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Roche ( H. ) Sparta's German Children. The Ideal of Ancient Sparta in the Royal Prussian Cadet Corps, 1818-1920, and in National Socialist Elite Schools (the Napolas), 1933-1945 . Pp. xiv + 306, figs, ills, maps. Swansea : The Classical Press of Wales , 2013. Cased, £45. ISBN: 978-1-905125-55-5 .
Reviews
Academic scholarship on Antiquity in National Socialist Germany became a subject of necessary scrutiny relatively early after the Second World War and was considered a critical part of what would later be called German Vergangenheitsbewältigung (coming to terms with the past). This is especially true of research on Sparta. The role of Sparta in the military elite schools of Prussia and the Third Reich was not explored in the process, most probably because these institutions were not to be sanitised for a re-civilised future Germany but were, as hotbeds of German militarism, to be abandoned entirely. R.'s interest in the topic is not primarily political. Instead, it is rooted in a broader interest in Sparta's long and winding road through modernity and Sparta's potential as a representation of modern thought in different societies. Central to the book, which is based on R.'s doctoral research, are two case studies that inquire into the role of an idealised ancient Sparta in shaping two elite education institutions and their pupils - the explicitly military-oriented Royal Prussian Cadet Corps, which trained boys from the age of ten for officer careers, and the Nationalpolitische Erziehungsanstalten (Napolas), which aimed to form a general elite for the future of National Socialist Germany.
In the introductory chapter R. surveys the literature and primary sources and deliberates on methodological issues inherent to interpreting her more problematic source material, like cadet-school fiction, memoirs and her personal correspondence with around 60 former Napola pupils. The second part of the introduction establishes the view that the Prussian military advocated a distinct version of the Spartan paradigm that was rooted in...