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Background article
Staesz Pfefferkuchen Spices!
The name alone is evocative of family traditions. It carries the promise of delicious cakes and biscuits, particularly in the run-up to Christmas.
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Biography
Stefan Tymiec Junior
Stefan Tymiec was born in Sztynort in July 1950. “I had a happy childhood”, he says. He hardly felt anything of the tragedies that his parents had lived through. His mother was German and remained in her homeland in 1945. His father was Ukrainian, one of many people who had been forcibly resettled from southeastern Poland. Stefan's childhood happiness lasted eight years, then the family set off for the West.
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Editorial
Steinort – a European place of remembrance
Steinort is a European place of remembrance, because it is a place where the most diverse stories and memories intersect, intertwine, and overlap. The interview project by Ulla Lachauer and Agata Kern explores these subjective strands of memory and reveals a number of different cultures of remembrance.
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Introduction
Steinort/Sztynort Migration Stories
Steinort Palace in northern Masuria was the seat of the noble Lehndorff family until 1945. The last Count, Heinrich von Lehndorff, was one of the conspirators of July 20, 1944. These stories tell of the fate of the East Prussian noble family and follow the lives of people who lived in the village, which is called Sztynort today. Others tell of German and Polish enthusiasts who are working to revive the run-down manor house. 17 biographical texts explore themes of expulsion and new beginnings, tragedy and awakening in this multi-ethnic region.
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The Białystok Ghetto Cemetery as a Setting of Historical-Political Disputes
The history of the necropolis in eastern Poland acts like a burning glass, a focal point of the upheavals of the 20th century and Polish-Jewish relations after the Shoa. Today, remembrance of this historically significant site alternates between disinterest, urban image cultivation, and a ritualized sense of duty.
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The Changing Landscape of Place Names
The Republic of Poland has a turbulent history – as do its many place names. Hardly any town or village has only one, which makes the matter very complicated, especially for historical research.
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Biography
The Four Lehndorff Daughters
"I lost my home," Vera von Lehndorff once said, "but lost childhood is a better description." When her father was executed on September 4, 1944, she was five years old. Her sister Eleonore, "Nona," was six and a half, and Gabriele was two. Catharina was only 19 days old; she was born in the Torgau prison hospital. The Nazis had taken the girls and their mother Gottliebe into custody, a practice known in German as "Sippenhaft” or “kin liability". It was a traumatic time and was by no means over when the war ended in 1945.
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The Lehndorff Family and the East Prussian Nobility
The East Prussian noble Lehndorff family can be traced back to the 13th century. The history and culture of remembrance around the family are exemplary for many other noble families in Eastern Europe. Our author Hans-Jürgen Bömelburg explains the role of commemorating the nobility and calls for a new approach to regional history.
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The Lehndorff Hunting Lodge
This charming wooden building was once the hunting lodge of the Lehndorff counts. Here they would gather after the great hunts to feast and celebrate together. Later, the building was leased to an innkeeper. After 1945 it was used as a storehouse, and for a while it served as a village store. It gradually fell into disrepair until one day it caught the eye of the young businessman Alexander Potocki.
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Introduction
The National Opera in Central and Eastern Europe
Today it is the passion of a select few music lovers – but in the 19th century, opera was a major social event, an expression of national consciousness, or even the musical declaration of national independence. But how did this happen? What role does the national opera play in Eastern Europe? And what makes an opera a national opera?
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Object story
The Odyssey of a Rococo dresser
For more than 150 years, the Rococo dresser stood on the upper floor of the Steinort castle, in the so-called "Simson room". It bears witness to the lifestyle of an East Prussian noble family. Behind it lies an adventurous journey that began after the failed assassination attempt on Hitler on July 20, 1944, when Heinrich Graf von Lehndorff, the last lord of the castle, was arrested and executed.
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Editorial
The Sounds of Bukovina
A region with many voices: The cultural diversity of Bukovina is particularly evident in its little-known music and singing culture – past and present. Twelve musical contributions provide an insight into the musical history of a multifaceted landscape on the northeastern edge of the Carpathians.
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The Uprooted Ones – Lemkos in Galicia and abroad
The small, private Museum of Lemko Culture in Zyndranowa is situated on the far periphery of southeastern Poland, yet it is a destination for many travelers, mainly from western and northern Poland, but also from other parts of the country and from abroad. For many, a visit here is connected with questions of identity and with the search for traces of family history. At the open-air museum, visitors can experience, among other things, the farm of the Gocz family and learn a great deal about the life of the villagers.
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Object story
The linen dresser
A simple chest of drawers, which came from the Steinort manor house, probably from the servants' quarters. In 1945 it was still quite new, made of pine, unpainted. Ten years ago, an old gentleman donated it to the Museum of Folklore in Węgorzewo, formerly Angerburg, along with other things he had taken from the manor after the end of the war.
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Musical rendition
Tragik (Tragedy) / Schlaflied (Lullaby)
Lutz Landwehr von Pragenau (music), Selma Merbaum-Eisinger (text) / Martina Swandulla (alto), Lutz Landwehr von Pragenau (piano)
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Biography
Verus von Plotho
"There was no culture of remembrance in my family," says Verus von Plotho. He grew up in a cosmopolitan world. He was born in Sao Paulo, Brazil, in 1969 and grew up in Munich. His mother is Gabriele Freifrau von Plotho, the third daughter of Heinrich and Gottliebe von Lehndorff. There was hardly any talk at home about his grandfather and his resistance to Hitler, nor about his earlier life at Steinort Castle. Grandson Verus grew up – unencumbered – in the shadow of a dramatic past.
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Podcast
Wenzel
Hans-Eckardt Wenzel, or "Wenzel" as he calls himself, is a poet and singer with Bohemian roots, born in Wittenberg in 1955. In GDR times, he studied farewell letters of young communists who lost their lives in the resistance against Hitler. Through his friendship with Antje Vollmer, he became acquainted with the story of Heinrich and Gottliebe von Lehndorff in 2008 and dedicated a song to the young aristocratic couple entitled: “The Final Letters."
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Wilderness without borders?
A boundless wilderness – or a mountain range divided both politically and culturally? The neighboring Bavarian Forest and Šumava National Parks on the German-Czech border share a complicated history in which the state border plays a key role.
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Biography
Wolfram Jäger
One day, Wolfram Jäger heard on the radio about the catastrophic condition of Lehndorff Palace. The well-known specialist in the restoration of historic buildings had recently completed a major project for UNESCO in Barcelona and immediately made his way to Masuria. In the spring of 2011, he made a momentous decision – a stroke of luck for the castle, a Herculean task for him.
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Musical rendition
Über Gipfel (Over Mountaintops)
Carmen Petra Basacopol (music), Mihai Eminescu (text) / Mia Jakob (soprano), Denise Maurer (piano)