Wilhelm Marr and Houston Stewart Chamberlain

Wilhelm Marr

Known as the father of modern antisemitism, Wilhelm Marr (1819-1904) led the fight to overturn Jewish emancipation in Germany. His conception of antisemitism focused on the supposed racial, as opposed to religious, characteristics of the Jews. His 1879 Berlin-based organization, the League of Anti-Semites, introduced the word "anti-Semite" into the political lexicon and established the first popular political movement based entirely on anti-Jewish beliefs. 

Houston Stewart Chamberlain

English-born Houston Stewart Chamberlain (1855-1927) was a social Darwinist and a true racist. He was welcomed into composer Richard Wagner's larger circles of German society when he became his son-in-law. In 1899, his Foundations of the 19th Century allowed him to reach public fame. In it, he provides his readership with a new approach to Western history in relation to the question of race and the necessary rise of Germanic power. He was, therefore, read and admired by the major figures of the Nazi ideology - one of whom was Hitler. 

Certain anthropologists would fain teach us that all races are equally gifted; we point to history and answer: that is a lie! The races of mankind are markedly different in the nature and also in the extent of their gifts, and the Germanic races belong to the most highly gifted group, the group usually termed Aryan. Is this human family united and uniform by bonds of blood?... I do not know and I do not much care; no affinity binds more closely than elective affinity, and in this sense the Indo-European Aryans certainly form a family...Physically and mentally the Aryans are pre-eminent among all people; for that reason they are by right...the lords of the world.