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The German Forest (German: Deutscher Wald) was a phrase used both as a metaphor as well as to describe in exaggerated terms an idyllic landscape in German poems, fairy tales and legends of the early 19th century Romantic period. Historical and cultural discourses declared it as the symbol of Germanic-German art and culture, or as in the case of Heinrich Heine or Madame de Staël, as a counter-image of French urbanity. It was also used with reference to historical or legendary events in German forests, such as Tacitus' description of the Battle of the Teutoburg Forest or even the nature mysticism of the stylized Germanic national myth, the Nibelungenlied as the history of its multi-faceted reception shows.
The early conservation and environmental movement, the tourism that was already under way in the 19th century, the youth movement, the social democratic Friends of Nature, the Wandervögel youth groups, the walking clubs and the right-wing Völkisch movement saw in forests an important element of German cultural landscapes.
In Nazi ideology, the motif of the "German Forest" was comparable to their "Blood and Soil" slogan, a typical Germanic symbol. Propaganda, political symbolism and landscape planning drew on this as a central theme for the period after a German victory.
Albrecht Lehmann has postulated the continuity of a romantic forest idealism in the German peoples from the Romantic period to the 21st century that transcends class and generation. Examples of the intense and distinctive handling of the cultural forest include the discussion of environmental damage and forest dieback, and the forms of commemoration and mourning associated with woodland cemeteries and natural burials.
Polls show a specifically German notion of equating forests and nature. The forest as an educational medium and healthy environment has, in the context of environmental education (see, forest education and forest kindergarten) has a particular significance in the German-speaking region.