A couple of Cultural items

[Etienne B.]

@Steve: Well spoken,I have nothing to add!

Etienne

[Thorsten B.]

Joe,

Of course the Julleuchter is the belonging equivalent to the Ehrenring and the Ehrendegen.

Why?

The Julleuchter is the root and base and key object of everything that has to be counted as SS religious and cult pieces. As you said it has been widespreaded in the biggest numbers - just to each and every family of the Sippengemeinschaft.
So it has to be seen as the one thing which expresses belonging to an own community, an own Orden - the Sippengemeinschaft of the SS.

The fact that it was given to employees just underlines it´s enormous cultural importance within Himmler´s long-term plans for shaping and educating finally the whole Volksgemeinschaft tied together by the same type of blood and a new developed pagan religion with the center in the heart of germanic soil and westphalian and saxonian tradition - Wewelsburg castle.

[Thorsten B.]

The Jul candles should be seen as an important add to the Julleuchter - otherwise the Julleuchter would be useless, of course, and could not spread out what Himmler´s wishes were as he stated in Alt-Rehse probably in front of young SS-postgraduates of medicine in 1938, probably on summersolstice due to it´s following content:

"The solstitial celebrations do represent more than the external thankfulness of the human beings towards the acting of the sun.
At solstice something antedates, something antedates within the SS: the summer solstice competition. The best of the Sturm and the Standarte are determined. At summer solstice that best one achieves the price during the solstitial celebration.

As the sun moves eternally, as must the movement of the human beings be eternally.
That is what we must acquaint to our human beings again little by little.
Little by little the thought about something that is for eternity, about a natural (self-evident) rotation, about a natural belief will return within our men und the woman and girls again.

I believe that one has the possibility from this direction to give our folk the possibility in contrast to the other folks of the earth, with the exception of the coloured people, that we bring together the wonder to recreate out of a dying folk a reborn and a rebirthing one again.
These are the thoughts why we in the SS celebrate summer- and wintersolstice"

[Thorsten B.]

The fact that the Julleuchter was awarded to women just is a proof of the fact that the SS was a Sippengemeinschaft - including men and women and their whole family, that´s it.

The fact that the Julleuchter was awarded to employees - please let me know which cases are in your mind while you wrote your comment - was because Himmler wanted it little by little that the beliefs, celebrations, cult and so a new religion based on germanic and pagan roots practised within the SS should one time spread out and be practised by the whole german folk and germanic folks, no doubt about this.

He saw his SS as the forerunner of the inner development of the german folk and germanic folks.

Therefore the Julleuchter was introduced in the germanic volunteers of the Waffen-SS as well and there are pics in existence which show in Holland the award of the Julleuchter to women as widows of SS-soldiers being killed in action in the east since they were full-fledged members of the SS.

[Thorsten B.]

Concerning the appearance of the Yule chest in the booklet of the Heimatwerk:

The other possibility is that the chest was - in a very late stage - indeed offered to non-SS-members as well this indicates for me that these cult pieces of the SS were on their way to be spreaded out into the german folk as well.

Therefore - little by little and cautious as Himmler was - the common german people should finally get in a smooth contact with these SS cult pieces so that the new religion would be successful and could somehow overtake the christian and all other religion still resting in the minds of the german people.

Himmler held a very important speech in front of his Gruppenführer and Obergruppenführer in 1936 in which he refers to the speed of development and change of beliefs among the german folk. He made clear that it´s only him who takes care and supervizes the inner and outer appearance of changing beliefs and celebrations and so introducing a new religion and defined his SS as being the forerunner of this whole development and project.

He strongly made clear as well that the inner development regarding these cultural matters within the SS must continue step by step and that it should never be made too quickly so that they would never ever be in the situation that they stepped foreward too quickly and due to this fast speed of change would have one day to go one step backwards again.

It´s a real problem that Himmler´s speeches and thoughts seem to be just not available in english language.

[Robert H]

And still many stiles are still common over in Germany, the forged Kerzenleuchter is a typical German craftsman work from a blacksmith, even of today. I got a blacksmith in my hometown neighborhood that I visited as a kid very often. This style was and is still common to see and find.

When I just would know where my rune book is to share it here, in Germany or in the US? Time to move back anyhow ...

[Thorsten B.]

Robert,

forged in the meaning of faked or in the meaning of handcrafted?

You don´t want to tell me that the SS-smithy in Wewelsburg castle was found only to continue with the well-known stiles here, do you?

So their products like candleholders, electric lighters and their handcrafted national emblems mainly, if not only for official and private SS-buildings were nothing new to the design of these cultural pieces?

AHH, that´s why Hermann Historica described the big iron wall eagle´s style and look as being typically made in the Wewelsburg style, right? And that´s why this impressing handcrafted eagle sold for an enormous price, right?

And so Allach as another cultural SS-company also only made pieces which were already known and in use within the world of creating porcelain and known among the german folk?

I think some of you cannot make the forest out just because there are too many trees around...

Oh well, you don´t have to develope, of course.

[JoeW]

I didn't write the Julleuchter and candle were not part of the cultural web being created by the SS. I wrote that I didn't believe they could be equated to the TK ring and Ehrendegen as symbols of personal honor and loyalty as you had written. There was no return on dishonorment of a Julleuchter and candle that is mentioned in the standard disbursement letter. There was no personal address to the recipient admonishing them to wear or carry in honor. There was only the explanation of and exhortation to use it in the style of Sippengemeinschaft.

[Robert H]

Thorsten,

I don't talk about fakes and I don't care about blacksmith work from Wewelsburg. My meaning is that example with the shown candle holder is an absolute common to find "Schmiedearbeit", also typical to find prior of the III.Reich area. This is not meant to criticize anything but many things are dedicated to the German heritage with or w/o the III.Reich time frame.
The SS brought certain things up again and made their "SS-Schabernack" with it. For my view most of the things are cultural rather then SS cultural.
But of course the SS brought up their own SS cultural items.

[Thorsten B.]

Robert,

Now I have to smile a bit.

Which items do you consider to be the real SS cultural items then?

[Thorsten B.]

While Robert opens his beer bottle I can already answer to Joe´s comment:

For sure the Julleuchter had to be returned due to dishonor - that can be even found in the little description regarding the Julleuchter at Wewelsburg castle.
The piece was an award, you could not buy it.

And can you please tell me how a Julleuchter should be worn or
carried in honour by the recipient?
Should he hang it on his jacket like a medal?? :-))

[Capt. R]

Thorsten,

I don't talk about fakes and I don't care about blacksmith work from Wewelsburg. My meaning is that example with the shown candle holder is an absolute common to find "Schmiedearbeit", also typical to find prior of the III.Reich area. This is not meant to criticize anything but many things are dedicated to the German heritage with or w/o the III.Reich time frame.
The SS brought certain things up again and made their "SS-Schabernack" with it. For my view most of the things are cultural rather then SS cultural.
But of course the SS brought up their own SS cultural items.

Robert, you are of course entirely correct that the ss as well as the national socialists resurrected the older German culture and used it to legitimize their own existence. They built on the traditions, culture, and history of the revered Germanic past. This is well known and anyone who disputes it is mistaken. The ss invented some new and cutting edge things but they built their organization on the back of the old traditions.

I would add that some families had no need for a jul chest produced from the third reich period since they already had their own ancestral chest or other family heirloom furniture to use for their ss corners! Finances did not always allow peasant farmers to buy expensive furniture just because it was culturally symbolic or significant. Common sense tells me that they did the best with what they had. The furniture was designed to mirror or emulate the rustic styles anyhow! Mostly upper class officials and officers were the buyers of the then modern produced furniture, I'd guess.

[Thorsten B.]

I agree 1000%.

[Thorsten B.]

Is anybody able to upload pics of the book "Heinrich Himmler´s Camelot" by Cook/Russell to show some very distinct pieces the SS-smithy manufactured in the castle?

The SS-smithy was found in 1935 and there were always four smiths working full time to carry out Himmler´s wishes and ideas to furnish the different rooms in the castle itself and buildings around it like the SS-village community house which opened on 4th of May in 1937 attended by Himmler.

I have spoken to an ingenieur who made his apprenticeship in the firm and smithy of Mr. Bielefeld in the fifties not too far away from Münster.
Emil Bielefeld was one of the four Artist Blacksmiths who run the smithy in the castle and he told me that - whenever Himmler visited the castle - he went into the North Tower and watched for quite some time their work.
"He sat down there and watched my boss for hours, keeping his examining eyes behind his glasses onto his and the other´s skillful hands. He loved work done by hands, he did not care about dust and the smoke and he was fascinated by the fire.
Yes, he kept starring into the forge - for him they were the gods, the masters of the fire."

That´s what that man told me and then he showed me directly in the Otten´s Hof how that remaining handmade stairrail actually was made and what a masterpiece it is in comparison to things they made in later times when germans started again suddenly to fit up their homes with iron lamps and such other handforged or better to say industrially produced iron accessoires.
There is a big difference regarding production methods, quality and outward appearance between wrought iron pieces from the seventies or later and authentic pieces from the period.

Back to the book "Heinrich Himmler´s Camelot":

for presenting pics of original iron pieces uploading page 48, 49, 51, 53, 54, 55, 56, 79 and 80 or 81 would be of great help.
Especially the big round electrified candleholders show the developed Irminsul motifs.

[Robert H]

Thorsten,

I leave the beer bottle to you as you already do.