Collecting the Edged Weapons of the Third Reich

The Third Reich, as Adolf Hitler viewed it, was to be an Organic Society, that is, a society in which all parts were to be in harmony with the whole, subject to the supreme will of the Fuhrer. No part would be permitted to function independently outside the whole, with a life of its own. Thus all institutions the schools, churches, businesses, industries, the arts, the sciences and the military - were to be injected with heavy doses of National Socialist ideology and subject to firm Party control, with coercion being used wherever necessary. The purpose was not to oppress but to unify: all in harmony with one another. With a common goal and a Great National Purpose visualized for them by the Fuhrer, a better life for all Germans would be achieved. The Nazis had a word for this concept: EINHEIT, meaning one-ness or unity. For Adolf Hitler, Einheit was a mystical concept.

The visual realization of Einheit was in those colorful, spectacular ceremonials and mass-meetings that were endemic throughout the life of the Third Reich and were its most glamorous feature. Through the mass meeting the symbolic unity between the lone Fuhrer on the high tribunal and the vast anonymous masses before him was achieved; each in spiritual harmony with the other, the vertical lines of the standing men echoed in the vertical architectural effects surrounding them. People, Fuhrer, and architecture all formed a single harmonious unit in visual as well as symbolical form.

But ceremonials are not very exciting without all the paraphernalia that goes with them. Colorful banners in profusion, snappy uniforms a-glitter with decorations, insignia of rank, dress swords and daggers, and plenty of stirring music; these were the necessary ingredients for any successful Nazi ceremonial.

With his intuitive gift for the nature of crowd psychology, Adolf Hitler shrewdly exploited the potential power of the visual arts to make and sway opinion. Thus, under his direction, the political ceremonial was raised to a fine art conducted with a professional finesse seldom found in similar events in other countries.

The ceremonial was designed to give the ordinary citizen a chance to "dress up," to escape the mundane world of his personal problems. Through the ceremonial the citizen could solidify his sense of belonging to a group, which would present itself along with other groups before the Fuhrer and thereby join one another in the spirit of Einheit.

A uniformed group, with its standards and accouterments, formed an impressive visual unit when it was massed together. All parts of a standard were designed to fit harmoniously with one another and with the men who would carry them; Hitler's own design, the ubiquitous Swastika banner, was a masterpiece of visual harmony. Each insignia, each decoration, each sword and dagger was also designed to be part of the visual whole, to not only be harmonious within itself but also to "fit" with the uniform, which, when seen with other uniforms massed together in one group, would form a single impressive unit ready to join with others to form still larger units. From the smallest dagger to the large blocks of massed uniforms and standards, the psychological purpose was the same: to inspire the citizen (both as a participant and as spectator) with the power and glory of the Reich, to confirm his chauvanistic pride in all things German, and to give humble thanks to the Fuhrer who made it all possible.

Thus a dress sword or dagger was not a mere potentially useful object; like all other ceremonial objects which the Third Reich produced in such profusion, it had a symbolic significance which bordered on the mystic. Its design was conceived in the spirit of Einheit, with all its parts in harmony with the whole object.

There is something about swords and daggers that arouses deep primitive feelings in people, especially in men. They figure in song and story as ancient symbols of courage, honor, and authority; indeed, skill with one often meant the difference between life and death. Daggers in particular figure quite prominently in ancient Germanic mythology; even women of the Germanic tribes wore them and were adept at using them.

Design of Third Reich dress daggers was primarily ancient Germanic or medieval in flavor; some had classical overtones and others were quite baroque.Here the purpose was to form a visual link between the present and the past, to show that the Third Reich was a continuation of the hallowed old Germanic virtues and traditions into the present. The Art Deco style of the 1930's, so fashionable among the advant-garde in other countries, was nowhere to be seen in the design of Nazi edged weapons and only very rarely in other Third Reich artifacts. Since this style derived from French Cubism it was therefore condemned by the Fuhrer as "degenerate" and "un-German." Dagger designs ranged from the ugly chunkiness of the Labor Corps hewing-knife to the graceful stiletto of the Hitler Youth leader. All were adorned with the appropriate symbols of the various organizations for which they were issued.

Although Adolf Hitler himself designed all of the basic iconography of the Third Reich, he is not known to have ever designed a dagger. Nor did Frau Gerdy Troost, who designed so many of the silver objects of the Nazi Regime, ever design a dagger or sword. The majority of the artists who did design them were anonymous, and probably designed other types of regalia as well (the Third Reich, under the aegis of its art-minded Fuhrer, was a paradise for political designers who were both talented and ideologically reliable.)

History has shown that as a nation becomes an empire its designs develop from simple forms to more complex ones. This certainly happened during the Third Reich. A good example of this among the edged weapons is a comparison between the elegant medieval-style of the early Luftwaffe dagger and the later ornate baroque design which replaced it. Heavy, complex designs have always been symbols of power, wealth, and authority; but whether the Nazi designers were conscious of this is not known. Designs of major significance in daggers as well as the other regalia were usually shown to the Fuhrer for his approval; his suggestions were always religiously obeyed. In time, Hitler's own taste became more baroque as he succumbed to megalomania.

Daggers and swords were accorded the same status in the Third Reich as were the standards and decorations, no more, no less. They were all integral parts of the whole. There was no cult of the dagger in Germany as there was a cult of the sword in Japan.

The presentation of a dagger, especially of a dagger with an engraved inscription on its blade, like the presentation of a new standard or decoration, was an occasion for a solemn ritual which affirmed faith and loyalty between the giver and the receiver, and between both to Fuhrer and Reich. All parts of the dagger's design, at least in theory, were to be in harmony with the form and spirit of the whole object, which in turn was to be in harmony with the use and setting to which it was put. All parts of the ritual in which it was presented, and the ceremonials in which it was worn, were segments of the larger whole symbolized by the slogan "One Reich, One People, One Leader." The Nazis consciously and deliberately practiced a concept unique in the 20th Century and not seen in Europe since the 17th - Total Art. Thus each dress dagger that one sees out of context in a collector's drawer or on his wall was far more than just a useful object or a pretty adornment. It represented Einheit, the spirit of Adolf Hitler's Organic Society in a microcosm.

Major Johnson, for fifteen years a collector and internationally-recognized authority on the subject of German edged weapons, has produced a wellresearched book which should prove to be invaluable to the beginner as well as the advanced collector and/or researcher of Third Reich edged weapons. Though only a small part of the regime's vast array of accouterments, Nazi blades have proven to be among its most popular collector's items.

Karen Kuykendall (professional artist, author, and collector of Third Reich relics since 1947) Casa Grande, Arizona.

Thomas M. Johnson, "Collecting the Edged Weapons of the Third Reich Vol. 1", Author Published, 1975

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