Ferdinand Blumentritt: Austrian, German, Czech or Bohemian?

 

Ferdinand Blumentritt (1853-1913) Photo BNF/Gallica

Historical geography, the shifts of powers, and the reality in the development of languages and races in central Europe had greatly affected if not made difficult our definitions of Blumentritt's true nationality... Austrian, German, Czech, or Bohemian?

When Rizal befriended and visited the "Gymnasiallehrer" in Leitmeritz (Litoměřice), borders were different then, the modern Czech Republic does not exist yet. (But at that time, the Czechs were already a nation conscious of its nationality and ethnicity for many centuries). The region was also called Bohemia, which was somehow, through the centuries, overrun by Germanic powers -- the Holy Roman Empire and the Austrian Hapsburg.

Ferdinand Blumentritt, because of language and culture could also be considered ethnic German. The problem with the word "German" was that it actually encompassed a larger definition involving not only one nation but also larger territories, regions, culture, traditions, and above all language. (Luther's Reformation had a very deep impact on the unity of Germanic people in the region under a lingua franca Luther himself created).

Blumentritt was also Austrian, born in Prague which was that time part of the Austro- Hungarian empire, greatly dominated by Germanic culture. Later on, as a consequence of Axis defeat in the First World War, the Austro-Hungarian empire would be dissolved. The Czechs will form a union with another Slavic people, the Slovaks-- Their new sovereign state was named Czechoslovakia.

The ethnic Germans in the newly established Czechoslovakia, descendants of ethnic Germans living there since the Middle Ages, people like Blumentritt, distinguishable by their names and heritage, were known as "Sudeten Germans".

In 1938, the apogee of Nazism and Hitler, Czechoslovakia was occupied by the Nazi and was absorbed to the Third Reich. Hitler's reason for invading the country was what he termed as emancipation of ethnic Germans (Sudeten Germans) who were living under the yoke of Czech and Slovak tyranny.

After the defeat of Nazi Germany, in 1945, ethnic Germans were expelled from Czechoslovakia (For obvious reason -- Gumanti syempre). Many chose to immigrate to then West Germany.

In 1992, three years after the Fall of the Iron Curtain or the so-called Velvet Revolution led by Vaclav Havel, Czechoslovakia split into two, the demarcation was of course that of the two people -- Czechs and Slovaks. Thus we have now the Czech Republic and the independent country called Slovakia.

So where is Blumentritt in this History? I guess it is much better to isolate Rizal-Blumentritt to their time and the circumstances of their respective countries or in the case of Blumentritt, his community or his ethnic identity.

I am reminded of Rainer Maria Rilke (1875- 1926), who share the same fortune (or misfortune) being born in Prague and being a subject of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. One of the greatest lyric poets in the German language, we seldom talk of Rilke's nationality, only his verses. Perhaps we in turn should be reminded of Blumentritt - Rizal's friendship, not just the name of some streets or "kalsadas" , nor this endless search for his true nationality.

Finally, in all of this, Blumentritt in a letter to a friend, had once directly confided that he considered himself a German.

~ Pasig City. January 2021