Danube Swabians
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The Danube Swabians (German: Donauschwaben, Hungarian: Dunai-Svábok or Dunamenti németek, Romanian: Şvabi or Şvabi Dunăreni, Serbian: Dunavske Švabe or Дунавске Швабе, Croatian: Podunavski Švabe) is a collective term for Germans who lived in the former Kingdom of Hungary, especially in the Danube (Donau) River valley. Because of differential development within the territory settled, the Danube Swabians cannot be seen as a unified people. They include the Germans of Hungary (Ungarndeutsche), Satu Mare Swabians, the Banat Swabians (Banater Schwaben), and the Danube Swabians in Serbia's Vojvodina (Wojwodinedeutsche) and Croatia's Slavonia (especially in Osijek region). The Carpathian Germans and Transylvanian Saxons are not included within the Danube Swabian group.
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[edit] History
[edit] Origins
Beginning in the 12th century, German merchants and miners began to settle in the Kingdom of Hungary at the invitation of the Hungarian monarchy. Although there were significant colonies of Carpathian Germans in the Spiš mountains and Transylvanian Saxons in Transylvania, German settlement throughout the rest of the kingdom had not been extensive until this time.
During the 17th-18th centuries, warfare between the Habsburg Monarchy and the Ottoman Empire devastated and depopulated much of the lands of the valley, referred to geographically as the Pannonian plain. The Habsburgs ruling Austria and Hungary at the time resettled the land with people of various ethnicities including Magyars, Slovaks, Croats, Serbs, Romanians, Ukrainians, and Germans. The Germans came at this time from Swabia, Hesse, Franconia, Bavaria, Austria, and Alsace-Lorraine. However, despite their origin, they were all referred to as Swabians.
[edit] Settlement
The first wave of resettlement came as the Ottoman Turks were gradually being forced back after their defeat at the Battle of Vienna in 1683. The settlement was encouraged by nobility whose lands had been devastated through warfare, and by military officers including Prince Eugene of Savoy and Claudius Mercy. Many Germans settled in the Bakony (Bakonywald) and Vértes (Schildgebirge) mountains north and west of Lake Balaton (Plattensee), as well as around the town Buda (Ofen), now part of Budapest. The area of heaviest German colonization during this period was in the Swabian Turkey (Schwäbische Türkei), a triangular region between the Danube river, Lake Balaton, and the Drava (Drau) River. Other areas settled during this time by Germans were Pécs (Fünfkirchen), Satu Mare (Sathmar), and south of Mukachevo (Munkatsch).
After the Banat area of Central Europe was annexed from the Ottomans by the Habsburgs in the Treaty of Passarowitz (1718), plans were made to resettle the region, which became known as the Banat of Temesvár (Temeschwar / Temeschburg), as well as the Bačka (Batschka) region between the Danube and Tisza (Theiss) rivers. Fledgling settlements were destroyed during another Austrian-Turkish war (1737-1739), but extensive colonization continued after the suspension of hostilities. The resettlement was accomplished through private and state initiatives. After Maria Theresa of Austria assumed the throne as Queen of Hungary in 1740, she encouraged vigorous colonization on crown lands, especially between Timişoara and the Tisza. The land steadily rejuvenated: marshes near the Danube and the Tisza were drained, farms were rebuilt, and roads and canals were constructed. Many Danube Swabians served on Austria's Military Frontier (Militärgrenze) against the Ottomans. Between 1740 and 1790 more than 100,000 Germans immigrated to the Kingdom of Hungary.
The Napoleonic Wars ended the large-scale movement of Germans to the Hungarian lands, although the colonial population grew steadily and was self-sustaining. Small daughter-colonies developed in Slavonia and Bosnia. After the creation of Austria-Hungary in 1867, Hungary established a policy of Magyarization whereby minorities, including the Danube Swabians, were induced by political and economic means to adopt the Magyar language and culture.
After the treaties of Saint-Germain (1919) and Trianon (1920) following World War I, the Banat was divided between Romania, Yugoslavia, and Hungary; Bačka was divided between Yugoslavia and Hungary; and Satu Mare went to Romania. Before World War II, the biggest populations of Germans in the Vojvodina were Hodschag, Werbass, and Abthausen.
[edit] World War II, Expulsion and Current Situation
At the start of World War II, many Danube Swabians served in the militaries of Romania, Hungary, and Croatia. Because it was not legal to draft Volksdeutsche, the Nazis conscripted them to theoretically "volunteer" Waffen-SS units, particularly, the 22nd Volunteer Cavalry Division (Maria Theresa) and the 7th Volunteer Mountain Division (Prinz Eugen). Of about 100,000 men who served in the various forces, approximately 29,000 lost their lives. This total includes 2,000 POWs from the 7th SS Division which were summarily executed by Tito's communist partisans.
In 1945, the Soviet Red Army marched into the Danube Swabian-populated lands beginning the exodus of Germans from Eastern Europe. After the war, many of the Germans of Yugoslavia, who by this point were mostly women, children, or elderly, were held in inhuman conditions in camps made out of their former towns, such as the one at Knićanin, or they were killed outright. From 1945-48, many Germans in Hungary were dispossessed and forced to "return" to Germany, although it was not their birthplace. The Germans in Romania were not deported but were instead dispersed within Romania. Many left Romania for West Germany between 1970-90, and this stream became a flood after 1990. Beginning in 1920 and especially after World War II, many Danube Swabians migrated to the United States, Brazil, Canada, Austria, Australia, and Argentina.
[edit] Culture
The Danube Swabian culture is a melting pot of southern German regional customs, with a large degree of Balkan and mostly Hungarian influence. This is especially true of the food, where paprika is heavily employed, which lead to the nickname for Hungarian Germans of Paprikadeutsche. The architecture is neither Southern German nor Balkan but is unique to itself. The houses, often made of mud bricks, are ubiquitous throughout the Banat region.
[edit] Language
The Danube Swabian language is only nominally Swabian. In reality, it contains elements of many dialects of the original German settlers, mainly Swabian, Rhinelandic/Pfälzisch, Alsatian, and Alemannic, as well as Austro-Hungarian administrative and military jargon. Loanwords from Hungarian are especially common regarding cuisine and agriculture, but also regarding dress, politics, placenames, and sports. Other cultures of influence include Serbian and Croatian, Russian (for communist concepts), Romanian, Turkish (Hambar), English (for football), and general Balkan and South Slavic loanwords or, properly, wanderwörter like Kukoriz (maize).
Many German words used by speakers of Danube Swabian dialects may sound archaic. To the ear of a Standard German speaker, the Danube Swabian dialect sounds like what it is: a mix of southwestern German dialects from the 1700s. Due to relative isolation and differing proximities to nearby German speakers (Austrians and Transylvanian Saxons), the language varies considerably, with speakers able to distinguish inhabitants of neighboring villages by the words they use for such things as marmalade (Schleckle being one variant), or by how many (usually Hungarian) loanwords they employ.
[edit] Naming
As is the custom in Hungary (as well as in East Asia), Danube Swabians often put the surname first, especially when writing, for example Butscher Jakob (see photo of memorial). Danube Swabian villages tend to have relatively few family names as the villagers stem from only a few families, but usually the same family name does not appear in more than a couple of villages, meaning that there are many Danube Swabian family names. The names come from throughout southern Germany, from assimilated Hungarians, and occasionally from Balkan and Italian origins. There are usually no middle names, but often double first names, if a distinction can be made. The variety of first names is few, since children were usually named after grandparents or godparents. Popular names for women include: Anna, Barbara, Christina, Katharina, Magdalena, Maria, Sophia, Theresia, and many two-name combinations thereof. Popular names for men include: Adam, Christian, Friedrich, Georg, Gottfried, Heinrich, Jakob, Johann, Konrad, Ludwig, Mathias, Nikolaus, Peter, Philipp (or Filipp), and Stefan (or Stephan). With so few names in villages, other modifiers or nicknames were almost always used to distinguish people. The modifiers were often size related (e.g., "Kleinjohann" or "Little Johann"), occupation related, or location related (usually by prefixing the streetname).
[edit] Coat of arms
The coat of arms (Wappen) of the Danube Swabians was designed in 1950 by Hans Diplich. Its blazon is Parti per fess wavy 1 Or, an eagle displayed couped Sable langued Gules; 2 parti per fess Argent and Vert, a fortress Argent roofed and turreted Gules surmounted with Sun and Crescent waning Or; chief wavy Azure.
It depicts:
- An eagle representing the protection of the Emperor of Austria;
- a blue ribbon representing the Danube river;
- a crescent moon representing the waning of Islamic influence through the withdrawal of the Ottoman Turks;
- the Sun representing both Prince Eugene of Savoy and the light of Christianity; and
- a fortress representing the fortified city of Temeschburg (Timişoara).
[edit] See also
- Expulsion of Germans after World War II
- Ethnic German
- Volksdeutsche
- Carpathian Germans
- Baltic Germans
- Transylvanian Saxons
- Volga Germans
[edit] External links
- History of the Danube Swabians
- Los Angeles Donau Schwabian Dancegroup heritage page
- The Donauschwaben
[edit] References
- Krallert, Wilfried (1958). Atlas zur Geschichte der deutschen Ostsiedlung. Bielefeld: Velhagen & Klasing.
- German wikipedia article
- http://www.axishistory.com
Categories: Bačka | Banat | Danube Swabian | Ethnic groups in Europe | Ethnic groups in Serbia | Ethnic groups in Vojvodina | Forced migration | German diaspora | History of Austria | History of Croatia | History of Germany | History of Hungary | History of Romania | History of Serbia | History of Vojvodina
