Gustaf Kossinna
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Gustaf Kossinna (28 September 1858 – 20 December 1931) was a German philologist and archaeologist who was Professor of German Archaeology at the
University of Berlin The Humboldt University of Berlin (, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin, Germany. The university was established by Frederick William III on the initiative of Wilhelm von Humbol ...
. Along with Carl Schuchhardt he was the most influential German prehistorian of his day, and was creator of the techniques of settlement archaeology (). His nationalistic theories about the origins of the
Germanic peoples The Germanic peoples were tribal groups who lived in Northern Europe in Classical antiquity and the Early Middle Ages. In modern scholarship, they typically include not only the Roman-era ''Germani'' who lived in both ''Germania'' and parts of ...
and
Indo-Europeans The Indo-European languages are a language family native to the northern Indian subcontinent, most of Europe, and the Iranian plateau with additional native branches found in regions such as Sri Lanka, the Maldives, parts of Central Asia (e. ...
influenced aspects of National Socialist ideology. Though politically discredited after
World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
, Kossinna's methodological approach has greatly influenced archaeology up to the present day. In the years following World War II, Kossinna's theories of settlement archaeology were widely dismissed as
pseudoscience Pseudoscience consists of statements, beliefs, or practices that claim to be both scientific and factual but are incompatible with the scientific method. Pseudoscience is often characterized by contradictory, exaggerated or unfalsifiable cl ...
. Recent discoveries in
archaeogenetics Archaeogenetics is the study of ancient DNA using various molecular genetic methods and DNA resources. This form of genetic analysis can be applied to human, animal, and plant specimens. Ancient DNA can be extracted from various fossilized spec ...
have prompted a renewed discussion of Kossinna's legacy and the significance of migration in prehistory.


Life

Kossinna was a Germanized Mazur He was born in Tilsit,
East Prussia East Prussia was a Provinces of Prussia, province of the Kingdom of Prussia from 1772 to 1829 and again from 1878 (with the Kingdom itself being part of the German Empire from 1871); following World War I it formed part of the Weimar Republic's ...
,
Kingdom of Prussia The Kingdom of Prussia (, ) was a German state that existed from 1701 to 1918.Marriott, J. A. R., and Charles Grant Robertson. ''The Evolution of Prussia, the Making of an Empire''. Rev. ed. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1946. It played a signif ...
. His father was a teacher at the secondary-school level. Kossinna attended the Königliche Litthauische Provinzialschule in Tilsit. As a child he learned
Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...
and
piano A piano is a keyboard instrument that produces sound when its keys are depressed, activating an Action (music), action mechanism where hammers strike String (music), strings. Modern pianos have a row of 88 black and white keys, tuned to a c ...
. As a university student he matriculated at a number of universities, studying classical and then
Germanic philology Germanic philology is the philology, philological study of the Germanic languages, particularly from a Comparative method, comparative or historical perspective. The beginnings of research into the Germanic languages began in the 16th century, wi ...
in the universities of
Göttingen Göttingen (, ; ; ) is a college town, university city in Lower Saxony, central Germany, the Capital (political), capital of Göttingen (district), the eponymous district. The River Leine runs through it. According to the 2022 German census, t ...
,
Leipzig Leipzig (, ; ; Upper Saxon: ; ) is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Saxony. The city has a population of 628,718 inhabitants as of 2023. It is the List of cities in Germany by population, eighth-largest city in Ge ...
,
Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...
and
Strasbourg Strasbourg ( , ; ; ) is the Prefectures in France, prefecture and largest city of the Grand Est Regions of France, region of Geography of France, eastern France, in the historic region of Alsace. It is the prefecture of the Bas-Rhin Departmen ...
. He also studied German history, local history and art history. Kossinna was influenced greatly by Karl Müllenhoff, who encouraged him to research the origins of
Indo-European The Indo-European languages are a language family native to the northern Indian subcontinent, most of Europe, and the Iranian plateau with additional native branches found in regions such as Sri Lanka, the Maldives, parts of Central Asia (e. ...
and Germanic culture. He also came under the influence of
Otto Tischler Otto is a masculine German given name and a surname. It originates as an Old High German short form (variants '' Audo'', '' Odo'', '' Udo'') of Germanic names beginning in ''aud-'', an element meaning "wealth, prosperity". The name is recorded fr ...
and
Friedrich Ratzel Friedrich Ratzel (August 30, 1844 – August 9, 1904) was a German geographer and ethnographer, notable for first using the term ''Lebensraum'' ("living space") in the sense that the National Socialists later would. Life Ratzel's father was th ...
. Kossinna obtained his doctorate at Strasbourg in 1887 in the subject of the early records of the high-
Frankish language Frankish (language reconstruction, reconstructed endonym: *), also known as Old Franconian or Old Frankish, was the West Germanic language spoken by the Franks from the 5th to 10th centuries. Franks under king Chlodio settled in Roman Gaul ...
. From 1888 to 1892 he worked as a librarian. During this time Kossinna read widely and published a number of scientific papers on the ancient history of Germany. In 1896 his ideas were expressed in his lecture "The Pre-Historical Origins of the Teutons in Germany". In 1902, Kossinna was appointed Professor of German Archaeology at the University of Berlin. This position was exclusively created for him. While in this capacity, Kossinna began the work of systematically building up the university institute in view of improving its study and teaching of prehistoric archaeology. Throughout his career, Kossinna published many books on the origins of the
Germanic peoples The Germanic peoples were tribal groups who lived in Northern Europe in Classical antiquity and the Early Middle Ages. In modern scholarship, they typically include not only the Roman-era ''Germani'' who lived in both ''Germania'' and parts of ...
, founding the "German Prehistory Society" to promote interest and research in the subject. He became the most famous archaeologist in the German-speaking world, and was notable for his use of archaeology to promote claims for an expanded German nation. Notably, Kossinna only conducted one excavation during his career, in 1915. The bulk of his work relied on evidence from the reports of colleagues and museum artifacts.


Ideas

By 1895, Kossinna had developed theory that a regionally delimited ethnicity can be defined by the material culture excavated from a site (culture-historical archaeology or simply
culture history Culture-historical archaeology is an archaeological theory that emphasises defining historical societies into distinct ethnic and cultural groupings according to their material culture. It originated in the late nineteenth century as cultural ...
theory). He wrote, "Sharply defined archaeological cultural areas correspond unquestionably with the areas of particular people or tribes". The statement is known as "Kossinna's law" and forms the basis of his "settlement-archaeology" method. Unlike modern settlement archaeology, which refers only to individual settlements or patterns of settlement, Kossinna meant to emphasise, in Arvidsson's words, that "a unified set of archaeological artifacts, a 'culture', was the sign of a unified ethnicity." Kossinna's ideas have been connected to the claim that Germanic peoples constitute a national identity with a historic right to the lands they once occupied, providing an excuse for later Nazi annexations of lands in Poland and Czechoslovakia. For example, in his article "The German '' Ostmark'', Home Territory of the Germans", Kossinna argued that Poland should be a part of the German empire. According to him, lands where artifacts had been found that he considered to be Germanic were part of ancient Germanic territory. In 1902, Kossinna identified the
Proto-Indo-Europeans The Proto-Indo-Europeans are a hypothetical prehistoric ethnolinguistic group of Eurasia who spoke Proto-Indo-European (PIE), the reconstructed common ancestor of the Indo-European language family. Knowledge of them comes chiefly from t ...
with the
Corded Ware culture The Corded Ware culture comprises a broad archaeological horizon of Europe between  – 2350 BC, thus from the Late Neolithic, through the Copper Age, and ending in the early Bronze Age. Corded Ware culture encompassed a vast area, from t ...
, an argument that gained in currency over the following two decades. Kossinna placed the
Proto-Indo-European homeland The Proto-Indo-European homeland was the prehistoric homeland of the Proto-Indo-European language (PIE), meaning it was the region where the proto-language was spoken before it split into the dialects from which the earliest Indo-European langu ...
in western central Europe, north of the alps. In studying the prehistory of the Germanic peoples and ancient
Indo-Europeans The Indo-European languages are a language family native to the northern Indian subcontinent, most of Europe, and the Iranian plateau with additional native branches found in regions such as Sri Lanka, the Maldives, parts of Central Asia (e. ...
, Kossinna saw the key to the unwritten prehistory of Europe. Kossinna emphasised a diffusionist model of culture, according to which cultural evolution occurred by a "process whereby influences, ideas and models were passed on by more advanced peoples to the less advanced with which they came into contact." He emphasised that such superiority was racial in character. Kossinna’s theories aimed to present a history of the Germanic peoples superior to that of the
Roman Empire The Roman Empire ruled the Mediterranean and much of Europe, Western Asia and North Africa. The Roman people, Romans conquered most of this during the Roman Republic, Republic, and it was ruled by emperors following Octavian's assumption of ...
. He considered the Romans and the French as destroyers of culture as compared to the Germanic peoples. One of his best-known books was ''Die Deutsche Vorgeschichte - Eine Hervorragend Nationale Wissenschaft'' (German Prehistory: A Pre-Eminently National Discipline). It was dedicated "To the German people, as a building block in the reconstruction of the externally as well as internally disintegrated fatherland."


Legacy

Following his death, his followers held high-profile positions under the Nazi regime, including Hans Reinerth, who held Kossinna's former chair at the University of Berlin between 1934 and 1945, and his views were incorporated into the curriculum in German schools. Kossinna's ideas have been heavily criticised partly because of the political use to which they were put, but also because of inherent ambiguities in the method. Problems with Kossinna's theories have been summarized by Hans Jürgen Eggers. Despite justified criticism of the method and its application by Kossinna, the central technique was not unique to him, but it has also developed elsewhere in Europe and the US. Kossinna occupies a key role in the emergence of prehistory as an academic discipline. His methods influenced those of V. Gordon Childe, whose associates dominated the field of archaeology for decades after
World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...
. In the years following World War II, particularly in the 1960s and 1970s, there was a counterreaction against Kossinna's theories of settlement archaeology, and the migration was generally considered not to have been a major factor in prehistoric culture change. More recently, studies of prehistoric migration through
archaeogenetics Archaeogenetics is the study of ancient DNA using various molecular genetic methods and DNA resources. This form of genetic analysis can be applied to human, animal, and plant specimens. Ancient DNA can be extracted from various fossilized spec ...
have been described as marking a return of Kossinna's cultural-historical thinking, drawing criticism from archaeologists. The apparent similarity of the once outdated theories of Kossinna has been referred to as ''Kossinna's Smile''. Archaeogeneticist David Reich, who worked on a study related to the Corded Ware culture, drew criticism and lost several archaeologist collaborators when they believed that the ancient DNA results promoted ideas similar to Kossinna's. Reich subsequently explicitly rejected Kossinna's theories in order to win them back. Reich noted that while Kossinna suggested a
Northern Europe The northern region of Europe has several definitions. A restrictive definition may describe northern Europe as being roughly north of the southern coast of the Baltic Sea, which is about 54th parallel north, 54°N, or may be based on other ge ...
an origin of the Indo-Europeans, his research rather suggested an origin on the
Pontic–Caspian steppe The Pontic–Caspian Steppe is a steppe extending across Eastern Europe to Central Asia, formed by the Caspian and Pontic steppes. It stretches from the northern shores of the Black Sea (the ''Pontus Euxinus'' of antiquity) to the northern a ...
.


Selected works

*
Über Die Ältesten Hochfränkischen Sprachdenkmäler: Ein Beitrag zur Grammatik des Althochdeutschen
', 1888 *
Die Indagermanische Frage
', 1902 *
Mannus
', 1909 *
Die Herkunft der Germanen: Zur Methode der Siedlungsarchäologie
', 1911 *
Der Goldfund von Messingwerk bei Eberswalde und Die Goldenen Kultgefäze Der Germanen
', 1913 *

', 1913 *
Die Deutsche Vorgeschichte: Eine Hervorragend Nationale Wissenschaft
', 1914 *
Das Weichselland: Ein Uralter Heimatboden Der Germanen
', 1919 *
Die Indogermanen, Ein Abriss
', 1921 *

', 1926 * '' ttps://books.google.com/books/about/Germanische_Kultur_im_1_Jahrtausend_nach.html?id=9cQPAAAAQAAJ Germanische Kultur Im 1. Jahrtausend Nach Christus', 1932 *
Altgermanische Kulturhöhe: Eine Einführung in Die Deutsche Vor- und Frühgeschichte
', 1937


See also

*
Culture history Culture-historical archaeology is an archaeological theory that emphasises defining historical societies into distinct ethnic and cultural groupings according to their material culture. It originated in the late nineteenth century as cultural ...
*
Madison Grant Madison Grant (November 19, 1865 – May 30, 1937) was an American lawyer, zoologist, anthropologist, and writer known for his work as a conservation movement, conservationist, eugenics, eugenicist, and advocate of scientific racism. Grant i ...
* Lothrop Stoddard * Joseph Widney *
Alfred Rosenberg Alfred Ernst Rosenberg ( – 16 October 1946) was a Baltic German Nazi theorist and ideologue. Rosenberg was first introduced to Adolf Hitler by Dietrich Eckart and he held several important posts in the Nazi government. He was the head o ...
* Hans F. K. Günther * William Z. Ripley * Carleton S. Coon *
Houston Stewart Chamberlain Houston Stewart Chamberlain (; 9 September 1855 – 9 January 1927) was a British-German-French philosopher who wrote works about political philosophy and natural science. His writing promoted German ethnonationalism, antisemitism, scientific r ...
* Harry H. Laughlin


Notes


References


Sources

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Further reading

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External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Kossinna, Gustaf 1858 births 1931 deaths People from Tilsit People from the Province of Prussia Alldeutscher Verband members Aryanism German archaeologists German philologists Germanic studies scholars German Germanists Militant League for German Culture members Nordicism German prehistorians Leipzig University alumni University of Göttingen alumni University of Strasbourg alumni Humboldt University of Berlin alumni Academic staff of the Humboldt University of Berlin Proponents of scientific racism