THULE SOCIETY
Publié le 22/02/2012
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THULE SOCIETY (Thule Gesellschaft). Among the obscure threads that were
drawn together to form the NSDAP, few have gained more notice than the Thule
Society. Founded in Munich on 17 August 1918 by Rudolf von Sebottendorff
and Walter Nauhaus, it was initially a cover for the Germanen Orden, a racist
league whose Munich branch was founded in 1913. Seeking ‘‘German-blooded,
serious men of pure character,'' the Orden stressed its ‘‘Aryan-Germanic'' orientation,
espoused religious revival, and voiced an ‘‘inexorable hate for the
Jews'' and the need to exclude them from the Volksko¨rper (racial body politic).
Somewhat awkwardly, the Orden and the Thule Society maintained separate
existences in the Weimar era.
A small, if locally important, group, the Thule Society amassed a Bavarian
membership of about 1,500. Its members held overlapping membership in the
Germanen Orden, the Freikorps Oberland, the Deutschvo¨lkischer Schutz- und
Trutzbund (German Racial Defense and Offense League), the Deutschsozialistische
Partei (German Socialist Party), and the Deutsche Arbeiterpartei (predecessor
to the NSDAP). Thule held meetings and initiations, employing the
subterfuge in the revolutionary months of 1918–1919 of being a study group
for Germanic antiquity. On at least two occasions members of Thule vainly tried
to overthrow the regime of Kurt Eisner.* Seven members were captured and
murdered in late April 1919 by Munich's Ra¨terepublik; Rudolf Hess,* a society
member, was out dispensing anti-Communist tracts when his cohorts were
found.
The Thule Society was a conspiratorial club; its aim was the promotion of
anti-Semitic propaganda, and few of its members became active Nazis. Sebottendorff
was, nonetheless, notable for selling the NSDAP its major newspaper,*
the Vo¨lkischer Beobachter.* During the Weimar years the society became increasingly
inactive. When Hitler* seized power, it was momentarily revived by
Sebottendorff. It published a journal, the Thule-Bote, and its emphasis was social
and artistic. When its ‘‘old fighters'' refused to be reduced to a ‘‘social club,''
the society split and disappeared.
Liens utiles
- exposé anglais introduction to the Consumer Society
- Ultima Thule
- ÉCOLE ET SOCIÉTÉ ou ÉDUCATION ET SOCIÉTÉ, The School and Society, 1899. John Dewey
- ÉCOLE ET LA SOCIÉTÉ (L') [School and Society]. de John Dewey (résumé)
- Myth and society