Editing Aryan race (section)

=== Theories of racial supremacy ===
The term ''Aryan'' was adopted by various [[racists|racist]] and [[antisemitic]] writers such as [[Joseph Arthur de Gobineau|Arthur de Gobineau]], [[Theodor Poesche]], [[Houston Chamberlain]], [[Paul Broca]], [[Karl Penka]] and [[Hans F. K. Günther|Hans Günther]] during the nineteenth century for the promotion of [[scientific racism]], spawning ideologies such as [[Nordicism]] and [[Aryanism]].{{Sfn|Mallory|2015|p=268}}{{Sfn|Arvindsson|2006|p=43}}{{sfn|Anthony|2007|p=9}}{{sfn|Kaufman|Sturtevant|2020|pp=57–58}} The connotation of the term ''Aryan'' was detached from its proper geographic and linguistic confinement as a [[Indo-Iranian languages|Indo-Iranian]] branch of [[Indo-European language family]] by this time.{{sfn|Anthony|2007|p=9}} The inequality of races and the notion of a "superior race" was universally accepted by the scholars of this era, therefore race was referred to "national character and national culture" beyond biological confinement.{{sfn|Santucci|2008|pp=40–41}}

In 1853, Arthur de Gobineau published ''[[An Essay on the Inequality of the Human Races]]'', in which he originally identified the Aryan race as the white race,<ref>{{cite web|title=Aryan|url=https://www.britannica.com/topic/Aryan|publisher=[[Encyclopædia Britannica]]|access-date=24 April 2022}}</ref> and the only civilized one, and conceived cultural decline and [[miscegenation]] as intimately intertwined.{{sfn|Arvindsson|2006|p=45}} He argued that the Aryans represented a superior branch of humanity,<ref name="Orsucci">{{cite web|first=Andrea|last=Orsucci|url=http://www.unifi.it/riviste/cromohs/3_98/orsucci.html|url-status=dead|title=Ariani, Indo-Germanic, stirpi mediterranee: aspetti del dibattito sulle razze europee (1870–1914)|language=it|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20020310125529/http://www.unifi.it/riviste/cromohs/3_98/orsucci.html|archive-date=10 March 2002|publisher= Cromohs Journal, [[University of Florence]]|date=2002-03-10}}</ref> and attempted to identify the races of Europe as Aryan and associated them with the sons of [[Noah]], emphasizing superiority, and categorized non-Aryan as an intrusion of the [[Semitic people|Semitic race]].{{sfn|Thapar|1996|p=5}} According to him, northern Europeans had migrated across the world and founded the major civilizations, before being diluted through racial mixing with indigenous populations described as racially inferior, leading to the progressive decay of the ancient Aryan civilizations.{{sfn|Arvindsson|2006|pp=13–50}}{{sfn|Arvindsson|2006|p=45}}

In 1878, German American anthropologist [[Theodor Poesche]] published a survey of historical references attempting to demonstrate that the Aryans were light-skinned blue-eyed blonds.{{Sfn|Mallory|2015|p=268}}

In 1899, [[Houston Stewart Chamberlain]] published what is described as "one of the most important proto-Nazi texts", ''[[The Foundations of the Nineteenth Century]]'', in which he theorized an existential struggle to the death between a superior German-Aryan race and a destructive [[Semitic people|Jewish-Semitic]] race.{{sfn|Arvindsson|2006|p=155}}

In 1916, [[Madison Grant]] published ''[[The Passing of the Great Race]]'', a polemic against interbreeding between "Aryan" Americans, the original [[Thirteen Colonies]] settlers of British-Scots-Irish-German origin, with immigrant "inferior races", which according to him were, [[Polish people|Poles]], [[Czechs]], Jews, and [[Italians]].{{sfn|Anthony|2007|p=9}} The book was a best-seller at the time.{{sfn|Anthony|2007|p=9}}

While the Aryan race theory remained popular, particularly in [[Germany]], some authors opposed it, in particular [[Otto Schrader (philologist)|Otto Schrader]], [[Rudolph von Jhering]] and the ethnologist [[Robert Hartmann (naturalist)|Robert Hartmann]], who proposed to ban the notion of Aryan from anthropology.<ref name=Orsucci/> The term was also adopted by various [[occultist]]s and [[Western esotericism|esoteric ideological systems]] of this era, such as [[Helena Blavatsky]],{{sfn|Goodrick-Clarke|1992|pp=20–21}} and [[Ariosophy]].{{sfn|Goodrick-Clarke|1992|pp=227}}