See G. F. M. Herwarth von Bittenfeld (Münster, 1896).
HERWEGH, GEORG (1817-1875), German political poet, was born at Stuttgart on the 31st of May 1817, the son of a restaurant keeper. He was educated at the gymnasium of his native city, and in 1835 proceeded to the university of Tübingen as a theological student, where, with a view to entering the ministry, he entered the protestant theological seminary. But the strict discipline was distasteful; he broke the rules and was expelled in 1836. He next studied law, but having gained the interest of August Lewald (1793-1871) by his literary ability, he returned to Stuttgart, where Lewald obtained for him a journalistic post. Called out for military service, he had hardly joined his regiment when he committed an act of flagrant insubordination, and fled to Switzerland to avoid punishment. Here he published his Gedichte eines Lebendigen (1841), a volume of political poems, which gave expression to the fervent aspirations of the German youth of the day. The work immediately rendered him famous, and although confiscated, it soon ran through several editions. The idea of the book was a refutation of the opinions of Prince Pückler-Muskau (q.v.) in his Briefe eines Verstorbenen. He next proceeded to Paris and in 1842 returned to Germany, visiting Jena, Leipzig, Dresden and Berlin—a journey which was described as being a “veritable triumphal progress.” His military insubordination appears to have been forgiven and forgotten, for in Berlin King Frederick William IV. had him introduced to him and used the memorable words: “ich liebe eine gesinnungsvolle Opposition” (“I admire an opposition, when dictated by principle.”) Herwegh next returned to Paris, where he published in 1844 the second volume of his Gedichte eines Lebendigen, which, like the first volume, was confiscated by the German police. At the head of a revolutionary column of German working men, recruited in Paris, Herwegh took an active part in the South German rising in 1848; but his raw troops were defeated on the 27th of April at Schopfheim in Baden and, after a very feeble display of heroism, he just managed to escape to Switzerland, where he lived for many years on the proceeds of his literary productions. He was later (1866) permitted to return to Germany, and died at Lichtenthal near Baden-Baden on the 7th of April 1875. A monument was erected to his memory there in 1904. Besides the above-mentioned works, Herwegh published Einundzwanzig Bogen aus der Schweiz (1843), and translations into German of A. de Lamartine’s works and of seven of Shakespeare’s plays. Posthumously appeared Neue Gedichte (1877).
Herwegh’s correspondence was published by his son Marcel in 1898. See also Johannes Scherr, Georg Herwegh; literarische und politische Blätter (1843); and the article by Franz Muncker in the Allgemeine deutsche Biographie.
HERZBERG, a town of Germany, in the Prussian province of Hanover, situated under the south-western declivity of the Harz, on the Sieber, 25 m. N.W. from Nordhausen by the railway to Osterode-Hildesheim. Pop. (1905) 3896. It contains an Evangelical and a Roman Catholic church, and a botanical garden, and has manufactures of cloth and cigars, and weaving and dyeing works. The breeding of canaries is extensively carried on here and in the district. On a hill to the south-west of the town lies the castle of Herzberg, which in 1157 came into the possession of Henry the Lion, duke of Saxony, and afterwards was one of the residences of a branch of the house of Brunswick.
HERZBERG, a town of Germany, in the Prussian province of Saxony, on the Schwarze Elster, 25 m. S. from Jüterbog by the railway Berlin-Röderau-Dresden. It has a church (Evangelical) dating from the 13th century and a medieval town hall. Its industries include the founding and turning of metal, agricultural machinery and boot-making. Pop. (1905) 4043.
HERZL, THEODOR (1860-1904), founder of modern political Zionism (q.v.), was born in Budapest on the 2nd of May 1860, and died at Edlach on the 3rd of July 1904. The greater part of his career was associated with Vienna, where he acquired high repute as a literary journalist. He was also a dramatist, and apart from his prominence as a Jewish Nationalist would have found a niche in the temple of fame. All his other claims to renown, however, sink into insignificance when compared with his work as the reviver of Jewish hopes for a restoration to political autonomy. Herzl was stirred by sympathy for the misery of Jews under persecution, but he was even more powerfully moved by the difficulties experienced under conditions of assimilation. Modern anti-Semitism, he felt, was both like and unlike the medieval. The old physical attacks on the Jews continued in Russia, but there was added the reluctance of several national groups in Europe to admit the Jews to social equality. Herzl believed that the humanitarian hopes which inspired men at the end of the 18th and during the larger part of the 19th centuries had failed. The walls of the ghettos had been cast down, but the Jews could find no entry into the comity of nations. The new nationalism of 1848 did not deprive the Jews of political rights, but it denied them both the amenities of friendly intercourse and the opportunity of distinction in the university, the army and the professions. Many Jews questioned this diagnosis, and refused to see in the new anti-Semitism (q.v.) which spread over Europe in 1881 any more than a temporary reaction against the cosmopolitanism of the French Revolution. In 1896 Herzl published his famous pamphlet “Der Judenstaat.” Holding that the only alternatives for the Jews were complete merging by intermarriage or self-preservation by a national re-union, he boldly advocated the second course. He did not at first insist on Palestine as the new Jewish home, nor did he attach himself to religious sentiment. The expectation of a Messianic restoration to the Holy Land has always been strong, if often latent, in the Jewish consciousness. But Herzl approached the subject entirely on its secular side, and his solution was economic and political rather than sentimental. He was a strong advocate for the complete separation of Church and State. The influence of Herzl’s pamphlet, the progress of the movement he initiated, the subsequent modifications of his plans, are told at length in the article [Zionism].