Europe likes to identify with classical Greco-Roman antiquity. European history shows a continuous dialogue with this one period in its past but never before did it lead to such a selective and exclusive identification as since the 19th century. The reasons for this classicism are manifold, its consequences mostly one-sidedly exposed. How classicism and its view of antiquity played a decisive role in the growth of nationalism, colonialism and the Western sense of superiority has rarely been highlighted and hardly researched. Research on the impact of antiquity on modern times is limited to reception history, focusing on the tradition of classical mythology or historical themes. This project focuses on the downsides: the acceptance of slavery and the principle of the Untermensch, the influence in phrenology, the connection with totalitarian state structures, sexism and misogyny. The project does not look for the causes in antiquity itself but in modern perspectives on antiquity and in the motifs with which antiquity is brought in for contemporary use.