I'm hoping someone can shed some light on the true nature of the swastika.

It seems like everyone likes to point out where it came from, but what they say is often contradictory. I've heard that it was Hindu, Japanese, Native American, and Celtic.

Which is the correct answer, and if they are all correct (which I do suspect), then which version did Hitler specifically adopt?

Earliest recorded = India.

Why did Hitler adopt it? I have no idea.

it's actually an aryan sign, it was used by the indo aryans( the ones who settled in india), when hitler came to power he used the swastika, but his germo-aryan swastika is a mirror image of the indo aryan swastika. btw: you can still see swastikas on buildings in India

The swastika was also used as a good luck symbol by the Navaho Indians. The American 45th Infantry Division, a National Guard unit based in Arizona and New Mexico, used the swastika on their unit patch from 1923 to 1939:

http://www.omd.state.ok.us/45InfBde/images/45original.gif

In 1939, because the swastika had become so strongly identified with Germany in general and the Nazi party in particular, patch was changed to show another Navaho symbol, the Thunderbird:

http://www.omd.state.ok.us/45InfBde/images/45current.gif

Gee, those Aryans sure get around :rolleyes:.

I was assuming you knew what historical meant. The earliest WRITTEN RECORDS positively put them in India, OK?

Buddhist temples also have swatstikas on them, although they face the opposite direction (I can't recall the name for these).

It's usually a sun symbol, and a nice symmetrical design that has independantly cropped up just about everywhere in the world, both the Old and the New. The ancient Greek used it. It was around in India way before that. It's found in the Americas. In China and Japan it's a buddhist symbol. It's the cartographic sign for 'buddhist shrine' of Japanese street maps I've seen.

There's nothing particularily 'Aryan' about it except that the Nazis wanted it to be, and prior to them the German 'Völkisch' movement in the years around 1900. 'Völkisch' itself is next to unstranslatable, but it was a kind of chauvinistic, concervative and antisemitical popular movement. The Nazis picked up a lot of stuff from them, not least the anti-semitism, the cult of blond 'Aryans' as the creators of all of human civilisation and the swastika as an 'Aryan' symbol.

Aryan:

#1 Indo-Iranian. No longer in technical use.
#2 A member of the people who spoke the parent language of the Indo-European languages. No longer in technical use.
#3 A member of any people speaking an Indo-European language. No longer in technical use.

Meow.

when i was rewsearching it the reson they belive the native american have it too is because its is soo acient that it exsited at the time when humans croosed into north america.
Also you'll still find it on churches in europe. and in flags, such as Sicily's and the Isle of Man, use a three pointed one.

The Isle of Man symbol is not a swastika.

I believe Hitler saw the swastika in a church and adopted the symbol from there.

But I can't find any sources for this...

The Isle of Man symbol is not a swastika.
It's a 'triqskelion' [edited after reading Kafka2], three legs in a circle. It's also a sun symbol and of a design similar to the four-legged swastika.

There are all kinds of sun-crosses. That's the connection between them.

I believe Hitler saw the swastika in a church and adopted the symbol from there.

But I can't find any sources for this...
I think he saw it in the weird magazine 'Ostara: Bücherie der Blonde', published by the 'Aryan' and anti-semitical racial mystic Jörg Lanz von Liebenfels, when Hitler was a starving artist down on his luck in Vienna prior to WWI.

Here's what I found googling 'Lanz von Liebenfels' and 'swastika':
http://www.intelinet.org/swastika/swasti14.htm

in the movie about hitler, after he sees a comunist poster he decideds he needs a cool symbol of his own and just makes it up

The Isle of Man symbol is not a swastika.

yes, it is, it is a thre pronged swastika.

Is a cross still a cross if it has three points instead of the usual four?

Is a circle still a circle if it contains four right angles? No of course it isn't. The legs of Man are not a Swastika. If you pursue that logic you end up concluding that any mandala-esque design is a swastika.

Check out the history of the images.

Swastika- earliest known use is on the site of Troy, circa 1000BC.

Triskelion- a damned sight older, found on prehistoric rock carvings in Northern Italy.

So you're trying to tell me that two very different shapes, from differing cultures and times, are actually the same?

Here's another point to consider-


The representation of the triskell must be dextrogyrous (turning to the right). A senstrogyrous (turning to the left) triskell would have a maleficent, or at least hostile meaning. Traditional Breton dances and processions always turn to the right. The war dances of the ancient Celts started by turning to the left to show hostility, and ended by turning to the right, as a sign of victory.



The Manx triskelion turns right. The German swastika turns left.

in the movie about hitler, after he sees a comunist poster he decideds he needs a cool symbol of his own and just makes it up
What Hitler wrote in 'Mein Kampf' was that he struggled personally with the design (size of circle and the swastika in relationship to each other etc.), not that he invented the symbol.

It was already a favourite symbol of antisemitical Germanc/'Aryan' racial suprematists in Germany, Austria, Scandinavia etc.

In one thread got into a bit of a shouting-match with some Finns over the fact that the planes of the early Finnish air-force were decorated with blue swastikas on a white background. The first plane was a gift from the Swedish count Eric von Rosen and this was his personal symbol.

So the Finns are very quick to point out that his swastikas have nothing to do with Nazism.
Which is correct, since they predate Nazism.

On the other hand Eric von Rosen was a racial suprematist fishing in the same murky waters as the young Hitler (the German 'Völkisch movement'). The reason he chose the swastika was the same as the ones Nazism later had for chosing this symbol.

There's even more of a Nazi connection:
Eric von Rosen was a relative (cousin or somesuch) Karin von Kantzow who married Hermann Göring. Göring spent most of the early 1920's in Sweden (being treated for his morphine addiction and at least once committed to a psychiatric hospital), where he met and married Karin. They spent quite a bit of time at Rokelstad, her relative Eric's estate, where the swastika was an integral part of his style of interior decoration.

Is a cross still a cross if it has three points instead of the usual four?

Is a circle still a circle if it contains four right angles? No of course it isn't. The legs of Man are not a Swastika. If you pursue that logic you end up concluding that any mandala-esque design is a swastika.

is it still a cross if it has 3 beams? Is it a cross if its two diagonal lines? is it a cross if it has a circle in it? yes!! its a reletivly simple varition considering how widely dispersed the symbol was.

So the Finns are very quick to point out that his swastikas have nothing to do with Nazism.


And i repeat it still doesn't. ;)

And i repeat it still doesn't. ;)
And I agree.:goodjob:

I have heard of the Swastika being used by the Japanese, Celts and Indians prior to the Nazis adopting it. The Japanese and Celtic references I have heard are simply conversational and I haven't found anything to support them.

I do however know plenty about the Hindu use of the Swastika - I am looking at one now, it's painted on the doorframe of my office. Here's the most succinct and accurate write up to explain further:

"The word Swastika is normally believed to be an amalgam of the words Su and Asati. Su means 'good' and Asati meant 'to exist'.

As per Sanskrit grammer the words Su and Asati when amalgamated into one word become Swasti (as in the case of Su and Aaatam becoming Swagatam meaning welcome). If this derivation of the word Swastika is true, then the literal meaning of the term Swastika would be 'let good-prevail'.

There exist many types of signs which stand for the Swastika. Even the standard version has two forms the one facing the right also called the symbol of- the right hand path and the one facing the left called the symbol of the lefthand path. These two Swastikas are also considered to represent the male and female. There is also a Swastika which is an amalgam of these two types."

Let good prevail!!!

EDIT: You will find that pretty much most Indians around the world, Hindu or not, will think of the above when shown a Swastika and NOT of the Nazi use. I was educated in England and had the message that the Nazis were evil shoved down my throat from a young age. Yet despite this and despite the fact I am not a Hindu Indian, I still think of the ancient Hindu symbol first. People are right to point out that the Swastika may be seen on buildings in India to this day. It is everywhere - motorbike stickers, painted on an elephants flank, on a school girl's exercise book, painted on a tree near where a saddhu (holy man prays), on a Dad's lunch box, on a kite, a T-shirt - it's everywhere and the connotations are hugely benevolent.

Here's a page with some interesting swastikas:

http://www.geocities.com/scocasso/manji/manji01.htm

and:

http://www.answers.com/topic/swastika

is it still a cross if it has 3 beams? Is it a cross if its two diagonal lines? is it a cross if it has a circle in it? yes!! its a reletivly simple varition considering how widely dispersed the symbol was.

Take a crucifix. Remove one of the points, then turn it upside-down, so it now resembles an inverted "T". To reverse the symbolic meaning, replace the Jesus figure with Ronald McDonald. Instead of having him crucified, have him licking the "T" suggestively. Is it still a crucifix?

It was a dumb comparison.

Take a crucifix. Remove one of the points, then turn it upside-down, so it now resembles an inverted "T". To reverse the symbolic meaning, replace the Jesus figure with Ronald McDonald. Instead of having him crucified, have him licking the "T" suggestively. Is it still a crucifix?
It's still a 'tau'-cross.
(Symbol of St. Anthony, Mithra, Thor and a few others.)

But is it a crucifix?

No.

Sorry. Double post. (Weird connection problem.)

But is it a crucifix?

No.
They share the distinction of being crosses, and that aspect makes them comparable.
But no, a tau-cross isn't a crucifix without the figure of Christ, just like a 'triskele' isn't a 'tetraskele', the Greek designation for the swastika, though the design concept is similar.

When I went to the official Carlsberg museum in Copenhagen two years ago, I saw some old Carlsberg beers pre-ww2. They had swastikas on them. Don't know why though.

We used to have a swastika on Sutton Hall at the University of Oklahoma. I think it's still there. The building dates back before 1923.

Didn't Hitler take the Swastika and fliped it and rotated it 45 degrees?

But is it a crucifix?

No.
a vacuem cleaner would be a crucifix if i stapled a jesus on tom it. i dont understand why your so unwilling to admit the the swatika has thousands of variations-being as its an acient symbol, and one of those variations is on the Manx Flag. that web link clearly shows and state this fact.

Didn't Hitler take the Swastika and fliped it and rotated it 45 degrees?

Exactly, and in that form the swastika got it's bad reputation.

a vacuem cleaner would be a crucifix if i stapled a jesus on tom it. i dont understand why your so unwilling to admit the the swatika has thousands of variations-being as its an acient symbol, and one of those variations is on the Manx Flag. that web link clearly shows and state this fact.

Because the triskelion is the older symbol, and from a different culture, in addition to being significantly different in structure and with a very distinct and seperate symbolism.

Slapping on a triskelion a label attached to a different and later symbol from a different culture is like calling a horse-drawn travois like the plains Indians used "a motorbike". Or calling a Neolithic arrowhead "an ICBM". Or calling the Holy Roman Empire "Germany". It's lazy, ignorant of history, and plain wrong.

And, no- a vacuum cleaner would not be a crucifix if you simply slapped a Jesus on it. The Jesus form would have to be in the crucifixion pose to qualify, in which case the Jesus form is the crucfixion in its own right and the vacuum cleaner is a superfluous addition.

In Singapore, we have a Buddhist organization called the Red Swastika Society... It's a religious and charity organization, nothing to do with the Nazis...

I'm just here to give a few links.

http://www.crystalinks.com/swastika.html

It was used by early Christians as an alternative cross to avoid persecution, and by later Christians as a decorative emblem.

Interesting....

http://www.intelinet.org/swastika/swasti01.htm

http://www.kamat.com/indica/culture/sub-cultures/swastika.htm

http://news.indiainfo.com/2005/01/19/1901hindus.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swastika%2C_Ontario

About the swastikas found in churches (such as Hagia Sofia, true not a church anymore, but the swaskikas date from when it was), what did they symbolize?

Most likely good luck. At least they are with Native Americans and Hindus.

Earliest recorded = India.

Why did Hitler adopt it? I have no idea.

Hitler was a pagan

That's a confused over-simplification. Reading Hitler's quotes on religious issues you end up concluding that what he worshipped was a Nationalistic ideal that hinged upon himself. He seems to have felt that everyone had divinity in them, but that he was considerably more divine than everyone else.

So you're looking at a personal ego cult really.

Why did Hitler choose the sawstika? I think it's a simple answer.

Hitler liked arcane symbols that he didn't really understand, particularly jagged and dramatic symbolism- check out the SS lightning-flashes. He surrounded himself in fetishistic imagery- statues, torches, flags etc. The swastika was just another dramatic symbol to be assimilated.

The swastika had the added advantage that most people in Germany in the 1920's already associated it with German/Aryan racial supremacy and anit-semitism.

My Boy Scout troop that dates back to the earliest days of the organization (about 1920's) used the swastika as a symbol back then, although I am in the Eastern US and I don't think the Northeastern Indian tribes ever used it.

Hitler wasnt Pagan, thats just propaganda, he was Christian :D .

As for why he used the swastika I really dont know, possibly he got it from the same place he got the idea about Aryans - India and old Sanskrit records. Does he give any clues in Mein Kampf?

The Swastika means 'unconqerable' it also makes a bold statement and is a powerful symbol for the uses of propaganda like the Soviet star or the hammer and sickle, which Hitler was combating on his rise to power from 1918 - 1933.

If you notice a lot of Hitler's early tricks were taken from socialist and communist movement leader's and it is widley thought that the swastika was used simply for the need of a powerful and evocative symbol for the infantile National Socialist movement.

As the meaning of the swastika is unconquerable it also shows what Hitler thought of the German people. Remember the German Reich as Hitler saw it had never lost a war, only it was stabbed in the back by what he termed as liberal parlimentarians and 'Jewish Communists' in a worldwide 'conspiracy' against the Germans who he termed as Aryan or in his mind superior.

Now to get all this from a symbol is easy and shows that while we might not like him (I defintley dont) Hitler was an absolute genuis in creating a message, and carrying it forth to the German people in a variety of means, caluculated to ensnare the thoughts of the very people it was designed for.

I got a present for a birthday a while back, it was Indian-styled, and featured Indian symbols, including a reversed Swastika.
The Swastika was originally an Indian good-luck symbol.
Hitler adapted the HakeunsKreuz (Bent Cross) and made a flag out of it. It is not the HakensKreuz per se that is the intersting bit, it's the amalgam of the flag that made the swastika.
The HakensKreuz represented some arcane ideal. The white circle represented Aryan purity. The red background represented the blood of fallen comrades.

Have you guys considered that that symbol is not exactly complex and that it therefore makes sense that completely different people from completely different cultures "thought it up" without ever knowing of each other?
I got a present for a birthday a while back, it was Indian-styled, and featured Indian symbols, including a reversed Swastika.
The Swastika was originally an Indian good-luck symbol.
Hitler adapted the HakeunsKreuz (Bent Cross) and made a flag out of it. It is not the HakensKreuz per se that is the intersting bit, it's the amalgam of the flag that made the swastika.
The HakensKreuz represented some arcane ideal. The white circle represented Aryan purity. The red background represented the blood of fallen comrades.
Just by the way, it's "Hakenkreuz" without the "s" and writing capital letters within a word is a strange idea, unless you are using acronyms, which then again aren't really words... ;)

Have you guys considered that that symbol is not exactly complex and that it therefore makes sense that completely different people from completely different cultures "thought it up" without ever knowing of each other?

Just by the way, it's "Hakenkreuz" without the "s" and writing capital letters within a word is a strange idea, unless you are using acronyms, which then again aren't really words... ;)

Grammar Nazi.

Grammar Nazi.
I'm a spelling Nazi, actually.

I'm a spelling Nazi, actually.

Well, half of that's right.

Well, half of that's right.
"I'm a spelling"

"Imaseln ai culy."

"' pligNz culy"

"Nazi, actually."

:hmm:

Why do whenever people see a swastika, German or otherwise, they inherently think evil? Why can't anyone see it for its geometrical value, or how it looks cool!?

I have a collection of Rudyard Kipling's poetry with an Indian swastika in the front. It dates to around 1903. He used on all his books until the rise of the Nazis.

The swastikas in Donald Duck in Nutziland (aka Der Fuehrer's Face) are the Kipling's rotated 45 degrees, which is the mirror image of the Nazi swastika.

Originally Posted by Hitro
Have you guys considered that that symbol is not exactly complex and that it therefore makes sense that completely different people from completely different cultures "thought it up" without ever knowing of each other?

That's pretty likely what could've happened. Some ideas spread around, and some just evolve independently (e.g. ideas of murder being wrong, currency). It could be that someone in a North American tribe just thought it up and used it as a symbol, and that someone in India did the same. After all, it's not that complicated a shape.

Earliest recorded = India.

Why did Hitler adopt it? I have no idea.
I believe it was adopted as it was a symbol of good luck, or good fortune or something along those lines.

Why do whenever people see a swastika, German or otherwise, they inherently think evil? Why can't anyone see it for its geometrical value, or how it looks cool!?

:agree:

I like the Swastika. It's a shame hitlar had to screw things up. Besides that, its also a Chinese letter. Just Guess what 卍 means.

From a diwali festival in india

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/fd/DiwaliSwastika.jpg

Interesting debate, and I have only a small piece to interject:

I was watching "The Grey Fox" (I think that was the name) documentary in my history class oh so long ago...it was a black and white documentary, comparing Hitler and Reynard the Fox, one of my favorite childhood stories.

Its explanation for the official adoption of the swastika flag was somewhat different from what has been posted above. It didn't say that Hitler himself created it, but that it was used by Nazis and recognized by Hitler as one of the symbols of their regime. Then, before WW2 started, a German ship flying the Nazi flag alongside the official German flag visited an American harbor. Angry American protestors (some Jewish, if I recall) climbed aboard the ship, pulled the flag down, and tore it up (it apparently was also captured on video camera). Apparently, the Nazis were so outraged by this act they decided to respond by making the swastika their official emblem.

I'll try to dig up the specific references and hopefully that footage...

Didn't Hitler take the Swastika and fliped it and rotated it 45 degrees?


You can see old (pre-Nazi) swastika symbols here and there. Hitler wasn't that original, as the symbol was flipped and rotated already before his times.

Swastika's nature as a symbol is to present eternity and everlasting movement, without start or end.

Swastika was a symbol many things, such as sun, sun's movement, rotation of earth, life and transmigration of soul, different phases of life and death. Basicly anything which goes on without clear start and end. The day or sun's movement was seen starting from the east (left) to the west (right) - this is why the first swastikas are usually "mirror images" to the Nazi swastika. Swastika was already "flipped" centuries ago, when it portrayed the way how world rotation was seen, from left to right. In the East life often wasn't limited to birth and death like the Western people usually tend to experience it.

In the late 19th century and early 20th century you can see a boom in using swastika as a decorative form in the Western decorative art, especially in art nouveau or art deco. In those times mythologies, occultism and spiritualism, sort of first form of New Age was experienced in the West. This pop culture kind of formed base for the Nazi mythology.

Hitler decided to use Swastika as the symbol of Nazi movement because he and other leading early Nazis like Ernst Hanfstaengl thought the movement needed similar eye-catching symbol to communism with its red flag and yellow hammer, sickle and star. Hitler designed the symbol very carefully. First people to see it described their feelings later, how amazed and captivated they felt and that they knew the Nazi movement will prevail in German politics. For many early followers, seeing the flag was a moment of decision and silent oath to follow it. Then why he used the swastika? There are no simple answers as there was no clear Nazi mythology back then. One solution could be that in Linz, Austria where he spent his boyhood, was a church which had a big decorative swastika.

In those years swastika was already used in many different ways. For example Finnish airforce used it because it received it's first aeroplane from a Swedish count who used swastika as his symbol of luck. This in 1917, when corporal Hitler was sitting in the trenches somewhere near Ypres without an idea how the future will be like.


Hope this sheds some light...

We used to have a swastika on Sutton Hall at the University of Oklahoma. I think it's still there. The building dates back before 1923.

Still there. They mentioned it in the student paper a few days ago.

The Boy Scout troop I was in growing up, which dated back to the earliest days of the BSA, once used the swastika as a logo.

when i was rewsearching it the reson they belive the native american have it too is because its is soo acient that it exsited at the time when humans croosed into north america.
Also you'll still find it on churches in europe. and in flags, such as Sicily's and the Isle of Man, use a three pointed one.

The Sicilian flag is possibly the strangest one I have ever seen.

The swastika motif is still part of some Finnish medals, the presidential flag and the air force unit badges (flags). I think the air force badges are something of little interest to most folks but trying to alter the Cross of Liberty (sometimes also called the Mannerheim Cross here) would probably result in an outcry.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swastika#Finland