BBC News - Origins of Swastika

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http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/4183467.stm

 

BBC News Website:

Tuesday, 18 January, 2005, 10:44 GMT

 

Origins of the swastika

 

The Nazis hijacked the symbol from its Hindu origins

The EU has been urged to ban the swastika because of its Nazi associations

with hate and racism. But the symbol was around long before Adolf Hitler.

The swastika is a cross with its arms bent at right angles to either the

right or left. In geometric terms, it is known as an irregular icosagon or

20-sided polygon.

 

The word is derived from the Sanskrit "svastika" and means "good to be". In

Indo-European culture it was a mark made on people or objects to give them

good luck.

 

It has been around for thousands of years, particularly as a Hindu symbol

in the holy texts, to mean luck, Brahma or samsara (rebirth). It can be

clockwise or anti-clockwise and the way it points in all four directions

suggests stability. Sometimes it features a dot between each arm.

 

Nowadays it is commonly seen in current and ancient Hindu architecture and

Indian artwork, including the ruins of the ancient city of Troy. It has

also been used in Buddhism and Jainism, plus other Asian, European and

Native American cultures.

 

French cathedral

 

The British author Rudyard Kipling, who was strongly influenced by Indian

culture, had a swastika on the dust jackets of all his books until the rise

of Nazism made this inappropriate. It was also a symbol used by the Boy

Scouts in Britain, although it was taken off Robert Baden-Powell's 1922

Medal of Merit after complaints in the 1930s.

 

It is rarely seen on its own in Western architecture, but a design of

interlocking swastikas is part of the design of the floor of the cathedral

of Amiens, France.

 

Swastika is also a small mining town in northern Ontario, Canada, about 580

kilometres north of Toronto. Attempts by the government of Ontario to

change the town's name during World War II were rejected by residents.

 

After long trials I also found a definite proportion between the size of

the flag and the size of the white disk, as well as the shape and thickness

of the swastika

 

Adolf Hitler in Mein Kampf

But it is its association with the National Socialist German Workers Party

in the 1930s which is etched on the minds of Western society. Before

Hitler, it was used in about 1870 by the Austrian Pan-German followers of

Schoenerer, an Austrian anti-Semitic politician.

 

Its Nazi use was linked to the belief in the Aryan cultural descent of the

German people. They considered the early Aryans of India to be the

prototypical white invaders and hijacked the sign as a symbol of the Aryan

master race.

 

The Nazi party formally adopted the swastika - what they called the

Hakenkreuz, the hooked cross - in 1920. This was used on the party's flag

(right), badge, and armband.

 

In Mein Kampf, Adolf Hitler wrote: "I myself, meanwhile, after innumerable

attempts, had laid down a final form; a flag with a red background, a white

disk, and a black swastika in the middle. After long trials I also found a

definite proportion between the size of the flag and the size of the white

disk, as well as the shape and thickness of the swastika."