The “Reinhard Heydrich Foundation, Reich Foundation for Scientific Research in Prague”, was established on 11 July 1942 by decree of the Reich Protector in Bohemia and Moravia.^[1] It was named after Reinhard Heydrich (1904–1942), who, as Deputy Reich Protector and Head of the SS Reich Security Main Office, had been assassinated by the Czech resistance movement. Its staff included German humanities scholars working at the German Charles University in Prague, who, within the framework of the foundation, devoted themselves to ‘special tasks relating to ethnic policy’ and supported the Nazi Germanisation policy in the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia.

According to its founding decree, the remit of the Reinhard Heydrich Foundation (RHS) was “to conduct research into the ethnic, cultural, political and economic conditions of Bohemia and Moravia, as well as of the peoples of Eastern and South-Eastern Europe ”.^[2] The centre of the research was on ethnographic and historical studies concerning Czechs and Germans in the Bohemian lands. These studies, which were intended to be guided methodologically by ‘racial studies’, ethnology and social and ethnic psychology, also served as preparatory work for the planned post-war Germanisation of parts of the Czech population.^[3] To this end, research was to be conducted into, amongst other things, the “blood-related and racial composition” and the “psychological makeup” of the Czechs.^[4]

Another task of the foundation was to strengthen the German Charles University as a centre of German scholarship with a particular focus on South-Eastern Europe. In light of current events, this involved preparing for the university’s 600th anniversary in 1948. In addition, the foundation took over and reorganised several former Czech research institutes, foundations and libraries.

The RHS worked closely not only with the German Charles University in Prague and the German authorities in the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, but also with other institutions engaged in German research on the East. The foundation commissioned research projects from the Institute for Social Anthropology and Ethnobiology at the German Charles University. Its director, Karl Valentin Müller (1896–1963),^[5] conducted, for example, ‘racial’ studies on Czech police officers.^[6]

As its official publication, the foundation, together with the Academy of Sciences in Prague/Praha and the Sudeten German Institute for Regional and Ethnic Research in Reichenberg/Liberec, published the journal *Deutsche Volksforschung in Böhmen und Mähren* (German Ethnic Research in Bohemia and Moravia).^[7]

Professor Alfred Buntru (1887–1974), Rector of the German Technical University in Prague and acting Rector of the German Charles University in 1942/43, served as head of the Reinhard Heydrich Foundation. The administrative director was the legal historian Wilhelm Weizsäcker (1886–1961). The foundation’s deputy director, SS-Hauptsturmführer and honorary member of the Security Service (SD) Hans Joachim Beyer (1908–1971), exerted a decisive influence on the foundation’s work.^[8] He had been appointed to Prague by Heydrich and, from 1942, headed the Institute for Ethnology and Nationalities Studies at the German Charles University in Prague. The German Minister of State for Bohemia and Moravia, SS-Obergruppenführer Karl Hermann Frank (1898–1946),^[9] was the trustee of the foundation.

The RHS comprised several institutes:^[10]

• Institute for European Ethnology and Ethnic Psychology (Hans Joachim Beyer, Rudolf Hippius)
• Institute for Eastern European Intellectual History (Eduard Winter^[11])
• Institute for the Regional History of Bohemia and Moravia (Heinz Zatschek,^[12] Anton Ernstberger)
• Institute for German Law in the East (Wilhelm Weizsäcker,^[13] Franz Laufke)
• Institute for the Folklore of Bohemia and Moravia (Josef Hanika,^[14] Edmund Schneeweis^[15])
• Institute for Folk Songs and Folk Music in East Central Europe (Gerhard Gesemann^[16])
• Institute for Czech Language and Literature (Eugen Rippl^[17])
• Institute of Economics (Ferdinand Ulmer^[18])
• Institute of Oriental Studies (Adolf Grohmann).

The history of the Reinhard Heydrich Foundation is linked to Nazi scientific policy in the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia. The foundation’s establishment was preceded by the closure of Czech universities on 17 November 1939 and the expansion of the German University of Prague. Its rector, Wilhelm Saure (1899–1951), was appointed in September 1940 as Special Commissioner for the Slavic academic institutions in Prague. In April 1940 and early 1941, Saure submitted proposals for the establishment of a ‘South-East European Research Community’ and a ‘Reich Foundation for German-Slavic Research’.^[19] Reinhard Heydrich, Deputy Reich Protector in Prague since September 1941 (1904–1942), who had been in office in Prague since September 1941, took up these plans and, at the end of 1941, placed the entire foundation project under the control of Department III B (Ethnic Groups) of the Reich Security Main Office. He appointed Hans Joachim Beyer as Special Representative with effect from 1 April 1942, replacing Sauer. Following Heydrich’s death on 6 July 1942, Beyer was tasked with establishing the RHS in his capacity as General Plenipotentiary of the Reich Protector. However, the foundation did not commence its actual activities until the summer of 1943, after it had been officially established on 4 June 1943 as part of the Nazi commemorative ceremonies marking the first anniversary of Heydrich’s death.^[20] Beyer ensured that the SS exerted a strong influence over the RHS.^[21] He and the psychologist Rudolf Hippius (1905–1945), who was also active in promoting Nazi ideology, published works on ‘Volkstum’ and ‘Umvolkung’ and collaborated with the authorities involved in Nazi racial policy. The historians Weizsäcker and Zatschek wrote in accordance with the guiding principles of ‘German Eastern Research’, which focused on German identity, although a radicalisation can be observed during the war years. Zatschek, for example, showed an openness to research into racial history.^[22] In 1944, some of the institutes were forced to cease their activities as they were deemed non-essential to the war effort. This also affected the ‘racial-biological’ research, which was discontinued towards the end of 1944.^[23] In March 1945, Beyer submitted one final, revised work programme. In it, he advocated a new European ‘community of peoples’ in opposition to Bolshevism and Americanism, through which the ‘foreign peoples’ under German rule were to be won over to an ‘active struggle’ against the enemies of the Third Reich.^[24]

A 1944 report by the Security Service on the mood and attitudes of Prague university lecturers specifically identified representatives of the Heydrich foundation such as Beyer, Hippius, Winter, Zatschek and Weizsäcker in particular as avowed National Socialist university lecturers or as staunch advocates of a “people-centred political orientation”.^[25] After the Second World War, they continued their careers largely unhindered, primarily in the Federal Republic of Germany, but (as in the case of Winter) also in the GDR.

• Karel Fremund: The Heydrich Foundation – an important instrument of Nazi extermination policy (a selection of documents). In: Collection of Archival Works 14 (1964), pp. 3–38.
• Ibid.: The Reinhard Heydrich Foundation – an important instrument of the fascist extermination policy in Czechoslovakia 1942–1945. In: Information on Imperialist Oriental Studies 3 (1965), pp. 1–48.
• Monika Glettler, Alena Míšková (eds.): Prague Professors 1938–1948. Between Academia and Politics. Essen 2001 (Publications on Culture and History in Eastern Europe 17).
• Alena Míšková: Racial Research and Eastern Studies at the German (Charles) University in Prague. In: Detlef Brandes (ed.): Forced Separation. Expulsion and Resettlement in and from Czechoslovakia 1938–1947 in Comparison with Poland, Hungary and Yugoslavia. Essen 1999 (Publications of the German-Czech and German-Slovak Historians’ Commission 8), pp. 39–53.
• Ibid.: The German (Charles) University from the Munich Agreement to the End of the Second World War. University Administration and Changes in the Body of Professors. Prague 2007.
• Karl Heinz Roth: Heydrich’s Professor. Historiography of ‘Volkstum’ and the Mass Exterminations: The Case of Hans Joachim Beyer. In: Peter Schöttler (ed.): Historiography as a Science of Legitimation 1918–1945. Frankfurt am Main 1997, pp. 262–342.
• Stanislav Šisler: The Emergence and Formation of Nazi ‘Slavic Research’ in the Years 1940–1943. In: Český lid 78 (1991) 4, pp. 261–271 (with a German summary).
• Andreas Wiedemann: The Reinhard Heydrich Foundation in Prague (1942–1945). Dresden 2000.
• Ibid.: The Reinhard Heydrich Foundation as an example of National Socialist scientific policy in the Protectorate. In: Christiane Brenner, K. Erik Franzen, Peter Haslinger, Robert Luft (eds.): Historiography on the Bohemian Lands in the 20th Century. Scholarly Traditions, Institutions, Discourses. Munich 2006 (Bad Wiesseer Conferences of the Collegium Carolinum 28), pp. 159–176.
• Ibid.: Reinhard Heydrich Foundation. In: Ingo Haar, Michael Fahlbusch (eds.): Handbook of ‘Völkische’ Sciences. Individuals, Institutions, Research Programs, Foundations. Munich 2008, pp. 584–588.

• Documents relating to the activities of the Heydrich Foundation from the National Archive in Prague [Národní archiv Praha] are available online. The records of the German State Ministry for Bohemia and Moravia [Německé státní ministerstvo pro Čechy a Moravu] and the State Secretary to the Reich Protector [Státní tajemník u říšského protektora] are available for viewing. URL: vademecum.nacr.cz/vademecum/MenuBar.action.

[1] Official Gazette of the Reich Protector in Bohemia and Moravia 1942, No. 30, pp. 211ff. National Archive, Prague, State Secretary to the Reich Protector in Bohemia and Moravia, Prague, inv. no. 176, file 109–4/1522, box 95; reprinted in Fremund: Heydrichova nadace, pp. 20ff.; cf. Wiedemann: The Reinhard Heydrich Foundation, p. 54.

[2] Wiedemann: The Reinhard Heydrich Foundation, p. 54.

[3] Cf. Detlef Brandes: “Ethnic Replacement, Resettlement, Racial Census”. Nazi “Ethnic Policy” in the Bohemian Lands. Munich 2012 (Publications of the Collegium Carolinum 125).

[4] Fremund: Heydrichova nadace, pp. 24–25; Wiedemann: The Reinhard Heydrich Foundation, pp. 44–47; Alena Míšková: The German (Charles) University, p. 166.

[5] Cf. Andreas Wiedemann: Karl Valentin Müller – a eugenicist in the service of ‘ethnic policy’. In: Stefan Albrecht, Jiří Malíř, Ralph Melville (eds.): ‘Sudeten German Historiography’. On the Background and Founding of the Historical Commission of the Sudeten Lands. Munich 2008 (Publications of the Collegium Carolinum 114), pp. 167–182; Michal Šimůnek: A New Subject. Hereditary and Racial Hygiene at the School of Medicine of the German Charles University in Prague 1939–1945. In: Antonín Kostlán (ed.): Science in the Bohemian Lands 1939–1945. Prague 2004, pp. 190–316, here pp. 239–251; Ota Konrád: Historiography, German Studies and Slavonic Studies at the German University in Prague 1918–1945. Prague 2011, pp. 241–244; Eduard Kubů: ‘The Significance of German Blood in Czech Identity’. The sociologist Karl Valentin Müller’s contribution to academic pedagogy on resolving the problem of the Germanisation of Central Europe. In: Bohemia 45 (2004), pp. 93–114.

[6] Wiedemann: The Reinhard Heydrich Foundation, pp. 77–79; Míšková: The German (Charles) University, p. 170.

[7] Other periodicals published or co-published by the RHS included *Slavia*, *Südostforschungen* and *Prager Studien und Dokumente zur Geistes- und Gesinnungsgeschichte*, *Volkswissenschaftliche Feldpostbriefe* and a *Volkswissenschaftlicher Informationsdienst*. See Wiedemann: The Reinhard Heydrich Foundation (as in note 1), pp. 86–88.

[8] On Beyer, see: Roth: Heydrich’s Professor, pp. 262–342.

[9] René Küpper: Karl Hermann Frank (1898–1946). A Political Biography of a Sudeten German National Socialist. Munich 2010 (Publications of the Collegium Carolinum 119).

[10] The directors are listed in brackets. The professional backgrounds of the 13 institute directors were as follows: five historians, three Slavicists, and one each of a psychologist, folklorist, lawyer, ethnologist and orientalist.

[11] Jiří Němec: Eduard Winter (1896–1982). ‘One of the most significant figures in Austrian intellectual history of our century is virtually unknown in Austria’. In: Karel Hruza (ed.): Austrian Historians 1900–1945. Biographies and Careers in Austria, Germany and Czechoslovakia in Portraits from the History of Science. Vienna 2008, pp. 619–676, here pp. 660–671; ibid.: Cesta Eduarda Wintra (1896–1982) mezi oficiální historiky Třetí říše [The Path of Eduard Winter (1896–1982) to Becoming an Official Historian of the Third Reich]. In: Proceedings of the Faculty of Arts, University of Brno C 48 (2001), pp. 171–188.

[12] Karel Hruza: Heinz Zatschek (1901–1965) – “Radical Concepts of Order” and “Thorough, Goal-Oriented Research”. In: Hruza (ed.): Austrian Historians 1900–1945 (as in note 11), pp. 677–792, here pp. 722–727.

[13] Joachim Bahlcke: Wilhelm Weizsäcker (1886–1961) – Lawyer. Legal History and the ‘People’s Community’. In: Glettler, Míšková (eds.): Prager Professoren, pp. 391–414; Thomas Krzenck: Wilhelm Weizsäcker – a scholar caught between guilt and complicity. In: Albrecht, Malíř, Melville (eds.): ‘Sudeten German Historiography’ (as in note 5), pp. 97–112.

[14] Cf. Martin Zückert: Josef Hanika (1900–1963): Folklorist. Between scholarly research and the ‘struggle for national identity’. In: Glettler, Míšková (eds.): Prague Professors, pp. 205–220; Tobias Weger: ‘Völkische’ scholarship between Prague, Eger and Munich. The example of Josef Hanika. In: Brenner, Franzen, Haslinger, Luft (eds.): Historiography of the Bohemian Lands, pp. 177–208.

[15] Cf. Martin Zückert: Edmund Schneeweis (1886–1964): Slavist and folklorist. Conformity as a scholarly strategy? In: Glettler, Míšková (eds.): Prague Professors, pp. 191–204.

[16] Klaas-Hinrich Ehlers: Gerhard Gesemann (1888–1948), Slavist. ‘Prof. Gesemann had grand plans…’ Slavic research in the political context of the 1930s and 1940s. In: Glettler, Míšková (eds.): Prague Professors, pp. 351–378.

[17] Daniel Kraft: Eugen Rippl (1888–1945), Slavist. “There must be no watering down or distortion in an academic publication…” An expert in the field of special language research. In: Glettler, Míšková (eds.): Prague Professors, pp. 323–350.

[18] The Economics Institute, which opened in July 1944, lasted only half a year.

[19] See Šisler: Vznik a formování, pp. 261–271.

[20] See Šisler: Vznik a formování, p. 266.

[21] Wiedemann: The Reinhard Heydrich Foundation, p. 36; Míšková: The German (Charles) University (as in note 4), pp. 152–157.

[22] Hruza: Heinz Zatschek (as in note 12), pp. 743ff. This includes, amongst other things, an article co-authored with Karl Valentin Müller: ‘The Biological Fate of the Přemyslids’. An example of the degenerative effect of German bloodlines in foreign ethnic groups. In: *Archiv für Rassen- und Gesellschaftsbiologie* 35 (1941), pp. 136–152.

[23] Wiedemann: The Reinhard Heydrich Foundation, p. 84.

[24] Wiedemann: The Reinhard Heydrich Foundation, pp. 94–97.

[25] SD Regional Headquarters Prague [Jacobi] to the German Minister of State for Bohemia and Moravia, SS-Obergruppenführer K. H. Frank, 27 April 1944. National archive, German State Ministry for Bohemia and Moravia [National Archive, German State Ministry for Bohemia and Moravia], Prague, inv. no. 680, file 110–4/529, fol. 46.

Stefan Lehr: The Reinhard Heydrich Foundation, Reich Foundation for Scientific Research in Prague (1942–1945). In: Online Encyclopaedia on the Culture and History of Germans in Eastern Europe, 2012. URL: ome-lexikon.uni-oldenburg.de/p32777 (as at 12 November 2021).