German Occupation Research Articles

Social-Cultural Processes within Sumy Region during the Period of the German Occupation 1941-1943 (Based on the Materials of “Sumy Visnyk” Newspaper)

The objective of the article is to cover the social-cultural processes on the territory of Sumy region during the period of the German military occupation in 1941-1943. The majority of the research source base comprises publications in the local occupation newspaper “Sumy Visnyk” which was issued 1941 to 1943. Its articles give the opportunity to study thoroughly certain social-cultural processes in general and the development of the theatrical and educational spheres, functioning of a museum, a cinema, and libraries in particular. Also, it enables characterizing the everyday life of the population in the state of occupation. The authors have come to a conclusion that the occupational periodicals were aimed at creating a positive perception of the occupation authority by the local population, manipulating the masses to make further resistance impossible. The life of the population was quite hard and also limited in many aspects. It included a curfew, restrictions for trade and migration. The purpose of the social policy was the use of the workforce but the workers were obliged to have an employee registration card provided by the labour exchange. The newspaper articles pour the light on such phenomena of cultural life as cinema premiers, theatre performances and concerts which had an extensive repertoire. Radiobroadcasts turned into the main tool for informing the population and taking ideological control over it. The museum resumed its work, the exhibitions of different pieces of art (paintings, embroidery and woodcarving) were held quite often. The educational reform took the turn of Ukrainization. Some new vocational-technical colleges, schools and German language courses were opened. A certain liberalization of a spiritual life was initialized. Worship in the Orthodox churches was also resumed.

‘Organic unity through a new order’: Ideas of corporatism and the Norwegian Nasjonal Samling

This paper analyses the complex relationship between ideas of corporatism, the Norwegian fascist party Nasjonal Samling (National Unity, NS), fascist Italy, and fascist internationalism in the 1930s. It demonstrates how the NS fused the foreign corporative model provided by fascist Italy with nativist traditions and used corporatism to its ends as a signifier for a national and international ‘new order’ on the rise, based on ideas of solidarity. The NS party manifesto from 1934 envisioned corporatism as a promising alternative to capitalist liberalism and as a solution to the parliamentary crisis. The corporatist NS program also facilitated connections between the Norwegian party and Italian Fascism, culminating in the idea of corporatism as a uniting principle of fascist internationalism in the mid-1930s. Finally, the paper discusses briefly the legacy of the corporatist NS program and its fragmentary implementation in the 1940s during the German occupation of Norway (1940-1945).

The fate of Krakow’s builders and architectus of Jewish origin in the face of World War II. Possibilities of applying the micro-historical method in research on architecture and urban planning

This article is about the fate of a group of architects and builders in Krakow during World War II. After the outbreak of the war and the start of the German occupation in September 1939, they found themselves in a very difficult position. As the persecution intensified, so did the opportunities for their professional activities strongly diminish, although they did not disappear. The article outlines in more detail two individual situations – those of Samuel Mehl and Jakub Stendig – one related to the creation of a building, the other to, among other issues, the loss of a building. The research used methods often applied in the studies in architecture and urbanism: literaturę analysis, search in archives, field research. The micro-historical method, which is rather rarely used in such research, was also applied. This method, which has been used for nearly 50 years in scientific, mainly historical research, is based on studying and preserving the individual element of the narrative while aiming to generalise the result. In spite of the extremely cruel persecution of the Jewish population in Krakow during World War II, some architects and builders of Jewish origin continued their professional activity under various and difficult conditions. Its forms varied from design work and construction of residential buildings, to care for historical monuments, to construction activity in a concentration camp. Professional activity and specific skills may have contributed to the fact that proportionally more Jewish architects and builders survived the Holocaust than the Jewish community in Krakow as a whole. The consequences of the Holocaust for the architecture and space of Krakow were serious and varied: the loss of an important professional group, the loss of valuable architectural and artistic works, the change of features in newly designed buildings. The legacy of the work of architects and builders of Jewish origin in Krakow is very significant. It has been commemorated in a variety of tangible and intangible forms, although insufficiently in proportion to its scale.

ОСОБЛИВОСТІ УВІЧНЕННЯ ПАМ’ЯТІ ЖЕРТВ НАЦИСТСЬКОГО ТЕРОРУ НА ХАРКІВЩИНІ У ВОЄННИЙ ТА ПОВОЄННИЙ ЧАС

The aim of the work. The article is devoted to a comprehensive study of commemorative initiatives and building of monuments connected with the commemoration of victims of Nazi terror on the territory of the Kharkiv region. The article explains the specifics of honoring the memory of different groups of victims of Nazi terror on the territory of the Kharkiv region in wartime and in the post-war period. The methodological base consists of general scientific methods (analysis, synthesis, deduction, induction, systematic approach) along with special historical ones (historical-comparative, historical-systematic). The principles of scientificity, objectivity, and historicism are also applied. The scientific novelty of the research is defined by the fact that the author conducted for the first time a comprehensive study of commemorative initiatives of victims of Nazi terror on the territory of the Kharkiv region. Conclusions. During 1941–1945, the Kharkiv region was controlled by the German Military Administration. The German occupation regime established in the Kharkiv region led to numerous deaths among civilians and prisoners of war. The people's initiative served as the first step in commemorating the victims of war. Further, the state assumed control over the building of monuments. Works of monumental art became the instruments for the distribution of Soviet myths about «The Great Patriotic War». The official Soviet ceremonial model of commemoration was characterized by an intrusive cult of internationalism, heroism, Soviet patriotism, and self-sacrifice. The authorities stayed indifferent to people, keeping no record of victims and depersonalizing the dead. Due to the fatal defeats of the Red Army, the Kharkiv region lost about half a million citizens, but it wasn't highly ranked in the national narrative about the war. The state demonstrated discriminatory methods for commemoration of certain categories of the dead. Some of them were represented in the memorial space, and others were deprived of their rights. First of all, this concerned victims of mass terror – Jews, orphans, and prisoners of war. Only with the collapse of the communist regime and the independence of Ukraine these categories of victims of Nazi terror got the opportunity to convey their own vision of war to the general public.

УКРАЇНСЬКЕ ШКІЛЬНИЦТВО В ОКУПАЦІЇ: ВІД ДРУГОЇ СВІТОВОЇ ДО РОСІЙСЬКО-УКРАЇНСЬКОЇ ВІЙНИ

The article presents the results of a study of the problem of organizing education in schools in the occupied territories of Ukraine during the Second World War and during the current Russian occupation. Attention is focused on the common and distinctive features of the two occupation regimes in the context of the organization of educational activities, as well as on the characteristics of the content and forms, goals and means of education used by the occupation regimes in the occupied territories. The author analyzes the educational policy pursued by the German occupation administration, internal contradictions and contradictory approaches of the fascist leadership to the functioning of Ukrainian schooling. The author emphasizes the unanimity of the Russian occupation authorities in the field of educational policy in the occupied territories. It is claimed that, despite the considerable historical distance, the two occupation regimes have many similarities in their approaches to the organization of educational activities in the occupied territories of Ukraine. It is emphasized that the enemy realize the crucial role of education in shaping the consciousness of future generations. The occupiers give a prominent place in the process of educating citizens loyal to the new government or loyal to it to teachers and pedagogical workers of all levels of education. At best, the occupiers suspend teachers who are disloyal to the new government, and more often arrest and convict them. It is noted that, just like eighty years ago, the willingness of teachers to cooperate with the occupiers is not widespread, but it is not isolated. In addition, during the occupation, there is a rapid replacement of textbooks with ideologically "correct" ones. However, significant differences in the educational policies of the German and Russian occupiers are also emphasized: the Germans primarily opposed Soviet ideology, while the Russians openly oppose Ukrainian culture, language, and Ukrainians in general, which leads to genocide and linguocide. The historical context of the occupation is also important, because the events that took place in the first half of the twentieth century are practically repeated almost a hundred years later, when liberalism and democracy prevail in Europe.

ПРАВОПИСНА ТА ЛЕКСИЧНА ВАРІЯНТНІСТЬ У ПУБЛІЦИСТИЦІ ПЕРІОДУ ДРУГОЇ СВІТОВОЇ ВІЙНИ (НА МАТЕРІЯЛІ ГРАКУ)

The article examines the cases of correlation between language standardization and ideology. The theoretical part of the study explores the history of the Ukranian spelling establishment. Then, the subcorpora of German, Soviet and underground periodicals have been created in General Regionally Annotated Corpus of the Ukrainian Language. In the practical part of the paper, an analysis of language norm variation in newspapers of different political orientation published during the Second World War in the General Regionally Annotated Corpus of the Ukrainian Language has been carried out, and the influence of ideology on the formation of language norms has been traced. The analysis concerns some phonetic and morphological peculiarities of the Ukrainian language. It was found that the German occupation newspapers and underground newspapers of OUN-UPA gravitate towards the Spelling of 1928, although some variability can be traced, and the Soviet ones gravitate towards the Spelling of 1933. It was established that the choice of a variant depended on the political orientation of the publication. At the lexical level, Soviet periodicals gravitate towards foreign words, while German and underground periodicals again show different tendencies.

“In Search of Special Sensations”: Moïse (Maurice) Zekri's Disorderly Life between Algeria and France (1879–1942)

Abstract This article presents the biography of a little-known Algerian Jew, Moïse (Maurice) Zekri (1879–1942), whose life illuminates several themes not normally associated with Algerian Jewry or French colonial history. An immigrant to Paris who opened one of the city's first gay venues, Maurice's Bar, in 1906, he also contributed to the rise of international organized crime in Montmartre, a development more commonly attributed to Corsicans. While based in Paris, Zekri traveled widely (to England, Belgium, Italy, Argentina, and the United States) and maintained close ties with Algeria, where he returned periodically. His social and professional circles included a diverse cohort of people ethnically and religiously, but his Jewish roots defined the end of his life. During the German Occupation of France, he was deported from his Paris home to Drancy, and in 1942, he was murdered in Auschwitz.

Informative, Ideological and Didactic Role of the Occupation Press in Accustoming Ukrainians to Life Under the New Order (Based on the Material of Local Periodicals of the Sumy Region in 1942–1943)

The Ukrainian present is focusing researchers’ attention on military topics. Interest in the study of the Second World War has especially increased, which gives reason to say that this period has been reactualized in national historical studies. The comprehension of the economic life in the context of the current hard times has encouraged the authoress of the submitted article to look at the studied problems through the lens of the past. In particular, the work is aimed at the searching and studying a collection of local magazines published during the German occupation in one of the regions. First of all, the task is to monitor information in propaganda periodicals related directly or indirectly to the economic system of the occupied territories. As a result of scientific research and analysis, the materials have been selected according to their form and content and grouped into four separate blocks. The first one includes administrative materials typical for the occupation press, through which the Hitler regime has regulated various spheres of economic activity of Ukrainians. The second block is formed with the published works covering the current situation in many sectors of the economy in a propaganda style, calling for compliance with a particular model of economic behavior. The third block contains articles by specialized experts who give practical advice to the public on how to run a personal peasant household. The fourth block includes actually short motivational texts used to direct the local population to live under the new order. Grouping the materials in this way and studying their content, among other things, have allowed us to trace how local newspapers performed several functions simultaneously during the German occupation: informative, ideological, and didactic. It is found that these media have covered a rather wide range of the Ukrainian economic system, but because of their ideological nature, the interpretation of the relevant content should a priori take into account the context of the social and political life of the time.

Reflections of Social Issues in Lithuanian Ober Ost Periodicals Published During The First World War

This article presents a discussion of the perception and reflection of the so-called ‘social question’ or ‘social problems’ in Lithuanian Ober Ost periodicals during the First World War. The time of this war acts as a natural bridge between two different periods, where the prewar Lithuanian context was noted to have an exclusively public discourse on social issues, while as the war was ending, the foundations started being laid for social security policy in the hands of the Lithuanian state. Despite this, the war years in Lithuania, and especially the period under German occupation, have been poorly researched in terms of social issues. First of all, it is important to ascertain how (or whether) prewar social issues were reflected among Lithuanians under the German occupation, how this population related to the new problems of the war years, and generally speaking, what the prewar social discourse tendencies (or even the fate of the social discourse) under the new circumstances were. The specifics of the German occupation, primarily the total mind control of society, coupled with unprecedented censorship, determined that these questions will be discussed on the basis of the Lithuanian periodical press in particular. Ever since the first three Lithuanian periodicals started being published at the end of 1917, it has been more or less possible to identify the coverage of particular rubrics and topics, their differences, and their tendencies in the sphere of social issues. At first, the social discourse unfolded in these periodicals very cautiously and modestly, but after the lifting of censorship restrictions on 15 October 1918, the situation changed markedly. By the end of 1918, publications were already competing against each other in terms of their coverage of topics and the openness of their opinions. Social topics in these publications became differentiated and structured, with independent discourses standing out according to different spheres, e.g. on issues such as land reform and the situation of workers.

‘Ein Querschnitt durch Flandern’. The ‘anti-Belgian’ image of Flanders in Friedrich Markus Huebner’s Flamisches Novellenbuch (1918)

ABSTRACT In April 1918, the Leipzig publishing house Insel released its Flämisches Novellenbuch, curated by the literary translator and art critic, Friedrich Markus Huebner. This anthology of contemporary Flemish literature, which promised its readers a literary tour of ‘real-life’ Flanders, was part of a much larger number of translations sponsored by the German occupier during the First World War in Belgium. This article explores the image of Flanders that was propagated by Huebner in service of the German cultural propaganda, with a focus on its anti-Belgian undertones. Huebner’s selection of short stories seems to represent Flanders as a poor, unfulfilled and rural nation, systematically oppressed by the Belgian state. In this regard, the anthology seamlessly aligns itself with the rhetorical strategy deployed by the German occupation administration – a narrative that casted the Belgian state as the true oppressor, while positioning the Germans as loyal allies and benevolent protectors of the Flemings.

Lviv Under the Soviets (1939-1941): Students, Refugees and Deportees

The Soviet aggression against Poland at the outbreak of the Second World War resulted in the annexation of more than 50% of the pre-war Polish territory to the Soviet Union, with the rest occupied by Germany. With a focus on western Ukraine, the initial period of Soviet rule is reviewed in the context of the German-Soviet geopolitical alliance, the troubled history of inter-ethnic relations, and the changes imposed by the regime. The situation at Lviv University illustrates the shift from Polish to Soviet sovereignty. In the autumn of 1939, with the earlier antisemitic policies lifted, many Jews applied for admission to the university under Soviet control. The university files show how the political changes were perceived at the time. They also highlight the influx of refugees escaping the German occupation in the rest of Poland. On a broader level, Soviet policies introduced contradictions that had a negative impact on all ethnic groups within the annexed territory. Even though the Soviets granted the right to citizenship to Polish citizens under their control, the regime unleashed systematic repressions. Removed from key positions, Poles were targeted by Soviet propaganda and the security apparatus. Despite a façade of Ukrainization, local Ukrainians were distrusted and their pre-war leaders persecuted. Jews were generally relieved that they had escaped falling under the Nazis. While some of them gained access to higher education and positions in the civil administration, many others were arrested and deported to labour camps, because of their pre-war political affiliations, ‘undesirable’ class distinctions, and refugee status.

The Concept of the Serbian Peasant Cooperative State

The paper introduces and interprets the corporatist plan of organizing and establishing the ‘Serbian Peasant Cooperative State,’ which was developed by the collaborationist authorities in Serbia during World War II. Born out of deep disillusionment with interwar parliamentarism and under the influence of the German occupation system in Serbia, this unrealized concept of state organization was an ultra-conservative response to the political conditions in occupied Serbia, as well as one of the aspects of its planned integration into Hitler’s new imperial order founded on the premise of Nazi hegemony and known as ‘New Europe.’ The present analysis is based on the limited number of surviving primary historical sources that testify to the genesis and character of the draft proposal. To provide context for interpreting the plan and the thinking behind it, the paper extends the chronological framework to the entire interwar period.

The Epoch that Did Not Happen. The Poem of the Perished and Its Relationship to History

It is difficult to exclude the expression of socialist realism in Lithuanian literature because of a deep coup d’état of intellectual values caused after the Soviets occupied Lithuania in 1940, in a System collapsing and masking political facts. Then, a year later, when the German occupation started, all the horrors of the Soviet occupation revealed their reality, the grip of censorship fell, and a call to the nation began... At that time, Vincas Mykolaitis-Putinas (1893-1967) created a poem which would become a great historical exception from the poetry of the Soviet era, which, after the return of the Red Army in 1944 “folded its wings” against propaganda and censorship legitimising the occupation, and against the introduction of the dogma of socialist realism in literature. The fate of Putinas’ poem became exceptional, breaking destinies by circulating in the underground and remaining anonymous, as the author could not name himself for the sake of survival in literature, spreading from the partisans’ movement to the American Lithuanian press. It is worth taking note of three factors: a) the relevance of the courage of the poem’s insights, which are constantly reborn at the non-end of the story; b) the controversy of the relationship between the poem and the author in the era of “socialist realism” and the uncertainty of that era, which penetrated even the life of a famous writer, fearing the openness of historical truth, c) significance of the creation date of the poem “Vivos plango. Mortuos voco” (1943), its spontaneous spread, concealment of authorship and the circumstances of its returned relevance in the present, which speak of its phenomenon, overshadowing the ineffectiveness of the “socialist realism” introduced by the Soviets in the context of Lithuanian literature.

The fate of ancestors living in the countryside in family accounts and in-home archives. The “My Family” Project implemented in 2022 by students of the Institute of History of the Jan Kochanowski University in Kielce

The present article contains an introduction (describing problems in the study of microhistory and distinguishing groups interested in these types of considerations), the characteristics of interviews and written papers and the conclusions drawn from them. The basis for its creation was the “My Family” Project, consisting of three elements: students’ written papers, a recording of an interview with a family member (preferably a grandmother or grandfather) and a presentation at a conference. The project was carried out in the summer semester of 2022 with second-year B.A. students at the Institute of History of the Jan Kochanowski University in Kielce as part of “The historian’s research methods” classes. Students involved in this initiative also took part in a conference entitled “My Family as an Archival Source” (as part of the “Meetings with an Archival Source” series), which took place on September 28, 2022. A report on this event was written by one of the students participating in the project. The first part of the project consisted of student interviews with family members. Parents and grandparents discussed topics such as the history of their ancestors, the years of German and Soviet occupation, and everyday life. The representatives of the older generation focused on telling about their experience of World War II in small towns of today’s Świętokrzyskie province, while the students’ parents discussed the dull reality of the Polish People’s Republic. The interviews concerning the occupation period were emotional; they show the savagery of the Germans murdering Polish ­civilians and indicate that historians have not yet worked through this issue. Students’ papers deal with the unique history of their ancestors. The topics discussed in them mainly concern the fate of the authors’ great-grandparents and grandparents. The texts describe the realities of Kielce villages during World War II, as well as the hardships of everyday life. The overwhelming majority of the ancestors of the students participating in the project lived in the countryside, having peasant or landowning origins. The article ends with conclusions presented by students during the discussion summarizing the project. Student papers can encourage readers to research their family’s past. Every history student should know the history of their family.

Antisemitism without Jews: the Impact of Redemptive Antisemitism in Norway before the Nazi Occupation

ABSTRACT In his magnus opus Nazi Germany and the Jews (1997), Saul Friedländer identifies redemptive antisemitism as a model of world explanation, which offers a universal answer to all alleged problems of modern society, such as capitalism, communism, liberalism and cultural, social and biological decline. Its core element is the perception of history and politics as a struggle against the Jews and their alleged world conspiracy. Consequently, Friedländer considers redemptive antisemitism the major ideological precondition for the Holocaust. Apart from the local arrangements of the Norwegian occupation regime (1940–1945), we argue that it was the specifically aggressive form of redemptive antisemitism that provided the ideological basis for the Holocaust. Building on Friedländer’s conceptualization, we define the phenomenon as consisting of three main elements: 1) Dualism and Demonisation, 2) Conspiracism and Intentionalism and 3) Apocalypticism and Palingenesis. By using three Norwegian case studies – articles and books of the radical antisemites Eivind Saxlund, Mikael Sylten and Halldis Neegaard Østbye – we demonstrate how a marginal phenomenon, due to changed circumstances and its transferability, became crucial during the German occupation. Our source material shows the potential for violence and the totality of redemptive antisemitism and underscores the impact of conspiracy beliefs on society.

Folkloristika Tartu ülikoolis 1941–1944: eriala järjepidevuse küsimus

The article looks at the teaching of folklore at the University of Tartu during World War II and the German occupation. It covers three academic years, from the autumn of 1941 to the spring of 1944. In previous studies, the period under review has been presented as a disruption: these years were either ignored altogether or described as an aberration in the development of the Soviet university. Yet it is noticeable that, when discussing the contribution of scholars whose professional biography also covers this period, their work is presented in the context of years, not political periods. All three approaches are characterised by the ideology of an authoritarian state: if research done during the German occupation was spoken of positively, it could be interpreted as anti-Soviet. Therefore, this topic – the everyday life of the University of Tartu during the German occupation and the war – is expected to become relevant. The gap in knowledge needs filling. Was there any activity in folklore at all during this period? The Chair of Folklore was established at the University of Tartu in 1919, when the Estonian-language university was opened. In the Tsarist era (1802–1917), studying the Estonian language and culture was possible in lectureship courses only. Jaan Jõgever (1860–1924) systematically taught folklore as part of the lectureship course from 1909. In 1919, Jaan Jõgever became the dean of the Faculty of Philosophy and one of the leading architects of the structure of the chairs of the Estonian language, culture and history at the university. Walter Anderson (1885–1962), an alumnus of Kazan University, who was already internationally renowned, was invited to the post of professor of folklore. In parallel, courses in Estonian folklore were taught by M. J. Eisen (1857–1934), who had previously worked as a pastor but, as a folklore collector, was a good expert on Estonian folklore. After Eisen died and Anderson left Tartu (in the course of the Umsiedlung in 1939), three alumni of the Estonian-language university engaged in teaching: Oskar Loorits (1900–1961), Elmar Päss (1901–1970), and the literary scholar August Annist (1899–1972). Elmar Päss moved to Tallinn at the end of the 1930s. Oskar Loorits, who was also the director of the Estonian Folklore Archives, became in charge of the chair. Due to conflict with the German occupation authorities, he could not continue working at the university at the end of 1942. However, folklore-related activities at the university continued: literary scholar August Annist delivered lectures and gave examinations in the specialisation. In autumn 1944, when the Soviet university reopened, Eduard Laugaste became the head of the Chair of Folklore. Annist continued as a lecturer of literature but was arrested in the early summer of 1945 and spent the next six years as a political prisoner. After he was released, he did not return to the university. This excursus reveals that, despite favourable and unfavourable circumstances, the teaching of folklore at the university that had started in 1909 was not discontinued during the war. However, it also shows that in the first half of the 20th century the government’s role was decisive in shaping the independence of the discipline by establishing the institutions. Today, it is important to analyse the development of the discipline, considering the interactions between the state, the institutions and the researcher(s), to gain a complete picture.

Wokół Polen-Denkmal. Rozbieżności w polskiej i niemieckiej pamięci o ofiarach II wojny światowej

On 15 November 2017, the Bundestag received an appeal to erect a monument in honour of Poles, commemorating Polish victims of the German occupation in 1939–1945. The initiative triggered a serious debate in Germany on the importance of Polish victims and their possible uniqueness. The article aims to analyse the arguments used in the discussion about Polen-Denkmal and to look at the significant differences in the perception of the history of World War II by Poles and Germans. The discrepancies result not only from the victim–perpetrator dichotomy, but also from their different approaches to the role of history, the nation-state and additionally to the state of knowledge. The article is based on an analysis of arguments in the intra-German and Polish-German debates, as well as data concerning research on the knowledge of Germans about the victims of World War II.

Military operations during the German occupation of Ilirska Bistrica and its surroundings during the Second World War

Between 1918 and 1946, the area of present-day Ilirska Bistrica fell under the Kingdom of Italy; Italy’s capitulation in September 1943 was followed by the period of the German occupation. Due to its geostrategic position on the rail and road junction between Postojna and Rijeka, Ilirska Bistrica had an important military role and hence a strong garrison. Whereas initially, the latter was only composed of German units, starting with 1944, the area also witnessed the arrival of the members of the Slovenian National Defence Corps and finally also the members of the Serbian Volunteer Corps and the Četnik Dinara Division. The presence of these forces prevented the Partisans from launching a direct attack on Ilirska Bistrica, which therefore only witnessed major battles in the very last month of the war.

The leading personnel of the German Police apparatus in Kyiv, 1941–1943

On September 29–30, 1941, the mass shooting of the predominantly Jews in Babyn Yar was carried out by execution teams consisting of members of Sonderkommando 4a and the 45th (reserve) and 303rd police battalions assigned to help. Members of Ukrainian police were engaged in sorting the belongings of the dead and other auxiliary functions. As a result, up to 34,000 Jews were killed in two days. Historians have already established the biographies of the main perpetrators involved in these shootings. However, the killings did not end there. Jews, POW’s, communists, members of the Soviet and OUN underground, as well as ordinary citizens were executed throughout the entire German occupation of Kyiv. The main perpetrators of mass violence belonged to the SS und Polizei apparatus. Nevertheless, the issue of responsible institutions and their personnel remains unsolved. That is why the author of the article aims to highlight the personnel of two main German institutions — the Ordnungspolizei, and Sicherheitspolizei, and SD.

Il destino delle opere d’arte di proprietà ebraica sotto la Repubblica Sociale Italiana

Abstract This paper examines the circumstances and mechanisms of the seizure of Jewish-owned artworks and valuables in Italy after the tightening of the racial laws under the Republic of Salò, focusing on Venice as an exemplary case study. Through specific instances, it illustrates the procedures for confiscating and exploiting artworks in the Venice area, highlighting the relations between the executive Fascist power and the German occupation forces. In particular, the analysis tackles the involvement of the antiquarian trade as well as the significant role of the Superintendent of Venice, Vittorio Moschini (1896–1976) in securing Jewish-owned artworks for Venetian museums. The paper concludes with comments on the need for a historical revision of the events and argues that, in light of its absence in Italy since the Washington Principles, there is an urgent need to establish provenance research in Italy.