Deutschlandlied
| English: The Song of the Germans | |
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Facsimile of Hoffmann von Fallersleben's manuscript of "Das Lied der Deutschen" | |
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National anthem of Germany | |
| Also known as |
Deutschlandlied English: The Song of Germany Deutschland über alles English: Germany above all |
| Lyrics | August Heinrich Hoffmann von Fallersleben, 1841 |
| Music | Joseph Haydn, 1797 |
| Adopted | 1922 |
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| Music sample | |
| "Deutschlandlied" (instrumental) | |
The "Deutschlandlied" ("Song of Germany", German pronunciation: [ˈdɔʏtʃlantˌliːt]; also known as "Das Lied der Deutschen" or "The Song of the Germans"), or part of it, has been the national anthem of Germany since 1922, except in East Germany, whose anthem was "Auferstanden aus Ruinen" ("Risen from Ruins") from 1949 to 1990.
Since World War II and the fall of Nazi Germany, only the third stanza has been used as the national anthem. The stanza's beginning, "Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit" ("Unity and Justice and Freedom") is considered the unofficial national motto of Germany,[1] and are inscribed on modern German Army belt buckles and the rims of some German coins.
The music was written by Austrian composer Joseph Haydn in 1797 as an anthem for the birthday of Austrian Emperor Francis II (1792–1806). In 1841, the German linguist and poet August Heinrich Hoffmann von Fallersleben wrote the lyrics of "Das Lied der Deutschen" to Haydn's melody, lyrics that were considered revolutionary at the time.
The song is also well known by the beginning and refrain of the first stanza, "Deutschland, Deutschland über alles" (literally, "Germany, Germany above all"), but this has never been its title. The line "Germany, Germany above all" meant that the most important goal of 19th-century German liberal revolutionaries should be a unified Germany which would overcome the perceived anti-liberal ethos of then-fragmented Germany (Kleinstaaterei). Along with the Flag of Germany, it was one of the symbols of the March Revolution of 1848.
In order to endorse its republican and liberal tradition, the song was chosen as the national anthem of Germany in 1922, during the Weimar Republic. West Germany adopted the "Deutschlandlied" as its official national anthem in 1952 for similar reasons, with only the third stanza sung on official occasions. Upon German reunification in 1990, only the third stanza was confirmed as the national anthem.
Melody
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The melody of the "Deutschlandlied" was originally written by Joseph Haydn in 1797 to provide music to the poem "Gott erhalte Franz den Kaiser" ("God save Franz the Emperor") by Lorenz Leopold Haschka. The song was a birthday anthem honouring Francis II (1768–1835), Habsburg emperor of Austria, and was intended as a parallel to the British "God Save the King".
It has been conjectured that Haydn took the first four measures of the melody from a Croatian folk song. Supporters of this theory note that a similar melody appears in a composition by Telemann.[2] This hypothesis has never achieved unanimous agreement; the alternative theory is that Haydn's original tune was adapted from a folk song.
The same melody was later used by Haydn as the basis for the second movement (poco adagio cantabile) of his Opus 76 No. 3, a string quartet, often called the "Emperor" or "Kaiser" quartet. The melody in this movement is also termed the "Emperor's Hymn."
Historical background
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Deutschlandlied
 Vocal (3 stanzas) |
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The Holy Roman Empire, stemming from the Middle Ages, was already disintegrating when the French Revolution and the ensuing Napoleonic Wars altered the political map of Central Europe. However, hopes for the Enlightenment, human rights and republican government after Napoleon I's defeat in 1815 were dashed when the Congress of Vienna reinstated many small German principalities. In addition, with the Carlsbad Decrees of 1819, Austrian Chancellor Klemens von Metternich and his secret police enforced censorship, mainly in universities, to keep a watch on the activities of teachers and students, whom he held responsible for the spread of radical liberalist ideas. Since reactionaries among the monarchs were the main adversaries, demands for freedom of the press and other liberal rights were most often uttered in connection with the demand for a united Germany, even though many revolutionaries-to-be had different opinions about whether a republic or a constitutional monarchy would be the best solution for Germany.
The German Confederation (Deutscher Bund – 1815–1866) was a loose federation of 35 monarchical states and four republican free cities, with a Federal Assembly in Frankfurt. They began to remove internal customs barriers during the Industrial Revolution, and the German Customs Union (Zollverein) was formed among the majority of the states in 1834. In 1840 Hoffmann wrote a song about the Zollverein, also to Haydn's melody, in which he praised the free trade of German goods which brought Germans and Germany closer.[3]
After the 1848 March Revolution, the German Confederation handed over its authority to the Frankfurt Parliament, and the Kingdom of Prussia joined the Confederation. For a short period in the late 1840s, Germany was economically united with the borders described in the anthem, and a democratic constitution was being drafted, and with the black-red-gold flag representing it. However, after 1849 the two largest German monarchies, Prussia and Austria, put an end to this liberal movement toward national unification.
Hoffmann's lyrics
August Heinrich Hoffmann (who called himself Hoffmann von Fallersleben after his home town to distinguish himself from others with the same common name of "Hoffmann") wrote the text in 1841 on holiday on the North Sea island of Heligoland, then a possession of the United Kingdom (now part of Germany).
Hoffmann von Fallersleben intended "Das Lied der Deutschen" to be sung to Haydn's tune, as the first publication of the poem included the music. The first line, "Deutschland, Deutschland über alles, über alles in der Welt" (usually translated into English as "Germany, Germany above all, above all in the world"), was an appeal to the various German monarchs to give the creation of a united Germany a higher priority than the independence of their small states. In the third stanza, with a call for "Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit" (unity and justice and freedom), Hoffmann expressed his desire for a united and free Germany where the rule of law, not monarchical arbitrariness, would prevail.[4]
In the era after the Congress of Vienna, influenced by Metternich and his secret police, Hoffmann's text had a distinctly revolutionary and at the same time liberal connotation, since the appeal for a united Germany was most often made in connection with demands for freedom of the press and other civil rights. Its implication that loyalty to a larger Germany should replace loyalty to one's local sovereign was then a revolutionary idea.
The year after he wrote "Das Deutschlandlied", Hoffmann lost his job as a librarian and professor in Breslau, Prussia (now Wrocław, Poland), because of this and other revolutionary works, and was forced into hiding until being pardoned after the revolutions of 1848 in the German states.
Lyrics and translation
The following provides the lyrics of the "Lied der Deutschen" as written by Hoffmann von Fallersleben.
Only the third stanza is currently the Federal Republic of Germany's national anthem.[5]
Deutschland, Deutschland über alles, |
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Deutsche Frauen, deutsche Treue, |
German women, German loyalty, |
Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit |
Unity and justice and freedom |
Note: The last two lines, between the repeat signs of |: and :|, are repeated once when sung.
Use before 1933
The melody of the "Deutschlandlied" was originally written by Joseph Haydn in 1797 to provide music to the poem "Gott erhalte Franz den Kaiser" ("God save Franz the Emperor") by Lorenz Leopold Haschka. The song was a birthday anthem to Francis II, Holy Roman Emperor of the House of Habsburg, and was intended to rival in merit the British "God Save the King".
After the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806, "Gott erhalte Franz den Kaiser" became the official anthem of the emperor of the Austrian Empire and the subsequent Austro-Hungarian Empire, until the end of the Austrian monarchy in 1918. The first line of the anthem changed with the name of each new emperor until 1918. Austrian monarchists continued to use this anthem after 1918 in the hope of restoring the monarchy. The adoption of the Austrian anthem's meolody by Germany in 1922 was not opposed by Austria.
"Das Lied der Deutschen" was not played at an official ceremony until Germany and the United Kingdom had agreed on the Heligoland–Zanzibar Treaty in 1890, when it appeared only appropriate to sing it at the ceremony on the now officially German island of Heligoland. During the time of the German Empire it became one of the most widely known patriotic songs.
The song became very popular after the 1914 Battle of Langemarck during World War I, when, supposedly, several German regiments, consisting mostly of students no older than 16, attacked the British lines singing the song, suffering heavy casualties. They are buried in the Langemark German war cemetery. The official report of the army embellished the event as one of young German soldiers heroically sacrificing their lives for the Fatherland. In reality the untrained troops were sent out to attack the British trenches and were mown down by machine guns and rifle fire. This report, also known as the "Langemarck Myth", was printed on the first page in newspapers all over Germany. It is doubtful whether the soldiers would have sung the song in the first place: carrying heavy equipment, they might have found it difficult to run at high speed toward enemy lines while singing the slow song. Nonetheless, the story was widely repeated.[6]
The melody used by the "Deutschlandlied" was still in use as the anthem of the Austrian Empire until the demise of the latter in 1918. On 11 August 1922, German President Friedrich Ebert, a Social Democrat, made the Deutschlandlied the official German national anthem. In 1919 the black, red, and gold tricolour, the colours of the 19th century liberal revolutionaries advocated by the political left and centre, was adopted (rather than the previous black, white, and red of Imperial Germany). Thus, in a political trade-off, the conservative right was granted a nationalistic anthem — though Ebert advocated using only the anthem's third stanza (which was done after World War II).[5]
Use during Nazi rule
During the Nazi era, only the first stanza was used, followed by the SA song "Horst-Wessel-Lied".[7] The anthem was played at occasions of great national significance such as the opening of the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin when Hitler and his entourage, along with Olympic officials, walked into the stadium amid a chorus of three thousand Germans singing "Deutschland, Deutschland über alles". In this way, the first verse of the anthem became closely identified with the Nazi regime.[8]
Use after World War II
After the Second World War ended in 1945, singing "Das Lied der Deutschen" was banned along with symbols of Nazi Germany by the Allies.
After its founding in 1949, West Germany did not have a national anthem for official events for some years despite the growing need for proper diplomatic procedures. Different musical compositions were discussed or used, such as the fourth movement of Ludwig van Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, which is a musical setting of Friedrich von Schiller's poem "An die Freude" ("Ode To Joy"). Though the black, red and gold colours of the national flag had been incorporated into Article 22 of the (West) German constitution, a national anthem was not specified. On 29 April 1952, Chancellor Konrad Adenauer asked President Theodor Heuss in a letter to accept "Das Lied der Deutschen" as the national anthem, with only the third stanza being sung on official occasions. President Heuss agreed to this on 2 May 1952. This exchange of letters was published in the Bulletin of the Federal Government. Since it was viewed as the traditional right of the President as head of state to set the symbols of the state, the "Deutschlandlied" thus became the national anthem.[9]
Meanwhile, East Germany adopted its own national anthem, "Auferstanden aus Ruinen" ("Risen from Ruins"). As the lyrics of this anthem called for "Germany, united Fatherland", they were no longer officially used after the DDR abandoned its goal of uniting Germany under Communism. (With slight adaptions, the lyrics of "Auferstanden aus Ruinen" can be sung to the melody of the "Deutschlandlied" and vice versa.)
When West Germany won the 1954 FIFA World Cup Final in Bern, Switzerland, the lyrics of the first stanza dominated when the crowd sang along to celebrate the surprise victory that was later dubbed Miracle of Bern.
In the 1970s and '80s, efforts were made by conservatives in Germany to reclaim all three stanzas for the anthem. The Christian Democratic Union of Baden-Württemberg, for instance, attempted twice (in 1985 and 1986) to require German high school students to study all three stanzas, and in 1989 CDU politician Christean Wagner decreed that all high school students in Hesse were to memorise the three stanzas.[10]
On 7 March 1990, months before reunification, the Constitutional Court declared only the third stanza of Hoffmann's poem to be legally protected as a national anthem under German law; Section 90a of the Criminal Code (Strafgesetzbuch) makes defamation of the national anthem a crime — but does not specify what the national anthem is.[11]
In November 1991, President Richard von Weizsäcker and Chancellor Helmut Kohl agreed in an exchange of letters to declare the third stanza alone the national anthem of the enlarged republic.[12] On official occasions, Haydn's music is used, and only the third stanza is sung.
The opening line of the third stanza, "Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit" ("Unity and Justice and Freedom"), is widely considered to be the national motto of Germany, although it was never officially proclaimed as such. It appears on Bundeswehr soldiers' belt buckles (replacing the earlier "Gott mit uns" ("God with Us") of the Imperial German Army and the Nazi-era Wehrmacht). "Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit" appeared on the rim of 2- and 5-Deutsche Mark coins, and is present on 2-Euro coins minted in Germany.
Criticisms
Geographical
The geographical references of the first verse (no longer sung) of "Deutschlandlied", which names three rivers and one strait — (the Meuse, Adige, and Neman (known as the Memel in German) Rivers and the Little Belt strait — as the boundaries of what the author viewed as Deutschtum, have been variously criticized as irredentist or misleading.[13] Of these, only the Belt (strait) and the Neman once were actual boundaries of Germany (the Belt until 1920, the Neman until 1945), whereas the Meuse and Adige were not. Today, no part of any of the four places mentioned in the "Deutschlandlied" lies in Germany.
In an ethnic sense, none of these places formed a distinct ethnic border. The Duchy of Schleswig-Holstein (to which the Belt refers) was inhabited by both Germans and, in the north, Danes, with the Danes forming a clear majority near the strait. Around the Adige there was a mix of German speakers and Italian speakers, and the area around the Neman was not homogeneously German, but also accommodated Lithuanians. The Meuse (if taken as referencing the Duchy of Limburg, nominally part of the looseknit 19th-century German Confederation), was ethnically Dutch with few Germans.
Nevertheless, such nationalistic rhetoric was relatively common in 19th-century public discourse. For example: Georg Herwegh in his poem "The German Fleet" (1841), gives the Germans as the people "between the Po and the Sund (Øresund)," and in 1832 Philipp Jakob Siebenpfeiffer, a noted journalist, declared at the Hambach Festival that he considered all "between the Alps and the North Sea" to be Deutschtum.[14] Since nowadays only the third stanza constitutes the official German anthem, the lyrics containing the outdated geographic references are never sung ceremonially.
Textual
Despite the text and tune of the song being quite peaceful compared to some other national anthems, the song has frequently been criticised for its generally nationalistic tone, the immodest geographic definition of Germany given in the first stanza, and the alleged male-chauvinistic attitude in the second stanza.[15][16] An early critic was Friedrich Nietzsche, who called the grandiose claim in the first stanza ("Deutschland über alles") "die blödsinnigste Parole der Welt" (the most ridiculous slogan in the world), and in Thus Spoke Zarathustra said, "Deutschland, Deutschland über alles — I fear that was the end of German philosophy."[15] The pacifist Kurt Tucholsky was also negative about the song, and in 1929 published a photo book sarcastically titled Deutschland, Deutschland über alles, criticising right-wing groups in Germany.
German grammar distinguishes between über alles i.e. above everything (for me), and über allen, meaning "above everyone else." However, the latter misleading translation was chosen by the Allies during the First World War for propaganda purposes.[17]
Variants, additions, and controversial performances
Additional or alternative stanzas
Hoffmann von Fallersleben also intended the text to be used as a drinking song; the second stanza's toast to German women and wine are typical of this genre. The original Heligoland manuscript included a variant ending of the third stanza for such occasions:
Einigkeit und Recht und Freiheit |
Unity and justice and freedom |
An alternative version called "Kinderhymne" (Children's Hymn) was written by Bertolt Brecht shortly after his return from American exile to a war-ravaged, bankrupt and geographically smaller Germany at the end of World War II. It gained some currency after the 1990 unification of Germany, with a number of prominent Germans opting for his "antihymn" to be made official:[18]
Anmut sparet nicht noch Mühe |
Grace spare not and spare no labour |
Notable performances and covers
The Unitarian Universalist hymnbook published in 1993, Singing the Living Tradition contains two versions of Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's "Light of Ages and of Nations"; the second hymn (#190) is sung to the tune of the Emperor's Hymn, labelled as "Austria". John Newton's hymn "Glorious Things of Thee Are Spoken" has, among others, been set to Haydn's melody.
The German musician Nico sometimes performed the national anthem at concerts and dedicated it to militant Andreas Baader, leader of the Red Army Faction.[19] She included a version of "Das Lied der Deutschen" on her 1973 album The End.... In 2006, the Slovenian "industrial" band Laibach incorporated Hoffmann's lyrics in a song titled "Germania", on the album Volk, which contains fourteen songs with adaptations of national anthems.[20][21] Performing the song in Germany in 2009, the band cited the first stanza in the closing refrain, while on a video screen images were shown of a German city bombed during World War II.[22]
In November 2009, the English singer Pete Doherty caused a stir when, live on Bayerischer Rundfunk in Munich, he sang the first stanza of the anthem; he was booed by the audience and after a few more songs the radio station pulled the plug on the show and the radio transmission.[23]
In August 2011, at the canoe sprint world championships in Hungary, Anne Knorr and Debora Nich won a gold medal for Germany in the 1000 metres K-2 women's final race. The organizers of the event caused outrage when they mistakenly played the first stanza of the anthem during the medal ceremony. In a subsequent television interview the German national coach Rainer Kiessler said that he was appalled and could not accept what had happened.[24][25]
In October 2011, on the US TV series Pan Am, the French stewardess Colette is in West Berlin when President John F. Kennedy delivers his 1963 "Ich bin ein Berliner" speech at the Berlin Wall. Attending a party at the US Mission that evening, she sings the controversial first verse of the "Deutschlandlied" slowly and emotionally, embarrassing the diplomats who she believes have been too quick to forgive and forget the events of World War II. Colette had been orphaned at the age of three when her parents died in Buchenwald, where they were sent by the Nazis.[26]
References
- ↑ The Complete Guide to National Symbols and Emblems, James Minahan, Google Books
- ↑ "Emperor's Hymn". Oxford Music Online. Oxford University Press. Retrieved 6 November 2011.
- ↑ "Schwefelhölzer, Fenchel, Bricken (Der deutsche Zollverein)". www.von-fallersleben.de (in German). Retrieved 27 June 2010.
- ↑ Bareth, Nadja (February 2005). "Staatssymbole Zeichen politischer Gemeinschaft". Blickpunt Bundestag (in German). Archived from the original on 2011-09-06. Retrieved 1 December 2009.
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 Geisler, Michael E. (2005). National symbols, fractured identities: Contesting the national narrative. UPNE. p. 70. ISBN 978-1-58465-437-7. Retrieved 2014-02-25.
- ↑ Mosse, George L. (1991). Fallen Soldiers: Reshaping the Memory of the World Wars. Oxford University Press. pp. 70–73. ISBN 978-0-19-507139-9. Retrieved 2014-02-25.
- ↑ Geisler, p.71.
- ↑ "The Triumph of Hitler". The History Place. 2001. Retrieved 9 September 2012.
- ↑ "Briefwechsel zur Nationalhymne 1952". Bundesministerium des Innern (in German). 6 May 1952. Retrieved 1 December 2009.
- ↑ Geisler, p.72.
- ↑ Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft (7 March 1990). "Case: BVerfGE 81, 298 1 BvR 1215/87 German National Anthem -decision". Institute for Transnational Law — Foreign Law Translations. The University of Texas School of Law. Retrieved 18 January 2015.
- ↑ Bundespräsidialamt. "Repräsentation und Integration" (in German). Retrieved 24 May 2013.
Nach Herstellung der staatlichen Einheit Deutschlands bestimmte Bundespräsident von Weizsäcker in einem Briefwechsel mit Bundeskanzler Helmut Kohl im Jahr 1991 die dritte Strophe zur Nationalhymne für das deutsche Volk.
- ↑ A History of Modern Germany: 1800 to the Present (2011) M. Kitchen.
- ↑ Music and German National Identity (2002) by C. Applegate. pp. 254
- ↑ 15.0 15.1 Malzahn, Claus Christian (24 June 2006). "Deutsche Nationalhymne: 'Die blödsinnigste Parole der Welt'". Der Spiegel (in German). Retrieved 1 December 2009.
- ↑ "Germans Stop Humming, Start Singing National Anthem". Deutsche Welle. 24 June 2006. Retrieved 2 March 2010.
- ↑ Ponsonby, Arthur (1928). Falsehood in War Time: Containing an Assortment of Lies Circulated Throughout the Nations During the Great War (Chapter 11). George Allen and Unwin, London. ISBN 1162798653.
- ↑ Geisler p. 75.
- ↑ Rockwell, John (21 February 1979). "Cabaret: Nico is back". The New York Times.
- ↑ Hesselmann, Markus (7 December 2006). "Völker, hört die Fanale!". Der Tagesspiegel (in German). Retrieved 1 December 2009.
- ↑ Schiller, Mike (6 December 2007). "Rev. of Laibach, Volk". PopMatters. Retrieved 1 December 2009.
- ↑ "Die slowenische Band Laibach stellte in der Arena ihr Album Volk vor". Märkische Allgemeine (in German). 21 July 2009. Retrieved 1 December 2009. (subscription required (help)).
- ↑ "Rockzanger Pete Doherty schoffeert Duitsers". Radio Netherlands Worldwide (in Dutch). 29 November 2009. Retrieved 1 December 2009.
- ↑ "Nazivolkslied op WK kajak". Het Nieuwsblad (in Dutch). 22 August 2011.
- ↑ "'Nazi anthem' played at canoe championship". Eurosport. 22 August 2011.
- ↑ "Ich Bin Ein Berliner". Pan Am. ABC. 9 October 2011. Archived from the original on 2011-12-13. Retrieved 22 November 2011.
External links
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Wikimedia Commons has media related to Das Lied der Deutschen. |
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Wikisource has original text related to this article: |
- National Anthem of the Federal Republic of Germany (third stanza) (MP3 sound file)
- German National Anthem at Federal Government homepage
- Audio of the "Deutschlandlied", with information and lyrics
- "Das Lied der Deutschen" at World Lieder
- "Das Lied der Deutschen" at Brandenburg Historica
- Das Kaiserlied: Scores at the International Music Score Library Project
- Singing of the German National Anthem during the official German Unity Day ceremony on 3 October 1990 (video)
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