CompactMemory provides a handy research tool for anybody interested in periodical Jewish publications in pre-Nazi Germany. 118 periodicals have been digitalized to simplify access for researchers and preserve publications representative of political, social and religious orientations.* Originally, about 5,000 of such periodicals existed; not only were they abolished by the Nazis, but like many publications they were deliberately destroyed. As Heinrich Heine had already predicted about a century before (under the impression of censorship of political / satirical writings), “Where they burn books, they also burn people.”
 *The digitalizations, of course are, in their original language, and they also povide the original layout, so it might be helpful to know Fraktur. BTW, in 1941 teaching original German handwriting was abolished by Hitler; he, being Austrian, never succeeded at writing in Kurrent, hence condemned it as “Judenlettern” and enforced the teaching of standardized Latin handwriting.
TM, you may forgive him; he’s just a stubborn Chasid. 😛
no was meant to be more poetical than offensive….. its just to give “colour” to the argument.
its pretty commonly used in these parts of the world and simply is yiddish for black.
Suppose I was misled by your mentioning of “parents” above.
A black singer of your last name? I cannot recall any. But indeed, there were black servants at German courts as early as the 16th century, which widely were considered desirable matches. Also, many children born out of relationships between GIs or Tommies over here got their German parent’s last name. That aside, your last name indeed is German.
Should I find that word offensive? Usually, when I hear “shvartze,” which for the past 15-20 years has been almost never, it has been used derogatorily.
I am talking about grandparents, from my mothers side, whos name is distinctly not German.
as for my last name being German does that mean the shvartze singer was also German?
As far as I know from my calligraphy books, that style of writing never became the mainstream way in Austria. Since your last name’s a German one, it might well be that your elders learnt that style of writing from originally German-based ancestors.
Froylein I find it really strange that as an Austrian he couldnt write in those characters, perhaps it was more to do with his lack of abilities in general. the reason why I say this, is my parents/grandparents all came from the Austro-Hungarian sphere of influence and thats how they used to write, I could never figure out why their writing was so different to ours?