All language subtitles for Secret.Nazi.Bases.S02E08.Himmlers.Occult.Castle.Wewelsburg.1080p.AMZN.WEB-DL.DDP5.1.H.264-BurCyg_track3_[eng]

[suspenseful music]

- [Narrator] Saturday,
March 31, 1945,

from his headquarters in
Breslau Heinrich Himmler

orders the complete destruction
of Wewelsburg Castle.

Three days later American
troops capture the smoking ruins

only to find a strange
and ominous place.

- But there were no military
installations there.

So, why would he
give those orders

unless he was trying
to hide something?

- [Narrator] What does
the head of the SS want

with the ruins of an old castle?

- The whole feeling of this
castle is dark and threatening.

- [Narrator] Why in the
middle of a global war

is the SS dispatching secret
expeditions around the world

for archaic objects
and stuff of legends

- Himmler is fascinated
by the occult.

He wants to imbue Hitler and
himself with mystical powers.

[dramatic music]

[doors thudding]

[tense music]

- [Narrator] Wewelsberg Castle
is located in Westphalia

in North-Western Germany
near the Teutoburg Forest.

- When you see this
castle from the outside,

it's actually quite attractive.

It's like many of the
picturesque German castles

you'd imagine today perched
up high amongst dense forest.

- Everything just
seems really majestic

and big and very elaborate.

It looks like it's really
dominating that mountain.

- It's a masonry structure,

pretty standard construction
methodology for that time.

Lots of windows, lots of towers,

which indicative the
architecture of the time.

- The personality that
I get from the building

is power and dominance.

This is a place that you are

able to enter only
by invitation.

- The Wewelsburg was
built in the 17th century

by the Prince-Bishop
of Paderborn.

He was the leader of
the Catholic church,

and he used it as
a second residence.

He went here when he wanted to
hunt or to have some parties.

After secularization at the
beginning of the 18th century,

this region was gone
to the Prussian state,

and the castle was
more or less a ruin.

- [Narrator] In 1933,
Wewelsburg gets a new tenant,

Heinrich Himmler,
the head of the SS.

- Himmler wanted
to be surrounded by
symbols and buildings

and ideas that inspired
pride in being German.

- He was looking for old
historical buildings,

and then some Vasalians
Nazis said to him,

"Well, let's try to
get the Wewelsburg."

- Himmler is interested in

Medieval times and
the Renaissance,

and the idea of Teutonic
Knights and codes of honor,

and that his SS are the
present day versions

of these great warriors
from a bygone era.

- [Narrator] Himmler
has found the perfect

Medieval castle
for his knighthood,

but things are not as
they seem at Wewelsburg.

- The whole structure
itself looks quite majestic,

but then when you take a look,

you realize that
it's not Medieval.

- The architectural design

is they take a
Renaissance castle

and turn it into
a Medieval castle

and evoke these Medieval images,

the type of columns,

the type of imagery
that's in them.

- That to me is very curious.

There's a wall where the brick
looks like it's come off,

and then you think, "Wait,
that was done on purpose?"

- [Narrator] Himmler and
architect, Hermann Bartels

draw up plans and apply
for government funding.

In 1934, they spend 11 million
Reichsmarks on renovations,

almost 85 million in
today's U.S. dollars.

[dramatic music]

- You have to ask why did
Himmler place so much emphasis

on reverse engineering
this Renaissance castle

back into one that looked like
it was from the Middle Ages.

- When you take a look
at Renaissance castles,

they weren't really
made to be bastions

or strongholds as the
Medieval castles were,

and that could be
one of the reasons

why they shifted it back
to make it look more like

a Medieval castle than
a Renaissance castle.

They're trying to key into

the psychology of a
war frame of mind,

but also to key into the people
who would be in the castle,

would feel like they are
the center of strength

and that they're unassailable.

- [Narrator] To make Wewelsburg
into what Medieval castle,

Himmler and Bartels
build a moat,

refinished the outer wall,

and adorn it with rod iron

created in a specially
built onsite smithy.

Himmler fills the
castle with art

and decor featuring
historical elements.

- It seems inconsistent
with the other structures

that the Nazis built.

This is the only building
that I've seen so far

where it looks like the Nazis

actually put effort
into aesthetics.

I don't see any sculptures

in the other
construction projects.

I don't see this elaborate
need for decorated walls.

- The plans went through
several iterations,

and the evolution
of the project grew

to encompass several
more structures

and an expansion into a village.

- [Narrator] Calling
this complex,

"The Center of the World,"

Himmler and Bartels
have elaborate plans

to expand the property,
flooding the valley,

and displacing the
nearby villages.

- Renovations took place at
this castle continuously,

even throughout the war.

Himmler's main priority
was running the SS,

so how did he find the time

to keep coming back
to this castle?

- [Narrator] But
despite the castle's

importance to German culture,

Himmler imposes a ban
on visiting in 1935.

Then in 1939,

forbids the publishing of
information about the castle,

increasing the mystery
surrounding it.

- Himmler had so much power.

He could pretty much get away
with doing whatever he wanted.

Yet, he went to great lengths

to keep this place
top, top secret.

Even the local townspeople

had no idea what was
going on next door.

[dramatic music]

- [Narrator] Under the
pretense that the castle

is to become an SS
training school,

Himmler is able to justify
the use of forced labor.

From 1940 to 1943,

a concentration camp
nearby provides Himmler

with the labor he needs
for this major overhaul.

The campus named Niederhagen

in an effort to
distance it semantically

from Wewelsburg Castle.

Niederhagen is the
only concentration camp

established in the
North Rhine-Westphalia

and houses 3900 inmates.

Over 1,000 would
lose their lives.

Among other tasks,

inmates are ordered to paint
the north tower in camouflage

to prevent the allies
from spying the
castle from the skies.

[birds chirping]

- The Germans are in the
middle of a total war,

and yet for Himmler,

this site seems to have some
kind of special significance.

[dramatic music]

- [Narrator] Perhaps
a clue can be found

in the location of the castle

and another strange
structure in its proximity.

- We know that Himmler had
strong beliefs about the occult.

I can certainly see how
someone who believed in that

could project the
idea of magical powers

onto these rock formations.

- Himmler was investing
time and money

in building this new religion,

and he was going to be
at the epicenter of it.

[dramatic music]

- [Narrator] Strange changes
are being made to the ruins

of a castle by the head of
the SS, Heinrich Himmler.

As the Nazis rise to power,

he pours more funds
into this structure

located in a very specific
region in Germany.

[tense music]
[beeps lowly]

Westphalia is home
to the Ruhr District,

an important industrial
center for Germany.

But it's the region's history

dating back as far
as the 1st century

that holds significance
for Himmler.

- He thought that this was
the heartland of the Saxons.

They got new ideas that

the Germanic tribes
were the superior people

and wanted to have
evidence about that,

and so they searched
in this area.

- There was a foretelling of
a great army from the west

that would defeat a
great army in the east.

Himmler likely imagined it
to be about him and the SS

and the German state fighting
off this Slavic monsters.

- And the castle is quite
close to other sites

that many Nazis thought
were very important

to the preservation of
German history and culture.

[dramatic music]

- [Narrator] Not far from
Himmler's chosen site,

an alien looking stone formation
reaches out of the earth

and curves on awe-inspiring
picture on the land.

- Still, within the
Westphalia region

is a series of
geological formations

known as the Externsteine.

- [Narrator] The Externsteine

is first mentioned
in writing in 1129.

Located in the Teutoburg Forest
33 miles from Wewelsburg,

it's a sandstone formation

with 13 freestanding pillars

believed to have been formed

during the Lower
Cretaceous period.

- Natural monuments like
that, they're awesome.

It was something greater
than us, forces of nature,

that made those rocks
in that configuration,

and that feels unstoppable
and really powerful.

- [Narrator] Folklore,
going back almost 400 years,

describes the Externsteine

as a sacred site
for pagan Saxons,

but no evidence has been
found to confirm this.

- On the external
stones there is relief,

with this Christian motif

and this shows that
this was a place

for the early Christians.

- [Narrator] Some Nazi
researchers believe

that one section of this
relief is a depiction

of a bent-over
Irminsul, a secret tree

that played an important
role in German paganism.

- So on the one hand,

this relief looks like
someone carrying a cross,

but if you have got a
different way of thinking,

you can see the Irminsul on it.

So they did some
excavations there,

but it was no holy
place for the Germanics.

There is no evidence for that.

- [Narrator] Not
finding what they want,

Nazi researchers rewrite
history to suit their needs,

and adopted the Irminsul
as a Nazi symbol.

This tactic would become common
with Heinrich Himmler's SS.

[dramatic music]

In the early 1920s,

Heinrich Himmler
is at university

in Munich studying agriculture

and participating in
paramilitary groups

when he meets some
of the leaders

of the newly formed Nazi Party.

- Heinrich Himmler
joined the Nazi party

in the very early stages,

and he proved himself to be a
very loyal follower of Hitler.

He becomes increasingly
instrumental over
time in the 1920s,

and by 1929, he's appointed
as the head of the SS.

- The SS is the Schutzstaffel,

and it's created as a kind of

personal bodyguard
to Adolf Hitler

in the very early stages of the
National Socialist Movement.

- [Narrator] Himmler begins
to reorganize the SS,

creating new divisions
like the security service

and the race and
settlement office.

- He was extraordinarily
ambitious

and also
extraordinarily violent.

- [Narrator] Under
Himmler's leadership,

the SS grows from 290
men to one million

by the end of World
War II in 1945.

- The SS is a state within a
state, an army within an army,

a police force within
a police force.

It runs all of the
concentration camps,

and Himmler is vying for power

with all the other
major Nazi leaders,

and he's winning.

[suspenseful music]

- [Narrator] Men who
wish to join the SS

must meet strict requirements.

- The SS was to only recruit
the most elite of Nazi society.

But if you look at
Heinrich Himmler himself,

he hardly fit the ideal of
what an SS man would look like.

The ideal SS man would be tall.

He would have what
were considered

to be classic Aryan features,

such as blue eyes
and blonde hair.

- You had to meet
specific standards

in terms of your
physical acumen,

your masculinity,
and physical prowess,

and you had to prove
your racial lineage

going back generations,

and you were supposed to be
already sufficiently convinced,

demonstrably so, about
Aryan's supremacy,

and about everything the
German state stood for.

- But the main criteria
for being a part of the SS

was fanatical
devotion and loyalty.

You would give your
life for Hitler.

- The word religion, I
think is appropriate.

They believed in
the Nazis' policies,

and they were going to be the
ones that would carry it out.

[dramatic music]

- [Narrator] The SS men dressed
entirely in black uniforms,

decorated with runes
and symbols of death.

- The color black in uniforms

leads people to be
more aggressive,

and also leads people
who see somebody in black

they see them as more of a
threat or more of a danger.

- You call also the
SS as a black order.

This is because of
the black uniforms,

but also to be like
a knight order.

- It never strayed
very far from this idea

of it being a sacred knighthood,

and people bought into that

because most people are
hard-wired to serve.

So, having convinced them
that the service was required

and then telling them
that they're unique
and extraordinary,

they're going to
want to join the SS.

- [Narrator] Himmler's
choice of Westphalia

reinforces this idea

by hearkening back to
a great Germanic hero.

[dramatic music]

A few miles from Externsteine

stands at 19th century
monument to Arminius or Hermann

who led an allegiance
of Germanic tribes

against the occupying
Romans in the 1st century,

- There was a famous
battle that the Germans

fought against the
Romans in this region,

and upon winning it, they
routed the Roman armies.

- [Narrator] In the battle
of Teutoburg Forest,

Hermann's warriors destroy
three Roman legions,

over 20,000 men,

in what has been called
Rome's greatest defeat.

- Himmler is dusting off
ancient historical facts

and mixing it up with mythology,

and he came to the
conclusion that this

was a great place
to create an emblem

of the SS and of
the Nazi movement.

- [Narrator] Germany's
history influences

the decor of the castle.

- Heinrich, Himmler and
SS filled these castles

with priceless works
of art and literature.

- [Narrator] But some
of the art in the castle

is filled with pagan symbols
and dark occult mysticism.

- On the outside, it looks
like a regular castle.

- When you step
inside Wewelsburg,

things get very
dark, very quickly.

[suspenseful music]

- It looks like a movie set.

You walk into a place
like Wewelsburg,

and you say, "This
can't be real."

- The design of
some of these rooms

clearly reflects the
Nazi's fascination

with the dark powers
of the occult.

- Himmler was a
student of the occult,

and he immersed
himself deeply in it.

- Around the whole
castle complex,

there are a number
of varied runes

integrated into the
walls and the floors.

It's almost as if
it was an intention

that any visitors would be
subliminally influenced.

- [Narrator] The building
contains a reception hall

for the SS captain
with Nordic runes

set into the tile of the floor.

- One can only imagine
these SS officers

coming in there with a secret
ceremony, most likely at night

and all the trappings
of the castle

and the architecture
of it just reinforced

the secretive, mythical,
and mystical nature

of what they were
trying to accomplish.

- And the ideas seem absurd,

and then you realize that this
is ideological underpinning

for what is about to become
the world's worst genocide.

[tense music]

- [Narrator] In addition
to the SS officers,

members of a new
strange organization,

including archeologists,
scientists, and other scholars

set up offices at the
castle with ambitious plans.

- Why establish an archeology
team within the SS?

What were they hoping to find?

[dramatic music]

- [Narrator] The ruins of
a castle are transformed

into an elite SS
officers' structure.

But unlike many
other Nazi buildings,

this one isn't for defense.

It has darker intentions.

In the garden on the
south side of the castle,

there is a strange structure.

- SS scientists are
digging up the grounds,

and they find bones
and all sorts of relics

and items from the ancient past.

What sort of purpose
that they got here?

Is this a mundane thing where
they're trying to invest

some kind of secret
religious energy into it?

- As they knew that
it was very typical

in this area to have
those grave stone tombs,

they built a new one,

but these items are
from the Medieval times.

They were not Germanic.

- The grave itself is
pretty nondescript,

but why would they be
going to this effort?

[dramatic music]

- [Narrator] The answer
may lie with the new team

that moves into the castle,
one that is made up of

scholars, archeologists,
and explorers.

The Ahnenerbe, meaning
ancestral heritage,

is an SS think tank
started by Himmler in 1935.

The group, comprised of scholars

from across the spectrum
of academic fields,

is formed to justify
Nazi racial doctrine

by trying to prove their belief
that Germans are descended

from a biologically
superior Aryan race.

[dramatic music]

- And this is what Hitler wants.

So, Hitler allows the budget,

and allows Himmler
all this discretion.

- Himmler was willing
to surround himself

with a lot of pseudo-scientists,

who had really no credibility
in the academic community,

and he was enamored
of offbeat ideas

and was willing to
entertain them in a way

that other members of
the leadership were not.

- [Narrator] One of
Himmler's pseudo-scientists

is Austrian occultist
Karl Maria Wiligut.

He believes that
Germanic culture

stretches back to 228,000 BC,

and the Earth was populated

by mythical creatures
like giants.

Wiligut contributes
significantly

to the development of Wewelsburg

as the ceremonial center of
SS pseudo-religious practice.

- He thought that in
establishing their
presence in a castle

that had a very long
historical pedigree in Germany,

they were linking themselves
to a celebrated Germanic past.

- [Narrator] But Himmler wants

more than just a
symbolic castle,

and his plans take shape
inside the castle itself.

[tense music]

- One of the spaces
that Himmler had built

was this large circular chamber

known as the Supreme
Leader's Hall.

- It's a really imposing room.

These pillars and arches

are symbols of strength
from Roman times.

Even in our modern day homes,

we'll have these large
pillars out front.

They're not doing
anything structurally,

but they are
conveying a message.

- A room like this
seems to try to evoke

the same kind of feeling that
you might get in a church.

Part of the goal of
SS indoctrination

was to overcome any
belief systems that,

would-be members of
the SS might have,

that would cause
them to hesitate

to carry out their
nefarious tasks,

and so they're
creating a kind of

an alternate
religious experience

where you engaged in
activities as a group,

like a political priesthood.

[tense music]

- Your attention is drawn
to the center of the room

on the floor where there's
this large black sun

that's being
created from mosaic.

- The symbol on the floor
is a kind of sun wheel.

It was used by the
Germanic folks,

but it is an older symbol.

You find it in Tibet,

but also in South America,

so it is a very common symbol,

and it stands for success.

- If you come in
believing in that symbol,

you're going to have a
physiological response

that reinforces that belief,

and that's going to
also reinforce the
belief in yourself.

- It's the only one
of its kind found,

and although it's
not entirely clear

what the Nazis
were planning here,

it has been suggested
that this was

the start of this
black sun symbolism,

that you can also find
in ancient mysticism

that the Nazis were
borrowing from.

After all, the Swastika,

the, essentially,
the Nazi symbol,

actually has its roots
back in ancient history.

[dramatic music]

- Off to the side of that
room there's a set of stairs

that lead down to
an even darker room.

- The SS is the darkest

most terror inspiring
organization in Nazi Germany.

Any space that they
took to be sacred

can only inspire horror
and terror in its viewers.

- The men that would
have gathered here

were practically demigods
in their own right.

They are the most
important people in the SS.

[dramatic music]

- [Narrator] As the Nazis plot

the beginning of their empire,

Himmler begins construction

on a strange castle in
the heart of Germany.

But in exploring the site,

modern researchers discovered
dark and ominous designs.

[ominous music]

- Off to the side of the
Supreme Leader's Hall,

there's a set of
stairs that lead down

to an even darker room.

- When you go down to
the crypt, it's colder.

- It looks very unfriendly.

This is not the open natural
world that we're in anymore.

This is a world of secrets
and a world of strife.

- In the center of the room,

there's this sunken
circular pit,

and right in the middle of that,

there's a pipe that
emanates through the floor.

- There are small
pedestals around the room

that would hold possibly
important artifacts.

- The crypt, as far as
we know, was never used,

but it begs the question,
what was it intended for?

- [Narrator] The
ceiling of the crypt

is designed to look like
that of a Mycenaean tomb.

It's cast from concrete

and covered with stone
from a quarry nearby.

- The shape of the
walls in the dome

bring it into a very
intimate setting

and allow sounds to bounce
and move around the room

so that everybody
could hear things.

- Yeah, I would expect that
it would be a bit echoey

and have a lot of resonance.

When you get a number
of people in a space,

and there are sounds that start

resonating against each other,

what you find is
that your brainwaves

start resonating at
the same frequencies,

and this leads to a
sense of community.

That you become as a person

and as a group at the same time.

- Now, what came
out of that pipe?

Maybe it was water
for a fountain,

or maybe that was
an eternal flame

that continuously burned
in the middle of the room.

- If the pipe carries water

and that central
circle was a pool,

we know that there's a lot
of religious ceremonies

across a variety of
religions that involve water,

that involve submersion,

or involve spraying
the water on somebody.

If that central pipe keys into
the idea of an eternal flame,

the flame is a symbol
of control over nature.

"This is what we took
to defeat the old gods

"and take control of the world."

- [Narrator] And what is the
purpose of these pedestals?

- There are rumors
that these were used

to display urns that
contained the ashes

of dead SS officers.

- This would be fitting

because the SS called
this hall a crypt,

which belongs to death.

But, of course,
no urn was found.

- Knowing what we
know of SS crimes,

we can only assume that
there had to have been

sinister elements to some of
these rituals and ceremonies.

[dramatic music]

- [Narrator] The posters
hanging in this room today

are Holocaust Memorial Art
meant to counter visitors

that are Nazi sympathizers

and ground the site in
its role as a memorial.

- I think it is
necessary to show

because some visitors
came here and said,

"Oh, it is the black order.

"They had got strategies,

"and they were
successful in war times,"

and we have to show the
other side of the SS.

They were murderous.

They were brutal.

They were criminal.

- [Narrator] These
rituals and symbols

are part of the SS
fascination with death.

- A lot of
religiously-backed armies

have worked on the idea that
if you die for the cause,

this leads to Valhalla,

the afterlife for the best
and strongest warriors

who died in battle.

It's taking away
the power of death

and instead making
death a reward.

- The SS was
obsessed with death.

They wore shiny black.

Images of death for everywhere.

- There was a series of
symbols that the SS valued

and were used to
denote membership,

we're used to remind members
that they were an elite,

and to bind them together under
a common set of principles.

- The most obvious
symbolic representation

of the Nazi's obsession
with death is on the caps

and the rings of the
SS, the Totenkopf,

the Death's Head symbol.

The actual symbol itself
has its roots back

in the Prussian units that
wore the same kind of symbol.

- The skull and
crossbones has been

widely used throughout history.

Pirates used that
amongst other things,

so it's a useful construct.

It's taking something that
many Germans were familiar with

and putting a new spin on it.

- Seeing a skull
or symbol of death

tends to increase
your arousal level.

Your heart rate goes up.

You start getting closer
to fight or flight state.

The people who are wearing them
feel more empowered by them.

They're strong.

They can conquer.

They can do things.

- The SS Death's Head
ring was a personal gift

bestowed by Himmler
on SS officers.

It could be neither
bought nor sold.

- [Narrator] The
ring was designed

by a Ahnenerbe
occultist Karl Wiligut

and only 14,500 were awarded.

- Part of the desire to get

the SS to overcome
their scruples

and to participate in violent
acts in the Third Reich,

was bonding them
together as a unit,

and the ring was designed to
bring prestige to the wearer

and make a powerful
visual statement

about their membership in
the community of the SS.

- If somebody died, they
tried to collect those rings,

and they would have secret
ceremonies or bury the rings.

There's this idea that,

even in death, they will live.

They will be a part of
a secret brotherhood.

They are immortal.

- [Narrator] In 1938, an
order from Heinrich Himmler

seized the return of all
the Death's Head rings

of fallen SS men to
be stored in a chest

at Castle of Wewelsburg.

Then in 1944,

he orders that all
the remaining rings,

over 11,000, also be
returned to the castle.

- But he goes further.

In order for them to
be sealed farther,

he orders them to be
blast-sealed into the hills,

never to be found again.

- The uniforms, the skulls,
all these images of death,

it must've struck fear
into their enemies

when the SS shows up with that
type of attire and imagery.

- It's well-known that Himmler
invested time and energy

in these weird occult fantasies.

I think he says that he was a
sick, crazed, weird individual

who would stop at
nothing to try and prove

his importance to the
Nazi 1,000-year Reich.

- [Narrator] But is Himmler's
belief in the occult genuine

or an elaborate ruse?

- I think a lot of
other Nazi leaders

used it to make their
followers more fanatical,

to give themselves
mythical powers,

or at least the
image of having such.

But Heinrich Himmler,

I think he believed
all this stuff.

He actually bought
into this madness.

[dramatic music]

- [Narrator] But Himmler
has plans far greater.

[thunder crashing]
He imagined his ancestors

had special powers
that were lost.

- When you're losing the war,

you're looking for
that next advantage,

something that will make the
other side's weapons obsolete.

- [Narrator] What
dark path is Himmler

willing to go down to win?

[dramatic music]

In the Westphalia region,

the Nazis find ancient
mythical evidence

to support their wild theories.

- Himmler was obsessed
with the occult

and had a deep belief
that the Aryan race

might somehow have descended
directly from the gods.

- [Narrator] Since he has no
legitimate academic proof,

Heinrich Himmler constructs
a strange SS center

in the ruins of
castle Wewelsburg

to try and radicalize others
into believing his theory.

- They looked all
around the world,

and they were quite
prepared to borrow

from ancient religions
and mystical cults

in order to give this sense
of having this rich background

that was going to take
the Nazi Reich forwards.

- [Narrator] The first of
these fantastical expeditions

is to find the legendary
lost continent of Atlantis.

Plato describes Atlantis
as a vast island kingdom

and its people as a powerful
advanced civilization.

But after being overthrown
by the Athenians,

Atlantis was
destroyed by the gods

and disappeared into the sea.

- Certainly over millennia,

there have been
civilizations and cultures

that have disappeared from
the face of the planet.

There's lost cultures in Africa.

There's lost cultures
around the Mediterranean,

and I think some
of that gives rise

to that idea of Atlantis.

- While it's generally agreed
that this place is a myth,

Himmler believes that
Atlantis was real,

and that the Aryans and
therefore the Germans,

are descendants of inhabitants
who escaped the destruction.

- We have got a lot of
myth about Atlantis,

and some people said
the Atlantis island

was in the Mediterranean Sea.

Others said it was in the North.

- [Narrator] The
Eddas, Icelandic sagas,

tell of the gods seeking shelter

in the mountains during
the great winter.

Himmler believes that this story

and Plato's tale of Atlantis

are different accounts
of the same event,

and that Atlantis was, in fact,
in the North Atlantic Ocean.

In support of this theory,

Ahnenerbe co-founder
Herman Wirth,

leads an expedition to examine

Sweden's ancient rock carvings.

He finds a number
of lines and circles

among the depictions of
animals, warriors, and ships,

and decides that they formed

the ancient alphabet
of the Atlanteans,

predating all of
their writing systems.

However, no evidence exists
of this being an alphabet,

and credible researchers
knew, even in the 1930s,

that when these
carvings were created

between 1700 and 500 BC,

several written languages,

such as those from
Egypt and Sumeria,

had already existed
for over 1,000 years.

[dramatic music]

- If you look hard enough,

and you don't have
any ethical scruples,

you can find something to back

darn near anything you believe,

and this is the kind of
work that they were doing.

[dramatic music]

- [Narrator] Other
debunked theories

and pseudoscience
are put into practice

during Ernest Cheever's
1938 expedition to Tibet.

Some SS researchers believed
that Tibet may have been

the new home of Atlantean
refugees seeking higher ground.

If this is true, there
will be traces of

the Nordic bloodline
in modern day Tibetans,

most prominently in
members of the upper caste,

the highest of which,
according to Tibetan lore,

hailed from the race of gods.

[dramatic music]

To find evidence of this,

anthropologist, Bruno Berger,

used widely discredited methods,

measuring the skulls
and facial features

of 300 Tibetan villagers

and concludes that these
tests confirm this theory.

Some of this research
would give Himmler

what he was looking for

and propel him to go even
further in his mad occult quest.

He is so pleased that when
the team arrives home in 1939,

Himmler greets them
at the airport,

where, according to witnesses,

he presents Cheever
with a Totenkopf ring.

[eerie music]

Soon strange new missions
are dispatched by Himmler.

One in particular
creates a new mystery

for modern researchers,
The Spear of Destiny.

According to legend,

the spear was
originally the sword

that was used to pierce Jesus's
side during the crucifixion,

and that whoever owns it

holds the destiny of the
world in their hands.

- The Nazis were
bound and determined

to find these
types of artifacts,

and that would then give Hitler

and Himmler these
special powers.

- [Narrator] A relic
purported to be the spear

is passed down
through the centuries

belonging, at one point, to
holy Roman Emperor Charlemagne

and at another to Napoleon.

Eventually, it lands
at a museum in Austria

where it is seen by
a young Adolf Hitler.

When the Third Reich
annexes Austria in 1938,

they loot the museum taking
the so-called Spear of Destiny,

as well as Charlemagne's
imperial crown

and put them on
display in Germany.

[dramatic music]

But the most famous Christian
relic is the one synonymous

with a sought after
object, The Holy Grail.

Believed to be the cup used
by Jesus at the last supper,

legend says it will bestow
happiness and eternal youth

upon anyone who drinks from it.

- Himmler resigns SS
historian Otto Rahn

to the task of finding
the Holy Grail.

Rahn is obsessed with the grail

and believes there are clues
in the "Legend of Perceval",

a Medieval story about King
Arthur's search for the grail.

However, Rahn comes
up empty in his quest,

and after falling out of favor
with Himmler, dies in 1939.

Himmler, undeterred, sets
out to find the grail himself

searching while on
a trip to Spain.

While Rahn and Himmler
failed to find the grail,

throughout World War II,

the Nazis will loot
every country they invade

procuring a number of artifacts.

- The SS seem to
have this desire

to find some mystic property
of items of antiquity.

I find it strange and unusual

from a society that
was so determined

to be progressive and
technologically driven.

[dramatic music]

- [Narrator] Pursuing so
many different avenues

makes it difficult to find

any consistency in
Himmler's plans,

but there may be
mythic to the madness.

- The very incoherence of the
mishmash of a wide variety

of stories and myths
and legends and symbols

can be in itself an
effective tool of propaganda.

It can perhaps inspire
adherence to want to know more

and to start rejecting
some of the ideas

that they had developed
outside of Nazi ideology.

- [Narrator] Himmler's
thirst for power

would ultimately lead to a
search so dark and ominous

in his efforts to create the
ultimate imperial weapon,

a super soldier army.

[dramatic music]

At Wewelsburg Castle,

Heinrich Himmler's research
teams are hell bent

on finding the ancient roots
of the so-called Aryan race.

Expeditions are mounted
around the world

to find these origins,

including one at
home in Germany,

proving that the Nordic race

is directly descended
from Cro-Magnon man,

and another showing
that ancient Rome

was actually founded
by Nordic immigrants

in spite of evidence
to the contrary.

- Confirmation bias is
really what's driving this.

That you start off
with the belief,

and you will find
evidence to support it,

and so, the more you look,

the more evidence you'll
find to support it,

but you'll just ignore the
evidence that refutes it.

- [Narrator] But
Himmler's next quest

might finally give him the
power he's looking for.

Himmler and Karl Wiligut
want to replace Christianity

with an Aryan religion.

[dramatic music]

- Himmler wanted to have SS
men who believe in something,

but not the church.

- [Narrator] To replace
Christian ceremonies

like marriages and
baptisms with Aryan rights,

they turn to old pagan
practices like witchcraft.

[fire crackling]

Ancient folk rituals

were commonly practiced
throughout Medieval Europe,

but after the
Protestant Reformation,

religious institutions
deemed these

pre-Christian
practices witchcraft

and persecuted
its practitioners.

- When you talk about magic,
witchcraft, or mysticism,

our brains are wired to
see these connections,

if we can't come up with
another explanation,

that's what we'll believe.

If you've had a
drought long enough

and you do a rain
dance every day,

and eventually it rains,

then the rain dance
caused the rain.

- [Narrator] Of the 90,000
witch trials held in Europe

in the 16th and 17th centuries,

it's estimated that
30,000 to 45,000 Germans,

mostly women, were found
guilty and burned alive.

- Himmler believed that
practicers of pagan religion

who had been Germanic were
persecuted by the church,

and there was an attempt
to eradicate them

through witch trials.

- [Narrator] To find
evidence of his theory,

Himmler sets up a
separate research team,

even more mysterious
than the Ahnenerbe,

the Hexenkartothek,
or H-Special Order.

Led by Rudolf Levin,

they compile and study
books and documents

describing the activities
of accused witches.

- The desire to recapture
some of those pagan beliefs

was part of Himmler's
attraction to these scholars

who were largely rejected
by the academic community,

but who were feeding him
alternative versions of history.

- [Narrator] After going
through thousands of documents

and under pressure to
come up with something,

Levin is able to
temporarily satisfy Himmler

by discovering that
his supposed ancestor,

a woman named Margareth Himbler,

was executed for
witchcraft in 1629.

But old books can
only tell so much.

So in 1936,

Himmler recruits
Finnish anthropologist,
Yrjo von Gronhagen,

to lead an expedition
to Karelia, Finland.

Karelia was relatively
untouched by the witch hunts,

and its people still practice

the pre-Christian pagan sorcery

described in the "Kalevala",

a 19th century, Finnish epic,

similar to the Icelandic Eddas.

Himmler tasks the team

with documenting
these ancient rituals

in the hope of
reintroducing them

into modern German culture

and his shadowy SS religion.

[dramatic music]

Musicologist, Fritz Bose
uses a magneto phone,

an early type of tape recorder

to make over 100 recordings
of villagers singing,

playing traditional
instruments, like the kantele,

and performing
chants and rituals.

Himmler, pleased with
von Gronhagen's progress,

makes plans to
implement the music

and rituals in future
SS solstice ceremonies.

[dramatic music]

[footsteps stomping]

While Himmler
believes the secrets

of the murdered Aryan witches

will make his men into the
SS super soldiers he desires,

he decides to hedge his bet

by introducing some modern
super powers into the mix.

In 1937, Nazi doctors

start giving soldiers
medical methamphetamine,

a drug Hitler himself
routinely uses.

This will keep the men awake

and energized for
days at a time.

As military operations become
increasingly mechanized,

methamphetamine will become

more and more critical
to their success.

By early 1945, the
tides have changed,

and the war is going
badly for Germany.

With the Allies only days away,

Himmler gives the order for
Wewelsburg to be destroyed.

- Why would he do that?

There were no
installations there.

There was nothing that the enemy

was going to gain an
advantage from by conquering.

- This castle is a sacred site
of their occult for the SS.

If he can't have it,

it should be destroyed,

and that was the
MO for the Nazis:

Destroy everything as
they're evacuating.

[tense music]

- [Narrator] Having
run out of explosives,

the men fit tank mines in
several locations on the site,

completely destroying them.

The castle is then set on fire

and looted by nearby villagers.

However, the north tower,

the home of the
Supreme Leader's Hall

and the crypt remains intact.

[dramatic music]

On May 31, 1945,

three weeks after Hitler's
suicide and Germany's surrender,

Heinrich Himmler is captured

and commits suicide
himself two days later.

Himmler is buried in an
unmarked grave near Lemberg.

The exact location
remains unknown.

The Nazi regime is over.

Himmler and the SS are defeated,

and Wewelsburg
castle is in ruins.

But as more secrets
are revealed,

the complete plans of
their evil dark legacy

takes full shape.

- The occult vision of Himmler

and his SS acolytes
is terrifying,

and who knows what
chilling vision

they would have realized
in a post-war Germany.

- Since the SS is so
shrouded in secrecy,

it's created something of
a mythologization of them,

which is alarming.

These are war criminals,

and it's one of the most
inhumane organizations

ever created in human history.

That's the legacy of the SS.

[suspenseful music]

[dramatic music]