning and sin. In the Bible, the snake secretly infiltrates the divine, pure garden of Eden, seduces Adam and Eve, and banishes humankind for posterity to the fate of mortality, suffering, and moral corruption. This symbolic imagery hearkens to fears born in the wake of the first Great War. Because there was little fighting on German soil and very few foreign soldiers, nationalist generals and professors convinced a portion of the public that defeat was due to disloyalty within Germany (Bergen, 64-65). Such fears found greater voice amidst scandals like the one I have mentioned in 1925. The image of the snake suggests that the German Jewry has entered the otherwise pure land of the volk, thereby inducing the two key kinds of “corruption”—both “usury” and “prostitution” (i.e. economic and moral). Carving the Jewish star thus speaks not only to the strength with which Hitler will attempt to reinvigorate an embarrassed Germany. Rather, the image more broadly encapsulates the National Socialists’ plan and method: they promise to shed light on the allegedly clandestine corrupting workings of the Jews, evidenced by Barmat, and answer their alleged crimes with a forgotten sense of militancy.
References:
Allen, William Sheridan. The Nazi Seizure of Power. Brattleboro, Vermont: Echo Point books & Media: 2014.
Bergen, Doris L. War & Genocide : A Concise History of the Holocaust. Lanham, Md.: Rowman & Littlefield, 2002.
Bloch, Brandon. “Lecture 10.” February 27, 2020.
Martini H. Geyer, “Contested Narratives of the Weimar Republic.” In Weimar Publics/Weimar Subjects : Rethinking the Political Culture of Germany in the 1920s. Edited by Kathleen Canning, Barndt Kerstin, and Kristin McGuire.New York: Berghahn Books, 2010.
At the top of the image is a Swastika, against a rectangular shape whose edges resemble splattered blood. Only the party’s name, and the word Liste read on the upper half of the photo. On the bottom half, a dagger nearly as large as the snake’s body is firmly stabbed through the animal’s head. Words branch outward: “Versailles, unemployment, war guilt lie, Marxism, Bolshevism, lies and betrayal, inflation, Locarno, Dawes Pact, Young Plan, corruption, Barmat, Kutisker, Sklarek, prostitution, terror, civil war” (Dr. Robert D. Brooks).
The poster, displayed in September of 1930, summarizes the turbulence of the preceding decade—defeat in World War I, a Versailles treaty that stripped Germany of over 10% of its land and inflicted reparations, and the establishment of a democratic Weimar government. By the time of the Reichstag election in 1930, Hitler had attracted a following both for his 1923 failed coup and for Mein Kempf (1925), a work of nationalistic, manly rhetoric; there Hitler began to develop his ideology that wartime surrender was a betrayal to those who had suffered gas attacks and machine gun barrages. In his study of Nazi activity in Northeim, Allen has shown that even to those who were mostly unaffected by the depression reverberating across the globe, fear of unemployment was a force for radicalization, and few political groups were as willing to embrace extremism and violence as the Nazis. Their campaign called for traditionalism, a renewed moral consciousness embracing religious values and conventional institutions; their message, carried forth largely by young German men, was aimed at war veterans and the middle class. Accordingly, across Germany party members organized spectacles of festivals and conferences, where they called for “fervent patriotism and avid militarism” (Allen, 35).
The concise list of words on the poster demonstrates the categorical connections essential to the National Socialist ideology. Economic decay and inflation are not only problems in themselves, the National Socialists held, but also symptoms of a wider moral decay. To fuel this message, the Nazis cited the names Barmat, Kutisker, Sklarek, three merchant Jews who were involved in a 1925 scandal. Reich President Ebert and top Social Democrats were publicly accused of being bribed by Jews in pursuit of bribery and fraudulent loans (Geyer, 211). In September of 1930, the Democratic Socialists successfully maintained a strong majority in the Reichstag. But the Nazis saw, Allen has noted, a countrywide “meteoric rise” (Allen, 40). At least in Northeim, they gained support largely from disaffected, new voters, attracted to their shows of strength.
Just as the list of words summarizes the National Socialists’ diagnosis of German ills, a subtle detail of the poster reflects a goal of the NSDAP. It is noteworthy that, though the tip of the weapon is planted into a Jewish star, it is unclear whether the animal already carried the symbol, or if the knife was used, in the first place, to carve it. Indeed, the latter seems more probable. After all, the star is not only etched in red but also loses shape at its bottom, as its sixth point ceaselessly blends into a stream of blood pouring from the snake; the edge of the knife also appears parallel to the line that would comprise part of the star.
Before 1933, the total population of Jews in Germany was around 500,000, less than 1% of the total population (Bloch, lecture 10). Bergen has pointed out that in “appearance, habits of daily life, or language (Bergen, 19), European Jews were largely indistinguishable from their neighbors. And Nazi ethnic cleansing laws would certainly later apply to other minorities—including disabled people—but here the party importantly portrays the Jews not as merely inferior but rather as dangerous, the mythological symbol of cunning and sin. In the Bible, the snake secretly infiltrates the divine, pure garden of Eden, seduces Adam and Eve, and banishes humankind for posterity to the fate of mortality, suffering, and moral corruption. This symbolic imagery hearkens to fears born in the wake of the first Great War. Because there was little fighting on German soil and very few foreign soldiers, nationalist generals and professors convinced a portion of the public that defeat was due to disloyalty within Germany (Bergen, 64-65). Such fears found greater voice amidst scandals like the one I have mentioned in 1925. The image of the snake suggests that the German Jewry has entered the otherwise pure land of the volk, thereby inducing the two key kinds of “corruption”—both “usury” and “prostitution” (i.e. economic and moral). Carving the Jewish star thus speaks not only to the strength with which Hitler will attempt to reinvigorate an embarrassed Germany. Rather, the image more broadly encapsulates the National Socialists’ plan and method: they promise to shed light on the allegedly clandestine corrupting workings of the Jews, evidenced by Barmat, and answer their alleged crimes with a forgotten sense of militancy.
References:
Allen, William Sheridan. The Nazi Seizure of Power. Brattleboro, Vermont: Echo Point books & Media: 2014.
Bergen, Doris L. War & Genocide : A Concise History of the Holocaust. Lanham, Md.: Rowman & Littlefield, 2002.
Bloch, Brandon. “Lecture 10.” February 27, 2020.
Martini H. Geyer, “Contested Narratives of the Weimar Republic.” In Weimar Publics/Weimar Subjects : Rethinking the Political Culture of Germany in the 1920s. Edited by Kathleen Canning, Barndt Kerstin, and Kristin McGuire.New York: Berghahn Books, 2010.
Collection
Citation
NSDAP, “The serpent of German evil by Charles Levene,” HIST 1049, accessed April 28, 2024, https://hist1049-20.omeka.fas.harvard.edu/items/show/30.