Muselmann (
German
German(s) may refer to:
* Germany (of or related to)
**Germania (historical use)
* Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language
** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law
**Ger ...
plural Muselmänner) was a
slang
Slang is vocabulary (words, phrases, and linguistic usages) of an informal register, common in spoken conversation but avoided in formal writing. It also sometimes refers to the language generally exclusive to the members of particular in-gro ...
term used amongst prisoners of German
Nazi concentration camps
From 1933 to 1945, Nazi Germany operated more than a thousand concentration camps, (officially) or (more commonly). The Nazi concentration camps are distinguished from other types of Nazi camps such as forced-labor camps, as well as concen ...
during the
Holocaust
The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; a ...
(
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
) to refer to those suffering from a combination of
starvation
Starvation is a severe deficiency in caloric energy intake, below the level needed to maintain an organism's life. It is the most extreme form of malnutrition. In humans, prolonged starvation can cause permanent organ damage and eventually, dea ...
(known also as "hunger disease") and exhaustion, as well as those who were resigned to their impending death.
The Muselmann prisoners exhibited severe emaciation
Emaciation is defined as the state of extreme thinness from absence of body fat and muscle wasting usually resulting from malnutrition.
Characteristics
In humans, the physical appearance of emaciation includes thinned limbs, pronounced and protrud ...
and physical weakness, an apathetic listlessness regarding their own fate, and unresponsiveness to their surroundings owing to their barbaric treatment.
Some scholars argue that the term possibly comes from the Muselmanns' inability to stand for any time due to the loss of leg muscle, thus leading them to spend much of their time in a prone position
Prone position () is a body position in which the person lies flat with the chest down and the back up. In anatomical terms of location, the dorsal side is up, and the ventral side is down. The supine position is the 180° contrast.
Etymolog ...
.[Muselmann definition]
(PDF) Yad Vashem
Yad Vashem ( he, יָד וַשֵׁם; literally, "a memorial and a name") is Israel's official memorial to the victims of the Holocaust. It is dedicated to preserving the memory of the Jews who were murdered; honoring Jews who fought against th ...
, official website. Shoah Resource Center, The International School for Holocaust Studies. Retrieved 30 November 2010 Muselmann also literally means "a Muslim
Muslims ( ar, المسلمون, , ) are people who adhere to Islam, a monotheistic religion belonging to the Abrahamic tradition. They consider the Quran, the foundational religious text of Islam, to be the verbatim word of the God of Abrah ...
" in Yiddish
Yiddish (, or , ''yidish'' or ''idish'', , ; , ''Yidish-Taytsh'', ) is a West Germanic language historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews. It originated during the 9th century in Central Europe, providing the nascent Ashkenazi community with a ver ...
and a number of other languages (albeit with spelling differences), and ultimately derives from the Old Turkish word for Muslim, '' مسلمان'' (''müsliman'').
Etymology
"Muselmann" seemingly derives from the German '' Muselman'', a historical term for "Muslim" (literally "mussulman
Mussulman, or variants, may refer to:
* An archaic or foreign-language term for a Muslim
People
*Bill Musselman (1940–2000), American basketball coach
*Eric Musselman (born 1964), American basketball coach
*Jeff Musselman (born 1963), American ...
") which is now considered derogatory
A pejorative or slur is a word or grammatical form expressing a negative or a disrespectful connotation, a low opinion, or a lack of respect toward someone or something. It is also used to express criticism, hostility, or disregard. Sometimes, a ...
. If this derivation is correct, "Muselmann" would literally mean "Muslim man" (''Muselman'' + ''Mann'') - but how this term later came to be used to denote starving concentration camp prisoners is uncertain. Some scholars argue that the term may derive from the Muselmann's inability to stand due to a combination of exhaustion and starvation-induced muscular atrophy in their legs, thus forcing them to spend much of their time in a prone position
Prone position () is a body position in which the person lies flat with the chest down and the back up. In anatomical terms of location, the dorsal side is up, and the ventral side is down. The supine position is the 180° contrast.
Etymolog ...
, which may have evoked the image of the Muslim practice of prostration
Prostration is the gesture of placing one's body in a reverentially or submissively prone position. Typically prostration is distinguished from the lesser acts of bowing or kneeling by involving a part of the body above the knee, especially t ...
during prayer, called ''Sujud
Sujūd ( ar, سُجود, ), or sajdah (, ), is the act of low bowing or prostration to God facing the ''qiblah'' (direction of the Kaaba at Mecca). It is usually done in standardized prayers (salah). The position involves kneeling and bowing t ...
''.
Viktor Frankl
Viktor Emil Frankl (26 March 1905 – 2 September 1997)
was an Austrian psychiatrist who founded logotherapy, a school of psychotherapy that describes a search for a life's meaning as the central human motivational force. Logotherapy is part ...
, who survived internment in the Auschwitz-Birkenau concentration camp, wrote in his memoirs that the term was first used by camp's prisoners to refer to the ''Kapo
A kapo or prisoner functionary (german: Funktionshäftling) was a prisoner in a Nazi camp who was assigned by the ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS) guards to supervise forced labor or carry out administrative tasks.
Also called "prisoner self-administrat ...
s'' - prisoners assigned to supervise forced labor by the SS guards - as to them, the term "Muslim" carried a connotation of barbarism. On the other hand, Eugen Kogon
Eugen Kogon (2 February 1903 – 24 December 1987) was a historian and Nazi concentration camp survivor. A well-known Christian opponent of the Nazi Party, he was arrested more than once and spent six years at Buchenwald concentration camp. Kogon ...
, who survived internment in Buchenwald
Buchenwald (; literally 'beech forest') was a Nazi concentration camp established on hill near Weimar, Germany, in July 1937. It was one of the first and the largest of the concentration camps within Germany's 1937 borders. Many actual or su ...
, wrote that the term originated from Nazi staff-members, who ascribed the Muselmann's apparent apathy to their circumstances (likely the result of weakness and acute hunger) to Islamic fatalism
Fatalism is a family of related philosophical doctrines that stress the subjugation of all events or actions to fate or destiny, and is commonly associated with the consequent attitude of resignation in the face of future events which are thou ...
.
Other theories as to the term's origins completely eschew any intimate connection to the notions of Islam, as even by the outbreak of World War II, the term ''Muselman'' was considered archaic, and was rarely used to refer to Muslims. Marie Jalowicz-Simon, a philologist
Philology () is the study of language in oral and written historical sources; it is the intersection of textual criticism, literary criticism, history, and linguistics (with especially strong ties to etymology). Philology is also defined as th ...
who also survived Nazi persecution, argued that by the 1940s, ''Muselmann'' had become a colloquial term for the elderly or infirm, which allowed it to be co-opted into the Nazi vocabulary.
Usage of the term in literature
The American psychologist David P. Boder assisted in identifying the term ''musselman'' when in 1946 he conducted interviews with camp survivors in Europe. He asked them to describe, spell and pronounce the word for camp inmates so emaciated that they had lost the will to live.
Primo Levi
Primo Michele Levi (; 31 July 1919 – 11 April 1987) was an Italian chemist, partisan, writer, and Jewish Holocaust survivor. He was the author of several books, collections of short stories, essays, poems and one novel. His best-known works ...
tried to explain the term (he also uses ''Musselman'') in a footnote of ''If This Is a Man
''If This Is a Man'' ( it, Se questo è un uomo ; United States title: ''Survival in Auschwitz'') is a memoir by Italians, Italian History of the Jews in Italy, Jewish writer Primo Levi, first published in 1947. It describes his arrest as a memb ...
'' (the commonly found English translation is titled ''Survival in Auschwitz''), his autobiographical account of his time in Auschwitz
Auschwitz concentration camp ( (); also or ) was a complex of over 40 concentration and extermination camps operated by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland (in a portion annexed into Germany in 1939) during World War II and the Holocaust. It con ...
:
The psychologist
A psychologist is a professional who practices psychology and studies mental states, perceptual, cognitive, emotional, and social processes and behavior. Their work often involves the experimentation, observation, and interpretation of how indi ...
and Auschwitz survivor Viktor Frankl
Viktor Emil Frankl (26 March 1905 – 2 September 1997)
was an Austrian psychiatrist who founded logotherapy, a school of psychotherapy that describes a search for a life's meaning as the central human motivational force. Logotherapy is part ...
, in his book ''Man's Search for Meaning
''Man's Search for Meaning'' is a 1946 book by Viktor Frankl chronicling his experiences as a prisoner in Nazi concentration camps during World War II, and describing his psychotherapeutic method, which involved identifying a purpose in life to f ...
'', provides the example of a prisoner who decides to use up his last cigarettes (used as currency in the concentration camps) in the evening because he is convinced he won't survive the ''Appell Appell is a surname. Notable people with the surname include:
*Dave Appell (1922–2014), American arranger, producer, and musician
* Olga Appell (born 1963), Mexican-American long-distance runner
*Paul Émile Appell or M. P. Appell (1855–1930), ...
'' (roll call assembly) the next morning; his fellow captives derided him as a ''Muselmann''. Frankl compares this to the dehumanized behavior and attitudes of the kapo
A kapo or prisoner functionary (german: Funktionshäftling) was a prisoner in a Nazi camp who was assigned by the ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS) guards to supervise forced labor or carry out administrative tasks.
Also called "prisoner self-administrat ...
s.
Italian philosopher Giorgio Agamben
Giorgio Agamben ( , ; born 22 April 1942) is an Italian philosopher best known for his work investigating the concepts of the state of exception, form-of-life (borrowed from Ludwig Wittgenstein) and '' homo sacer''. The concept of biopolitics ( ...
defined his key examples of 'bare life', the Muselmann and the patient in an overcoma, in relation to their passivity and inertia. The Muselmann was for him "a being from whom humiliation, horror and fear had so taken away all consciousness and personality as to make him absolutely apathetic", " te and absolutely alone ... without memory and without grief."
The testimonial of Polish witness Adolf Gawalewicz, ''Refleksje z poczekalni do gazu: ze wspomnień muzułmana'' ("Reflections in the Gas Chamber's Waiting Room: From the Memoirs of a Muselmann"), published in 1968, incorporates the term in the title of the work.
Canadian Jewish author Eli Pfefferkorn published a novel in 2011 with the title ''The Muselmann at the Water Cooler''.
The narrator of British author Michael Moorcock
Michael John Moorcock (born 18 December 1939) is an English writer, best-known for science fiction and fantasy, who has published a number of well-received literary novels as well as comic thrillers, graphic novels and non-fiction. He has work ...
's ''Pyat Quartet
The ''Pyat Quartet'', also known as ''Between the Wars'', is a tetralogy of historical fiction novels by English author Michael Moorcock comprising ''Byzantium Endures'', ''The Laughter of Carthage'', ''Jerusalem Commands'' and ''The Vengeance o ...
'' is a concentration camp survivor who frequently states "I will not become a musselman" when recalling past traumas. The narrative intentionally plays on the etymology of the term, as the titular ''Pyat'' is a racist obsessed with the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople
The Fall of Constantinople, also known as the Conquest of Constantinople, was the capture of the capital of the Byzantine Empire by the Ottoman Empire. The city fell on 29 May 1453 as part of the culmination of a 53-day siege which had begun o ...
.
The word ''Musselman'' is frequently used in a demeaning manner. For example, in his book ''Man's Search for Meaning
''Man's Search for Meaning'' is a 1946 book by Viktor Frankl chronicling his experiences as a prisoner in Nazi concentration camps during World War II, and describing his psychotherapeutic method, which involved identifying a purpose in life to f ...
'' author and Holocaust survivor Viktor Frankl
Viktor Emil Frankl (26 March 1905 – 2 September 1997)
was an Austrian psychiatrist who founded logotherapy, a school of psychotherapy that describes a search for a life's meaning as the central human motivational force. Logotherapy is part ...
berates the attitudes of those who fit his definition of the word ''Musselman'' by associating the word with those who are unable to psychologically endure the brutal tactics utilized by the Nazis.
Origin and alternative slang terms
The term spread from Auschwitz-Birkenau to other concentration camps. Its equivalent in the Majdanek concentration camp
Majdanek (or Lublin) was a Nazi concentration and extermination camp built and operated by the SS on the outskirts of the city of Lublin during the German occupation of Poland in World War II. It had seven gas chambers, two wooden gallows, a ...
was ''Gamel'' (derived from German ''gammeln'', colloquial for "rotting") and in the Stutthof concentration camp
Stutthof was a Nazi concentration camp established by Nazi Germany in a secluded, marshy, and wooded area near the village of Stutthof (now Sztutowo) 34 km (21 mi) east of the city of Danzig (Gdańsk) in the territory of the German-a ...
''Krypel'' (derived from German ''Krüppel'', "cripple"). When prisoners reached this emaciated condition, they were selected by camp doctors and murdered by gas, bullets or various other methods.
In the Soviet Gulag
The Gulag, an acronym for , , "chief administration of the camps". The original name given to the system of camps controlled by the GPU was the Main Administration of Corrective Labor Camps (, )., name=, group= was the government agency in ...
s, the term ''dokhodyaga'' (Russian доходяга "goner") was used for someone in a similar situation.
Action 14f13
Those prisoners considered ''Muselmänner'' and thus unable to work were also very likely to be labelled "excess ballast" inside the concentration camps. In spring 1941 Heinrich Himmler
Heinrich Luitpold Himmler (; 7 October 1900 – 23 May 1945) was of the (Protection Squadron; SS), and a leading member of the Nazi Party of Germany. Himmler was one of the most powerful men in Nazi Germany and a main architect of th ...
expressed his desire to relieve concentration camps of sick prisoners and those no longer able to work. Aktion T4
(German, ) was a campaign of mass murder by involuntary euthanasia in Nazi Germany. The term was first used in post-war trials against doctors who had been involved in the killings. The name T4 is an abbreviation of 4, a street address of ...
, a "euthanasia" programme for mentally ill
A mental disorder, also referred to as a mental illness or psychiatric disorder, is a behavioral or mental pattern that causes significant distress or impairment of personal functioning. Such features may be persistent, relapsing and remitti ...
, disabled
Disability is the experience of any condition that makes it more difficult for a person to do certain activities or have equitable access within a given society. Disabilities may be cognitive, developmental, intellectual, mental, physical, se ...
and other inmates of hospitals and nursing homes who were deemed unworthy of life, was extended to include the weakest concentration-camp prisoners. Himmler, together with Philipp Bouhler
Philipp Bouhler (11 September 1899 – 19 May 1945) was a German senior Nazi Party functionary who was both a (National Leader) and Chief of the Chancellery of the Führer of the NSDAP. He was also the SS official responsible for the euthanas ...
, transferred technology and techniques used in the Aktion T4 programme to the concentration camps, and later to ''Einsatzgruppen
(, ; also ' task forces') were (SS) paramilitary death squads of Nazi Germany that were responsible for mass murder, primarily by shooting, during World War II (1939–1945) in German-occupied Europe. The had an integral role in the im ...
'' and death camps
Nazi Germany used six extermination camps (german: Vernichtungslager), also called death camps (), or killing centers (), in Central Europe during World War II to systematically murder over 2.7 million peoplemostly Jewsin the Holocaust. The v ...
.
The first concentration-camp victims of this program were gassed by carbon monoxide poisoning
Carbon monoxide poisoning typically occurs from breathing in carbon monoxide (CO) at excessive levels. Symptoms are often described as "flu-like" and commonly include headache, dizziness, weakness, vomiting, chest pain, and confusion. Large e ...
and the first known Selektion
This is a list of words, terms, concepts and slogans of Nazi Germany used in the historiography covering the Nazi regime.
Some words were coined by Adolf Hitler and other Nazi Party members. Other words and concepts were borrowed and appropriated, ...
took place in April 1941 at Sachsenhausen concentration camp
Sachsenhausen () or Sachsenhausen-Oranienburg was a German Nazi concentration camp in Oranienburg, Germany, used from 1936 until April 1945, shortly before the defeat of Nazi Germany in May later that year. It mainly held political prisoners ...
. By the summer of 1941 at least 400 prisoners from Sachsenhausen had been "retired". The scheme operated under the Concentration Camps Inspector and the ''Reichsführer-SS
(, ) was a special title and rank that existed between the years of 1925 and 1945 for the commander of the (SS). ''Reichsführer-SS'' was a title from 1925 to 1933, and from 1934 to 1945 it was the highest rank of the SS. The longest-servi ...
'' under the name "Sonderbehandlung
(, "special treatment") is any sort of preferential treatment. However, the word ''Sonderbehandlung'' was used as an euphemism for mass murder by Nazi functionaries and the SS, who commonly used the abbreviation ''S.B.'' in documentation. It ...
14f13". The combination of numbers and letters derived from the SS record-keeping system and consists of the number "14" for the Concentration Camps Inspector, the letter "f" for the German word for "deaths" (''Todesfälle''), and the number "13" for the cause of death, in this case "special treatment", a bureaucratic euphemism for gassing.[
]
See also
* KZ Syndrome
* Ka-tzetnik
Further reading
*Israel Gutman, ''Encyclopaedia of the Holocaust
The ''Encyclopedia of the Holocaust'' (1990) has been called "the most recognized reference book on the Holocaust". It was published in an English-language translated edition by Macmillan in tandem with the Hebrew language original edition publ ...
'', New York: Macmillan (1990), vol. 3. p. 677
*Wolfgang Sofsky, ''The Order of Terror: The Concentration Camp'', Princeton: Princeton University Press (1999), pp. 25, 199–205.
*Giorgio Agamben, The Witness and the Archive, book.
*Jeremy Adler, ''Die Philologie des Boesen'', Lecture, Leipzig, 2019.
References
{{Authority control
Terminology of Nazi concentration camps
Malnutrition