Dean,

You've got a fine collection of postcards, really an excellent cultural study. History and legend seem to blend well together.

By the way, that nice compliment about my writing skill is undeserved, I just cobbled that together from a couple of encyclopedias ... Big Grin ... I'll add some more brief, borrowed explanations here to help describe your latest image.

The elder you mention is none other than Wotan or Odin. Wotan, in Norse Mythology was a warrior sovereign, and is often seen as the primary god. The Nazis used the archetype of Wotan because of his "Warrior-King" traits, but many of even the top ranking officials believed in the Mythological character as more than merely Archetype. Josef Goebbels, in his conference notes once made the remark regarding what was to be let known about the Nazi agenda for the post-war period, said, "We will of course not let them know about Wotan. (Woden)". More remarkably, Wotan, or Odin, was rumored to have hung himself on a tree to obtain knowledge which was granted him, and gave his victory in doing so gave him the ability to travel freely in the nether-worlds (like hell) or in the heavens. The Nazis at the highest level intended after Europe was in their control, to assimilate the Church, and re-interpret such central doctrines as Christ's crucifixtion and victory over death, with the keys to Heaven and Hell in terms of old Norse Legend, or as it was referred to as 'volkish mysticism'. Wotan or Odin is also said to have learned runes in this way, which fascinated the Nazis.(the swastika is an example of a rune)

On the young warrior's shield we can see, "Bund der Deutschen in Böhmen," or League of Germans in Bohemia. That will bring us to this ...

Lands constituting German Bohemia were historically an integral part of the Habsburgs Kingdom of Bohemia but, with the imminent collapse of Habsburg Austria-Hungary at the end of World War I, areas of the Czech-majority Bohemia with an ethnic German majority who began to take actions to avoid joining a new Czechoslovak state. On 27 October 1918, the Egerland region declared independence from Bohemia and a day later the independence of Czechoslovakia was proclaimed in the Bohemian capital of Prague.

On 11 November 1918, Emperor Charles I of Austria relinquished power and, on 12 November, the ethnic German areas of the empire were declared the Republic of German Austria with the intent of unifying with Germany. The Province of German Bohemia (German: Provinz Deutschböhmen) was formed from the part of Bohemia containing the most ethnic Germans (however, ethnic German areas of southwestern Bohemia in the Bohemian Forest Region were added to Upper Austria instead of German Bohemia). The capital of the province was Liberec.

In late November 1918, the Czechoslovak army began an invasion of German Bohemia and during December it occupied whole area of the region with Liberec falling on 16 December and the last major city, Litom??ice, falling on 27 December 1918. The status of German areas in Bohemia and Moravia was definitively settled by the 1919 peace treaties of Versailles and Saint-Germain-en-Laye that declared that the areas belong to Czechoslovakia. The Czechoslovak Government then granted amnesty for all activities against the new state.
The region was then reintegrated into the Bohemian Land of the First Republic of Czechoslovakia and remained a part of it until the Nazi dismemberment of Czechoslovakia when it was added to Sudetenland. After World War II, the area was returned to Czechoslovakia. Most of the remaining German population living in the region following the War were driven out of the country; many of these persons were killed or died during their flight from the attacking Czech and Soviet armies.

The date of the Christmas greeting, December 20, 1918, on your card coincides perfectly with the events depicted and those described - neat! Wink

Bill