This is a controversial sale to be held Wednesday in Munich. Some 147 personal items that belonged to Adolf Hitler and other Nazi dignitaries are auctioned there. While the Jewish associations in Germany denounce this sale, the price of the personal effects of the dictator climb high. "Hitler sells", admits bluntly the house that organizes this auction.
Hitler's top hat, with its initials engraved inside, will be priced at 12,000 euros, while the lease of his apartment in Munich in 1933 will be at 2,500 euros. Among the items for sale, there is also a black silk dress that belonged to his wife Eva Braun.
"We are always afraid that neo-Nazis will buy"
The police will be there to oversee the sale, for which only recognized collectors have been invited. Out of the question, indeed, to welcome fanatics of the Third Reich. But on the internet or on the phone, it is clear that buyers are not always simple collectors, explains Thomas Kirchner, the director of the German Center for Art History in Paris. "We are always afraid that it is neo-Nazis or people of extreme right who buy these objects," he says at the microphone of Europe 1. "The last time, a large part of the sale is gone in Argentina, and we are well aware of this country's links with Nazism after 1945. I am sure that no museum will buy anything, and the prices are exorbitant, "he says.
Many of these objects were recovered at the time by American or Russian soldiers, who are now dead, and their descendants are now seeking to get rid of them.