Vortrag: Grundlinien der Geschichte des Baltikums

In the organizer's words:

Introductory lecture by Prof. Dr. Winfrid Halder on the joint study trip with the Gesellschaft für Christlich-Jüdische Zusammenarbeit Düsseldorf e. V. to Lithuania and Latvia (July 02 to 09, 2026)
Open to all interested parties

Anyone leafing through Gerhard Köbler's "Historisches Lexikon der deutschen Länder" (Historical Dictionary of the German States), which was last republished by the renowned academic publisher C. H. Beck in 2019, may be in for a surprise. The subtitle of this standard historical work is "The German Territories from the Middle Ages to the Present" - and then there is an article on Riga, the current capital of Latvia. If you want to drive there from Schwedt an der Oder, for example, which is probably the most north-eastern major city on the territory of the Federal Republic of Germany today, you have around 1,200 kilometers ahead of you once you have crossed the Oder directly at Schwedt, all the way across Polish, Lithuanian and Latvian territory. Nevertheless, Gerhard Köbler was of course not mistaken when he included the city in his handbook. Riga owes its foundation in 1201 to the missionary bishop Albert von Buxhoeveden (around 1165-1229), who came from near Bremen and whose statue can still be found on the city's mighty cathedral. Albert is also said to have laid the foundation stone of the cathedral. Riga was also a Hanseatic city (since 1282), like Dortmund or Soest or Danzig or many other once or still German cities, all of which can be looked up in Köbler. The city on the Daugava (which not coincidentally also has a German name, namely Düna) was also subject to the Teutonic Order for a time, and then even had the status of a Free Imperial City for some time, which Cologne, for example, never achieved without controversy, in contrast to Wangen im Allgäu, for example (see Köbler). From the late 16th century, Riga belonged to Poland-Lithuania, then was Swedish for almost a century from 1621, before falling to the Russian Tsarist Empire. This did not change the fact that German was the main language spoken in the city. Naturally, German was also the mother tongue of Heinz Erhardt (1909-1979), who was born and grew up there. When German television audiences voted Erhardt the second best German comedian in 2007, very few people were aware of the not entirely uncomplicated history of his home town - except for those who occasionally leaf through the "Köbler". But their number should not be overestimated. When Ehrhardt was elected, it was probably not particularly emphasized that an uncle of his became the first finance minister of the newly independent Republic of Latvia in 1919, while Riga also became the capital of Latvia for the first time.

You could leaf through the "Köbler" and find out, for example, that the now Lithuanian Tauroggen (Tauragė) can also be found there, as it belonged to Prussia for some time ... In general, it is a good idea to realize how much we Germans have in common with the history of our Baltic neighbors. And this has been the case for centuries and not just since April 2025, when Panzerbrigade 45, the first large-scale Bundeswehr unit outside the borders of the Federal Republic of Germany, was stationed in Rukla, Lithuania. This is logical in terms of security policy, but also historically. You just need to know why. Let's try to get an overview together.