Nature and Ideology: Natural Garden Design in ... - Dumbarton Oaks

“TEUTONIC” TRENDS
8. Germanic burial place in the province of Hannover
(from W. Pastor, Aus germanischer Vorzeit, Berlin, 1907, pl. VI)
culture to nature. Cultural history was idealized to natural history, as indicated in the subtitle of
Pastor’s book, The Earth in the Time of Man (Die Erde in der Zeit des Menschen): Attempt at a Natural
Scientific History of Culture (Versuch einer naturwissenschaftlichen Kulturgeschichte). Nature, the German
primeval forest, Pastor argued, “had contributed best to create the specific race that is today
the most important element of our planet.” 29
The primeval forest, with its clearings made by the early Germanic tribes for their settlements,
gained a great ideological significance. Pastor published a collection of essays entitled
Clearings (Lichtungen); his book The Earth in the Time of Man also contains a chapter entitled
“Clearings,” in which he quotes Tacitus’ description “of the first clearings in the Germanic
primeval forests.” 30 The concept of the clearing, including a council ring, was later realized with
Himmler’s Grove of the Saxons. The American landscape architect Jens Jensen had close contact
with German colleagues and was influenced by such ideas about Germanic and Nordic history.
His ideas about Clearings 31 and council rings may have been inspired by the works of Pastor and
related authors. He himself stated in his 1938 contribution to the International Horticulture
Conference in Berlin: “The Nordic, or if you please, Germanic mind, is not imbued with formalism
of any kind. To him it is an affected thing. It does not speak the truth as the truth should
29 Pastor, Deutsche Urzeit, 7.
30 Pastor, Die Erde, 190.
31 See, for example, J. Jensen, The Clearing: “A Way of Life,” Chicago, ca. 1949.
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