The history of the Washingtonia (197)
Schlaraffia Washingtonia is the Schlaraffian chapter of the American capital. It carries the chapter number 197 and has existed since 1914, which makes it one of the oldest German-speaking cultural societies kept alive in Washington, D.C. without interruption.
1914 and 1915 — permission to found, and sanction
In 1914 the Allmutter Praga in Prague granted permission to found a new colony in Washington, to be called Washingtonia. One year later, in 1915, the colony was sanctioned and thereby raised to a full chapter. The timing is remarkable: the First World War was raging in Europe, and in the American capital a chapter came into being whose language and whose game came from that very Europe.
1920 — three men returning from Siberia
How far Schlaraffian friendship reached across borders and front lines is shown by an episode from 1920. Three knights returning from Siberian captivity found Schlaraffian care at a field meeting aboard the Floating Castle Mount Vernon in Norfolk, Virginia. A field meeting is a gathering held away from the home castle; that this one took place on board gave it the name. The episode stands for what Schlaraffia is about at heart: a stranger who knows the watchword is no longer a stranger.
The Potomac Castle and the chapters of the East Coast
The castle of the Washingtonia carries the name of the river the city stands on: Potomacburg, the Potomac Castle. In 1973 a chapter feud between the chapters Bostonia and Totowa was fought there. A feud in the Schlaraffian sense is a contest of wit and artistry that ends in reconciliation, never in resentment.
The chapters of the American East Coast have always been closely linked. The sixtieth foundation festival of the Washingtonia began in May 1974 with a preliminary meeting held by the high Baltimora from neighbouring Maryland.
1978 — the largest gathering in the history of the chapter
The largest gathering in its history came on 31 October 1978. For the one thousand five hundred and thirty-fourth meeting, 146 members from 36 chapters rode in. The chapter was sixty-five years old at the time. The number of meetings says more than any anniversary: those who come together more than fifteen hundred times in sixty-four years do not do so out of duty.
German language and culture in the capital
For more than a century the Washingtonia has cultivated the German language, humour, the arts and friendship in Washington, D.C. Meetings are held in German. Anyone who speaks the language or would like to learn it, anyone who enjoys music, wordplay and good company, is welcome as a guest. The first visits are free and without obligation, and nobody needs any skill beyond listening.
The historical notes in this section come from the electronic Allschlaraffian Reychs Archive (eARA) and are documented in the volumes of the German Schlaraffen newspaper.
History of Schlaraffia
🦉 Schlaraffia in figures: founded 1859 · over 200 Reyche worldwide · 5 continents · one language · one spirit: humour, friendship and art.
The cradle: Prague, 1859
It began with a handful of artists and men of letters in the Prague of 1859. Actors, poets, painters — people who wanted to set the gravity of the times aside for a few hours in order to laugh, to play and to keep friendship together. They simply called their circle Schlaraffia.
The name was the programme: the fabled land of Cockaigne, that country of lightness and joy, was to become real for a few hours. No class distinctions, no everyday hierarchies — only play, humour and art.
The game spreads
The idea travelled fast. Soon further Reyche arose in other cities of the German-speaking world: Vienna, Berlin, Hamburg, Munich. With the wave of German emigration in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Schlaraffia crossed to the New World as well.
New York, Buenos Aires, São Paulo — wherever German-speaking emigrants found a new home, they founded a Schlaraffen-Reych too. The bond of a shared language and a shared game held them together, across every distance.
Schlaraffia survives the storms of history
Two world wars, political upheavals, prohibitions — Schlaraffia has come through much. In Germany and Austria the work of the Reyche was restricted or forbidden during the war years. But as soon as peace returned, the Reyche came back to life. That will to endure is no accident: where real friendship rules, it finds a way.
Worth noting: while in Europe some Reyche paused for a time, Schlaraffia overseas carried on unbroken. The Allschlaraffia — the worldwide umbrella — held the whole together.
The Allschlaraffia — the worldwide union
All the Schlaraffen-Reyche of the world are joined in the Allschlaraffia. This umbrella sets the common rules, assigns the Reych numbers and sees to it that a Schlaraffe from Tokyo is at home at once in a Sippung in Frankfurt.
In doing so the Allschlaraffia keeps up something that has grown rare in the modern world: a fellowship founded on values rather than on profit or networking. Humour, friendship and art are not empty words here; they are practised at every Sippung.
Become part of our history?
Write the next chapter with us. A visit without obligation is enough.
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