Der Einsatzstab Rosenberg und die Erfassung musikalischer Kulturgüter in Westeuropa während des Zweiten Weltkrieges

Abstract

In 1940, after the defeat of France by German military forces, both state and party agencies in the Third Reich established large-scale programs for the appropriation and theft of documents and artworks of presumed German origins from the occupied territories. For music scholars the search for such materials was handed over to the “Sonderstab Musik” (special commission for music), headed by Herbert Gerigk of the “Amt Rosenberg” (Rosenberg office). Musicologists working for the special commission, therefore, were simultaneously documenting German musical sources in the libraries and archives of the occupied territories, in many cases also participating in the theft of Jewish property.