Hitler came to power in 1933, and over the following years he converted Germany into a one-party state under the control of his Nazi Party and governed by his personal dictatorship. He espoused the idea that modern Germans descended from the ancient Aryans, who he claimed—in contrast to established academic understandings of prehistory—had been responsible for most major developments in human history such as agriculture, art, and writing. The majority of the world's scholarly community did not accept Hitler's racial theories and claims about prehistory, and the Nazis decided to give them greater scholarly backing, establishing the Ahnenerbe with the purpose of providing evidence for Nazi racial doctrine and to promote these ideas to the German public through books, articles, exhibits, and conferences. Ahnenerbe scholars interpreted evidence to fit Hitler's beliefs, and some consciously fabricated evidence to do so. The organisation sent out various expeditions to other parts of the world, intent on finding evidence of ancient Aryan expansion.