Wilhelm Teudt was a völkisch lay archaeologist searching for an ancient Germanic civilization. His 1929 work Germanische Heiligtümer continues to
have some currency in esoteric and neopagan communities.

He trusted in his paranormal

Paranormal

Paranormal is a general term that designates experiences that lie outside "the range of normal experience or scientific explanation" or that indicates phenomena understood to be outside of science's current ability to explain or measure...

 faculty of picking up the "vibrations" of his ancestors helping him visualize ancient sceneries of the sites he was researching. Teudt joined the NSDAP aged 73, in 1933.

Teudt was particularly interested in the Externsteine

Externsteine

The Externsteine are a distinctive rock formation located in Ostwestfalen-Lippe of northwestern Germany, not far from the city of Detmold at Horn-Bad Meinberg. The formation is a tor consisting of several tall, narrow columns of rock which rise abruptly from the surrounding wooded hills...

, which he suggested was the location of the Saxon Irminsul

Irminsul

An Irminsul was a kind of pillar which is attested as playing an important role in the Germanic paganism of the Saxon people. The oldest chronicle describing an Irminsul refers to it as a tree trunk erected in the open air...

. He led the German excavations at the site until 1940 when it was turned over to the Ahnenerbe

Ahnenerbe

The Ahnenerbe was a Nazi German think tank that promoted itself as a "study society for Intellectual Ancient History." Founded on July 1, 1935, by Heinrich Himmler, Herman Wirth, and Richard Walther Darré, the Ahnenerbe's goal was to research the anthropological and cultural history of the Aryan...

's control.