JUDAICA collection / picture alliance / dpa
Helmut Förster is retired chief physician and holder of the Grand Latinum. As a senior student, he listened to Roman history for four semesters and read many of the original writings of Tacitus and Florus.
On a rainy day in February, he walks up the stairs of his house in Essen, opens the door of his "study" and sits on a high-backed swivel chair with leather cover, surrounded by stacks of books with yellow sticky notes sticking out of them.
DER SPIEGEL 12/2020
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Right arrow to outputFor years, the 78-year-old has devoted himself to one of the greatest puzzles in historical research in the room under the sloping roof: the legendary Varus Battle. Förster has published a book on the subject and has given numerous lectures, including at adult education centers. He is probably one of the busiest lay historians in Germany and does not shy away from discussions with all the other professional and after-work researchers who are working on the legendary event from the year 9 AD.
In the slaughter, which was allegedly accompanied by torrential rains, the Teutonic Arminius and his followers are said to have slaughtered around 15,000 members of the legions of the governor Publius Quinctilius Varus. Arminius, who, according to Roman sources, belonged to the Cheruscan tribe, is considered by some to be a Germanic liberator who broke into the Romans "a kind of ancient Stalingrad", as Förster calls it.
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