Rendering of Meanings of the Great War in East Prussia and Memel Territory: Symbols, Practices and Rites

Abstract

The paper focuses on the remembrance of the First World War and the meaning attached to the war before 1939 in the only interwar German area directly affected by military action, i.e. in East Prussia and Memel Territory (Klaipėda Region) separated from it in 1920. It discloses various forms of giving prominence to battles and war victims, the rites dedicated to the memory of the war, and the rendering of the war-related meanings in monuments, toponymy, images, museum exhibits, and textbooks. The efforts of political and social actors to publicly exploit different war-related meanings are analysed.