He was an interesting fellow. Interestingly a lot of his work was based on Jacob Grimm's efforts at Germanic mythology and folklore and its connection to German

He was an interesting fellow. Interestingly a lot of his work was based on Jacob Grimm's efforts at Germanic mythology and folklore and its connection to Germanic and Indo-Iranian linguistics. He died just before the end of WWI, and it was after his death that the real nastiness of German nationalism took off. The only reason the SS could find von List acceptable was that they were so batshit crazy[1] regarding their views on the German race that they couldn't see anything else about what he was saying. [1] For example by the time the Nazis took power, a common theme in nationalist circles was that all languages were descended from the ancient Germanic mother-tongue. Of course once you get to that point, the Germans had to be descended from Aryans (the folks who brought Sanscrit to India). Why? Because the Aryans brought Sanscrit (a language!!) to India and therefore must have been Germans! If you want sources on this idea I am happy to cite them. Again though there were the crazies in List's time but they were nothing compared to the crazies after the war.