Eugen Fischer (5 July 1874 – 9 July 1967) was a German professor of
medicine
Medicine is the science and practice of caring for a patient, managing the diagnosis, prognosis, prevention, treatment, palliation of their injury or disease, and promoting their health. Medicine encompasses a variety of health care pr ...
,
anthropology
Anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, concerned with human behavior, human biology, cultures, societies, and linguistics, in both the present and past, including past human species. Social anthropology studies patterns of be ...
, and
eugenics
Eugenics ( ; ) is a fringe set of beliefs and practices that aim to improve the genetic quality of a human population. Historically, eugenicists have attempted to alter human gene pools by excluding people and groups judged to be inferior o ...
, and a member of the
Nazi Party
The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported t ...
. He served as director of the
, and also served as rector of the
Frederick William University of Berlin.
Fischer's ideas informed the
Nuremberg Laws
The Nuremberg Laws (german: link=no, Nürnberger Gesetze, ) were antisemitic and racist laws that were enacted in Nazi Germany on 15 September 1935, at a special meeting of the Reichstag convened during the annual Nuremberg Rally of ...
of 1935 which served to justify the Nazi Party's belief in German racial superiority to other "races", and especially the Jews.
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Germany from 1933 until his death in 1945. He rose to power as the leader of the Nazi Party, becoming the chancellor in 1933 and the ...
read Fischer's work while he was imprisoned in 1923 and he used Fischer's
eugenic notions in support of a pure
Aryan society in his manifesto, ''
Mein Kampf
(; ''My Struggle'' or ''My Battle'') is a 1925 autobiographical manifesto by Nazi Party leader Adolf Hitler. The work describes the process by which Hitler became antisemitic and outlines his political ideology and future plans for Ge ...
'' (''My Struggle'').
Fischer was born in
Karlsruhe
Karlsruhe ( , , ; South Franconian: ''Kallsruh'') is the third-largest city of the German state (''Land'') of Baden-Württemberg after its capital of Stuttgart and Mannheim, and the 22nd-largest city in the nation, with 308,436 inhabitants. ...
,
Grand Duchy of Baden
The Grand Duchy of Baden (german: Großherzogtum Baden) was a state in the southwest German Empire on the east bank of the Rhine. It existed between 1806 and 1918.
It came into existence in the 12th century as the Margraviate of Baden and subs ...
, in 1874. He studied medicine,
folkloristics
Folklore studies, less often known as folkloristics, and occasionally tradition studies or folk life studies in the United Kingdom, is the branch of anthropology devoted to the study of folklore. This term, along with its synonyms, gained currenc ...
,
history
History (derived ) is the systematic study and the documentation of the human activity. The time period of event before the invention of writing systems is considered prehistory. "History" is an umbrella term comprising past events as well ...
,
anatomy
Anatomy () is the branch of biology concerned with the study of the structure of organisms and their parts. Anatomy is a branch of natural science that deals with the structural organization of living things. It is an old science, having i ...
, and anthropology in
Berlin
Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitu ...
,
Freiburg
Freiburg im Breisgau (; abbreviated as Freiburg i. Br. or Freiburg i. B.; Low Alemannic: ''Friburg im Brisgau''), commonly referred to as Freiburg, is an independent city in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. With a population of about 230,000 (as o ...
and
Munich
Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and ...
. In 1918, he joined the Anatomical Institute in Freiburg, part of the
University of Freiburg
The University of Freiburg (colloquially german: Uni Freiburg), officially the Albert Ludwig University of Freiburg (german: Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg), is a public research university located in Freiburg im Breisgau, Baden-Württemb ...
.
In 1927, Fischer became the director of the
(
KWI-A
The Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Anthropology, Human Heredity, and Eugenics was founded in 1927 in Berlin, Germany. The Rockefeller Foundation partially funded the actual building of the Institute and helped keep the Institute afloat during the Gr ...
), a role for which he'd been recommended the prior year by
Erwin Baur.
In 1933 Fischer signed the ''
''.
In 1933,
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Germany from 1933 until his death in 1945. He rose to power as the leader of the Nazi Party, becoming the chancellor in 1933 and the ...
appointed him rector of the
Frederick William University of Berlin, now
Humboldt University
Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (german: Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a German public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin. It was established by Frederick William III on the initiati ...
. Fischer retired from the university in 1942.
Otmar Freiherr von Verschuer was a student of Fischer.
After the war, he completed his memoirs, it is believed that in them he lessened his role in the
genocidal
Genocide is the intentional destruction of a people—usually defined as an ethnic, national, racial, or religious group—in whole or in part. Raphael Lemkin coined the term in 1944, combining the Greek word (, "race, people") with the L ...
programme of
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
. He died in 1967.
Early work
In 1906, Fischer conducted field research in
German South West Africa
German South West Africa (german: Deutsch-Südwestafrika) was a colony of the German Empire from 1884 until 1915, though Germany did not officially recognise its loss of this territory until the 1919 Treaty of Versailles. With a total area of ...
(now
Namibia
Namibia (, ), officially the Republic of Namibia, is a country in Southern Africa. Its western border is the Atlantic Ocean. It shares land borders with Zambia and Angola to the north, Botswana to the east and South Africa to the south and ea ...
). He studied the
Basters
The Basters (also known as Baasters, Rehobothers or Rehoboth Basters) are a Southern African ethnic group descended from white European men and black African women, usually of Khoisan origin, but occasionally also enslaved women from the Cape, ...
, offspring of
German
German(s) may refer to:
* Germany (of or related to)
**Germania (historical use)
* Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language
** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law
**Ge ...
or
Boer
Boers ( ; af, Boere ()) are the descendants of the Dutch-speaking Free Burghers of the eastern Cape frontier in Southern Africa during the 17th, 18th, and 19th centuries. From 1652 to 1795, the Dutch East India Company controlled this are ...
men and Black African (
Khoekhoe
Khoekhoen (singular Khoekhoe) (or Khoikhoi in the former orthography; formerly also '' Hottentots''"Hottentot, n. and adj." ''OED Online'', Oxford University Press, March 2018, www.oed.com/view/Entry/88829. Accessed 13 May 2018. Citing G. S. ...
) women in that area. His study concluded with a call to prevent the production of a "
mixed race
Mixed race people are people of more than one race or ethnicity. A variety of terms have been used both historically and presently for mixed race people in a variety of contexts, including ''multiethnic'', ''polyethnic'', occasionally ''bi-ethn ...
" by the prohibition of "
mixed marriages" such as those which he had studied. It included
human experimentation on the
Herero
Herero may refer to:
* Herero people
The Herero ( hz, Ovaherero) are a Bantu ethnic group inhabiting parts of Southern Africa. There were an estimated 250,000 Herero people in Namibia in 2013. They speak Otjiherero, a Bantu language. Though t ...
and
Namaqua people. He argued that while the existing "
Mischling" descendants of the mixed marriages might be useful for Germany, he recommended that they should not continue to reproduce. His recommendations were followed and by 1912 interracial marriage was prohibited throughout the German colonies.
[Friedlander 1997, p. 11] As a precursor to his experiments on Jews in Nazi Germany, he collected bones and skulls for his studies, in part from
medical experimentation on African prisoners of war in Namibia during the
Herero and Namaqua Genocide
The Herero and Namaqua genocide or the Herero and Nama genocide was a campaign of ethnic extermination and collective punishment waged by the German Empire against the Herero (Ovaherero) and the Nama in German South West Africa (now Namibia). I ...
.
His ideas which were related to the maintenance of the apparent purity of races, influenced future German Nazi legislation on race, including the
Nuremberg laws
The Nuremberg Laws (german: link=no, Nürnberger Gesetze, ) were antisemitic and racist laws that were enacted in Nazi Germany on 15 September 1935, at a special meeting of the Reichstag convened during the annual Nuremberg Rally of ...
.
In 1927, Fischer was a speaker at the
World Population Conference which was held in Geneva, Switzerland.
Nazi Germany
In the years from 1937–1938 Fischer and his colleagues analysed 600 children in
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
who were descended from French-African soldiers who occupied western areas of Germany after the
First World War
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...
and were known as the
Rhineland Bastards
Rhineland Bastard (german: Rheinlandbastard) was a derogatory term used in Nazi Germany to describe Afro-Germans, believed fathered by French Army personnel of African descent who were stationed in the Rhineland during its occupation by France ...
; the children were subsequently subjected to
sterilization
Sterilization may refer to:
* Sterilization (microbiology), killing or inactivation of micro-organisms
* Soil steam sterilization, a farming technique that sterilizes soil with steam in open fields or greenhouses
* Sterilization (medicine) rende ...
.
Fischer did not officially join the
Nazi Party
The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party (german: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei or NSDAP), was a far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported t ...
until 1940. However, he was influential with National Socialists early on. Adolf Hitler read his two-volume work, ''Principles of Human Heredity and Race Hygiene'' (first published in 1921 and co-written by
Erwin Baur and
Fritz Lenz) while incarcerated in 1923 and used its ideas in ''Mein Kampf''. He also authored ''The
Rehoboth Bastards and the Problem of
Miscegenation
Miscegenation ( ) is the interbreeding of people who are considered to be members of different races. The word, now usually considered pejorative, is derived from a combination of the Latin terms ''miscere'' ("to mix") and ''genus'' ("race") ...
among Humans'' (1913) (german: Die Rehobother Bastards und das Bastardierungsproblem beim Menschen), a field study which provided context for later racial debates, influenced German colonial legislation and apparently provided "scientific" support for the blatantly
racist
Racism is the belief that groups of humans possess different behavioral traits corresponding to inherited attributes and can be divided based on the superiority of one race over another. It may also mean prejudice, discrimination, or antagonism ...
and
anti-Semitic
Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism.
Antis ...
Nuremberg laws
The Nuremberg Laws (german: link=no, Nürnberger Gesetze, ) were antisemitic and racist laws that were enacted in Nazi Germany on 15 September 1935, at a special meeting of the Reichstag convened during the annual Nuremberg Rally of ...
.
[''Holocaust Encyclopedia'' p. 420.]
Under the Nazi regime, Fischer developed the physiological specifications such as skull dimensions which were apparently used to determine racial origins and he also developed the so-called
Fischer–Saller scale for
hair colour. He and the members of his team experimented on
Gypsies and
African-Germans, drawing their
blood
Blood is a body fluid in the circulatory system of humans and other vertebrates that delivers necessary substances such as nutrients and oxygen to the cells, and transports metabolic waste products away from those same cells. Blood in the cir ...
and measuring their
skull
The skull is a bone protective cavity for the brain. The skull is composed of four types of bone i.e., cranial bones, facial bones, ear ossicles and hyoid bone. However two parts are more prominent: the cranium and the mandible. In humans, th ...
s in order to scientifically validate his theories. After directing the
, he was succeeded by
Otmar Freiherr von Verschuer, who tutored
Josef Mengele
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when he was active at
Auschwitz
Auschwitz concentration camp ( (); also or ) was a complex of over 40 Nazi concentration camps, concentration and extermination camps operated by Nazi Germany in Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany, occupied Poland (in a portion annexed int ...
.
Efforts to return the Namibian skulls which were taken by Fischer were started with an investigation which was conducted by the
University of Freiburg
The University of Freiburg (colloquially german: Uni Freiburg), officially the Albert Ludwig University of Freiburg (german: Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg), is a public research university located in Freiburg im Breisgau, Baden-Württemb ...
in 2011 and they were completed with the return of the skulls in March 2014.
In 1944, Fischer intervened in an attempt to get his friend
Martin Heidegger
Martin Heidegger (; ; 26 September 188926 May 1976) was a German philosopher who is best known for contributions to phenomenology, hermeneutics, and existentialism. He is among the most important and influential philosophers of the 20th centu ...
, the Nazi philosopher, released from service in the ''
Volkssturm
The (; "people's storm") was a levée en masse national militia established by Nazi Germany during the last months of World War II. It was not set up by the German Army, the ground component of the combined German ''Wehrmacht'' armed forces, ...
'' militia. However, Heidegger had already been released from service when Fischer's letter arrived.
Works
1909 to 1949
*Fischer, Eugen. 1899. "Beiträge zur Kenntniss der Nasenhöhle und des Thränennasenganges der Amphisbaeniden", ''Archiv für Mikroskopische Anatomie''. 55:1, pp. 441–478.
*Fischer, Eugen. 1901. "Zur Kenntniss der Fontanella metopica und ihrer Bildungen". ''Zeitschrift für Morphologie und Anthropologie''.4:1. pp. 17–30.
*Fischer, Eugen, Professor an der Universität Freiburg i. Br. 1906. "Die Variationen an Radius und Ulna des Menschen". ''Zeitschrift für Morphologie und Anthropologie''. Vol. 9. No. 2.
*Fischer, Eugen. 1908. ''Der Patriziat Heinrichs III und Heinrichs IV.'' Tübingen: J.C.B. Mohr (Paul Siebeck). Fischer's PhD thesis.
*Maass, Alfred. ''Durch Zentral-Sumatra''. Berlin: Behr. 1910. Additional contributing authors: J.P. Kleiweg de Zwaan and E. Fischer.
*Fischer, Eugen. 1913.''Die Rehobother Bastards und das Bastardierungsproblem beim Menschen: anthropologische und ethnographiesche Studien am Rehobother Bastardvolk in Deutsch-Südwest-Afrika'', ausgeführt mit Unterstützung der Kgl. preuss, Akademie der Wissenschaften. Jena: G. Fischer.
*Gaupp, Ernst Wilhelm Theodor. Eugen Fischer (ed.) 1917. ''
August Weismann
August Friedrich Leopold Weismann FRS (For), HonFRSE, LLD (17 January 18345 November 1914) was a German evolutionary biologist. Fellow German Ernst Mayr ranked him as the second most notable evolutionary theorist of the 19th century, after Cha ...
: sein Leben und sein Werk''. Jena: Verlag von Gustav Fischer.
*Schwalbe, G. and Eugen Fischer (eds.). ''Anthropologie''. Leipzig: B.G. Teubner, 1923.
*Fischer, E. and H.F.K. Günther. ''Deutsche Köpfe nordischer Rasse: 50 Abbildungen mit Geleitwarten''. Munich: J.F. Lehmann. 1927.
*Fischer, Eugen and
Gerhard Kittel. ''Das antike Weltjudentum : Tatsachen, Texte, Bilder''. Hamburg: Hanseatische Verlagsanstalt, 1943.
1950 to 1959
*Sarkar, Sasanka Sekher; Eugen Fischer and Keith Arthur, ''The Aboriginal Races of India'', Calcutta: Bookland. 1954.
*Fischer, Eugen. ''Begegnungen mit Toten: aus den Erinnerungen eines Anatomen''. Freiburg: H.F. Schulz. 1959.
See also
*
Karl Binding
Karl Ludwig Lorenz Binding (4 June 1841 – 7 April 1920) was a German jurist known as a promoter of the theory of retributive justice. His influential book, ''Die Freigabe der Vernichtung lebensunwerten Lebens'' ("Allowing the Destruction of Life ...
*
Josef Mengele
, allegiance =
, branch = Schutzstaffel
, serviceyears = 1938–1945
, rank = '' SS''-'' Hauptsturmführer'' (Captain)
, servicenumber =
, battles =
, unit =
, awards =
, commands =
, ...
*
Nazi eugenics
Nazi eugenics refers to the social policies of eugenics in Nazi Germany, composed of various pseudoscientific ideas about genetics. The racial ideology of Nazism placed the biological improvement of the German people by selective breeding of ...
*
Nazi human experimentation
Nazi human experimentation was a series of medical experiments on large numbers of prisoners, including children, by Nazi Germany in its concentration camps in the early to mid 1940s, during World War II and the Holocaust. Chief target po ...
*
Nazi racial theories
The Nazi Party adopted and developed several pseudoscientific racial classifications as part of its ideology (Nazism) in order to justify the genocide of groups of people which it deemed racially inferior. The Nazis considered the putative ...
*
Otmar Freiherr von Verschuer
*
Racial policy of Nazi Germany
The racial policy of Nazi Germany was a set of policies and laws implemented in Nazi Germany under the dictatorship of Adolf Hitler, based on a specific racist doctrine asserting the superiority of the Aryan race, which claimed scientific legi ...
*
Racism in Germany
Racism in German history is inextricably linked to the Herero and Namaqua genocide in colonial times. Racism reached its peak during the Nazi regime which eventually led to a program of systematic state-sponsored murder known as The Holocaust. Acco ...
*
Scientific racism
Scientific racism, sometimes termed biological racism, is the pseudoscience, pseudoscientific belief that empirical evidence exists to support or justify racism (racial discrimination), racial inferiority, or racial superiority.. "Few tragedies ...
*
Subsequent Nuremberg trials
*
Doctors' Trial
The Doctors' Trial (officially ''United States of America v. Karl Brandt, et al.'') was the first of 12 trials for war crimes of high-ranking German officials and industrialists that the United States authorities held in their occupation zone ...
*
Anthropometry
Anthropometry () refers to the measurement of the human individual. An early tool of physical anthropology, it has been used for identification, for the purposes of understanding human physical variation, in paleoanthropology and in various atte ...
*
Fischer scale
*
Fischer-Saller scale
*
Shark Island Concentration Camp
Shark Island or "Death Island" was one of five concentration camps in German South West Africa. It was located on Shark Island off Lüderitz, in the far south-west of the territory which today is Namibia. It was used by the German Empire during ...
*
Rhineland Bastards
Rhineland Bastard (german: Rheinlandbastard) was a derogatory term used in Nazi Germany to describe Afro-Germans, believed fathered by French Army personnel of African descent who were stationed in the Rhineland during its occupation by France ...
Notes
References
*
*
*
*
*Schmuhl, Hans-Walter. "The Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Anthropology, Human heredity and Eugenics, 1927-1945", Boston Studies in the Philosophy of Science vol. 259, Wallstein Verlag, Göttingen, 2003
*
*Friedlander, Henry. 1997. ''The origins of Nazi genocide: from euthanasia to the Final Solution''. University of North Carolina Press. .
External links
Book Reviewof ''The Rehoboth Bastards'' in ''Nature'' (1913)
*
*
*
ttp://www.estherlederberg.com/Eugenics%20(CSHL_List)/Eugen%20Fischer.html Detailed overview of Eugen Fischer with references*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Fischer, Eugen
1874 births
1967 deaths
Physicians from Karlsruhe
German eugenicists
Members of the Prussian Academy of Sciences
Physicians in the Nazi Party
People from the Grand Duchy of Baden
University of Freiburg alumni
University of Freiburg faculty
Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich alumni
University of Würzburg faculty
Humboldt University of Berlin faculty
Nazi Party members
Nazi eugenics
People associated with the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute of Anthropology, Human Heredity, and Eugenics
People of the Herero and Namaqua genocide
Max Planck Institute directors