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Documentary - The Rape of Europa

JMapleton

JMapleton

Diamond Member
I watched this documentary on Netflix last night. It's about art and antiquities stolen by the Nazi's during WWII and the role art played in the Nazi regime.

I had probably an "above average" knowledge of WWII before and I was in no way an historian on the subject, but I never realized what awful physical damage the Nazi's did to Europe, let alone the lives lost. Historic cities like Warsaw, Pisa, Florence, and many other incredibly historic areas are absolutely annihilated by the WWII belligerents. Places like The Compansanto and Monte Cassino were nearly lost completely. Most people in our generation have never heard of these places, this is probably why, because now there is nothing original left to see but 100 years ago these places would have been household names to the well traveled.

The documentary mainly deals with the art of Europe and how is was stolen by the Nazis, hidden by the Allied, and many of it lost in the process. Like all the most valuable works of art of all of Europe were moved around and transported from place to place, hand to hand, treated like it was garbage on occasion, and some of it stolen by looters. Incredible the scope of this. Like all the history of Europe was moved around during a few short years.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Rape_of_Europa

It's on Netflix, I HIGHLY recommend it for anyone interested in history.
 
Good thread. I bought this documentary. The history is little known that stealing the art of Europe was a major agenda for the Nazis.
 
JMapleton said:
I had probably an "above average" knowledge of WWII before and I was in no way an historian on the subject, but I never realized what awful physical damage the Nazi's did to Europe, let alone the lives lost.
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That does not compute.
 
Craig234 said:
Good thread. I bought this documentary. The history is little known that stealing the art of Europe was a major agenda for the Nazis.
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Hitler knew very well the incalculable value of the art. He was a failed artist himself before his rise in politics, and the scope of this fact is often overlooked. He was denied attending the Vienna School of Art. Not surprisingly, there never were any people in his landscape paintings.
 
I was pretty impressed with the documentary. I new there was some looting, but not to the systemic degree the Nazi had setup. I'm sure most of the missing paintings will never be found.
 
uh, monte cassino was destroyed by american bombers for no real purpose, not the nazis.
 
ElFenix said:
uh, monte cassino was destroyed by american bombers for no real purpose, not the nazis.
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It was destroyed because they thought they were using it as a lookout post. But indirectly it was destroyed by the Nazi's, as if they had not risen to power, Monte Cassino would still exist.
 
Europa-moon.gif


???
 
Much of the art went into private collections.

They know that it was stolen; therefore do not display in out in showings or loan it to museums/galleries
 
EagleKeeper said:
Much of the art went into private collections.

They know that it was stolen; therefore do not display in out in showings or loan it to museums/galleries
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That is true - there are many wealthy sons of bitches who do this, and this includes national museums (hello, England), and also happened quite a bit with the Iraq war looting.
 
Many people who are very familiar with the battles of WWII may not know much about other parts of the war, from this art looting to many of the civilian atrocities.

I've posted threads before about where the civilian casualties in the war happened, and they are a story.

A statistic I recently ran across, if the bomb that injured Hitler in 1944 had ended the war, half of the German soldiers killed would not have been.

It seems the German rulers had a 'nothing to lose' view of what would happen to them and so the German war machine refused surrender greatly increasing the killing.
 
Craig234 said:
Many people who are very familiar with the battles of WWII may not know much about other parts of the war, from this art looting to many of the civilian atrocities.
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True but Europe's stolen art and the untold destruction of its historical heritage is pretty well known. Certainly I would think that anyone claiming to have "above average" knowledge of WWII would be familiar with at least the basics of this.
 
Locut0s said:
True but Europe's stolen art and the untold destruction of its historical heritage is pretty well known. Certainly I would think that anyone claiming to have "above average" knowledge of WWII would be familiar with at least the basics of this.
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I think the point he was trying to make is some folks are knowledgeable about just the battles and didnt ever study the overall history. Like armchair generals, grognards.


Ignorance can be amazingly specific. There are assloads of people living in Manassas that dont know two battles were fought here including the very first first one.
 
shortylickens said:
I think the point he was trying to make is some folks are knowledgeable about just the battles and didnt ever study the overall history. Like armchair generals, grognards.


Ignorance can be amazingly specific. There are assloads of people living in Manassas that dont know two battles were fought here including the very first first one.
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Very true I guess. I usually assume very specific knowledge comes with "checklist knowledge" of the very basics as well but I suppose that's not always the case.
 
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