Archaeology and ideological propaganda in annexed Alsace (1940–1944)

Abstract

In June 1940, following the signature of the Rethondes armistice, the French province of Alsace was joined to Germany and integrated with the neighbouring German province of Baden, into the Gau Baden-Elsass, later known as Gau Oberrhein. A period of more than four years began, when the Nazi authorities resorted to any means to Germanize the province and its inhabitants as quickly as possible. Various measures were taken as early as 1940, such as a ban on the speaking of French and even the wearing of the Basque beret. Those measures were backed up with the use of propaganda at different levels in everyday life. One of the favourite themes of the media consisted in trying to demonstrate that Alsatians were descendants of ‘Germanic’ populations who settled a long time ago in this country, and that those origins justified their integration into the Reich (FIGURE 1). Local archaeological research was especially favoured by the Nazis to further this theory.