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The Bebelplatz (formerly and colloquially the Opernplatz) is a
public square
A town square (or square, plaza, public square, city square, urban square, or ''piazza'') is an open public space, commonly found in the heart of a traditional town but not necessarily a true square, geometric square, used for community gathe ...
in the central
Mitte
Mitte () is the first and most central borough of Berlin. The borough consists of six sub-entities: Mitte proper, Gesundbrunnen, Hansaviertel, Moabit, Tiergarten and Wedding.
It is one of the two boroughs (the other being Friedrichshain-Kreuzb ...
district of
Berlin
Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...
, the capital of
Germany
Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...
.
The square is located on the south side of the
Unter den Linden
Unter den Linden (, "under the linden trees") is a boulevard in the central Mitte district of Berlin, the capital of Germany. Running from the City Palace to Brandenburg Gate, it is named after the linden (lime in England and Ireland, not re ...
boulevard, a major east-west thoroughfare that runs through Berlin's
city center
A city centre is the commercial, cultural and often the historical, political, and geographic heart of a city. The term "city centre" is primarily used in British English, and closely equivalent terms exist in other languages, such as "" in Fren ...
. It is bounded to the east by the
State Opera building (hence its prewar name), to the west by buildings of
Humboldt University
Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (german: Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, abbreviated HU Berlin) is a German public research university in the central borough of Mitte in Berlin. It was established by Frederick William III on the initiative of ...
, and to the southeast by
St. Hedwig's Cathedral, the first
Catholic
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
church built in
Prussia
Prussia, , Old Prussian: ''Prūsa'' or ''Prūsija'' was a German state on the southeast coast of the Baltic Sea. It formed the German Empire under Prussian rule when it united the German states in 1871. It was ''de facto'' dissolved by an em ...
after the
Reformation
The Reformation (alternatively named the Protestant Reformation or the European Reformation) was a major movement within Western Christianity in 16th-century Europe that posed a religious and political challenge to the Catholic Church and in ...
. Following the war, the square was renamed after
August Bebel
Ferdinand August Bebel (22 February 1840 – 13 August 1913) was a German socialist politician, writer, and orator. He is best remembered as one of the founders of the Social Democratic Workers' Party of Germany (SDAP) in 1869, which in 1875 mer ...
, a founder of the
Social Democratic Party of Germany
The Social Democratic Party of Germany (german: Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlands, ; SPD, ) is a centre-left social democratic political party in Germany. It is one of the major parties of contemporary Germany.
Saskia Esken has been the ...
.
History
Early history
The square, then called ''Platz am Opernhaus'' (i.e. square at the opera house), was laid out between 1741 and 1743 under the rule of King
Frederick II of Prussia
Frederick II (german: Friedrich II.; 24 January 171217 August 1786) was King in Prussia from 1740 until 1772, and King of Prussia from 1772 until his death in 1786. His most significant accomplishments include his military successes in the Sil ...
. On 12 August 1910, it was renamed for Emperor
Francis Joseph I of Austria
Franz Joseph I or Francis Joseph I (german: Franz Joseph Karl, hu, Ferenc József Károly, 18 August 1830 – 21 November 1916) was Emperor of Austria, King of Hungary, and the other states of the Habsburg monarchy from 2 December 1848 until his ...
(''Kaiser-Franz-Josef-Platz'') on the occasion of his 80th birthday. The buildings surrounding the square were subsequently largely destroyed in
World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
by
air raids and the
Battle of Berlin
The Battle of Berlin, designated as the Berlin Strategic Offensive Operation by the Soviet Union, and also known as the Fall of Berlin, was one of the last major offensives of the European theatre of World War II.
After the Vistula– ...
. The ensemble was restored in the 1950s, and the square was renamed on 31 August 1947 as Bebelplatz.
Nazi book burning
The Bebelplatz is known as the site of one of the infamous
Nazi book burning
The Nazi book burnings were a campaign conducted by the German Student Union (, ''DSt'') to ceremonially Book burning, burn books in Nazi Germany and First Austrian Republic, Austria in the 1930s. The books targeted for burning were those viewed ...
ceremonies held in the evening of 10 May 1933 in many German university cities. The book burnings were initiated and hosted by the nationalist
German Student Association, thus stealing a march on the
National Socialist German Students' League
The National Socialist German Students' Union (German: ''Nationalsozialistischer Deutscher Studentenbund'', abbreviated NSDStB) was founded in 1926 as a division of the Nazi Party with the mission of integrating University-level education and aca ...
. The assembly of the books had started on the sixth, when students dragged the contents of the
Institut für Sexualwissenschaft
The was an early private sexology research institute in Germany from 1919 to 1933. The name is variously translated as ''Institute of Sex Research'', ''Institute of Sexology'', ''Institute for Sexology'' or ''Institute for the Science of Sexua ...
library into the square. At the Student Association's invitation Propaganda Minister
Joseph Goebbels
Paul Joseph Goebbels (; 29 October 1897 – 1 May 1945) was a German Nazi politician who was the ''Gauleiter'' (district leader) of Berlin, chief propagandist for the Nazi Party, and then Reich Minister of Propaganda from 1933 to 19 ...
held an inflammatory speech prior to the burning. Besides other spectators, it was attended by members of the Nazi Students' League, the
SA ("brownshirts"),
SS and
Hitler Youth
The Hitler Youth (german: Hitlerjugend , often abbreviated as HJ, ) was the youth organisation of the Nazi Party in Germany. Its origins date back to 1922 and it received the name ("Hitler Youth, League of German Worker Youth") in July 1926. ...
groups. They burned around 20,000 books, including works by
Heinrich Mann
Luiz Heinrich Mann (; 27 March 1871 – 11 March 1950), best known as simply Heinrich Mann, was a German author known for his Social criticism, socio-political novels. From 1930 until 1933, he was president of the fine poetry division of the ...
,
Erich Maria Remarque
Erich Maria Remarque (, ; born Erich Paul Remark; 22 June 1898 – 25 September 1970) was a German-born novelist. His landmark novel '' All Quiet on the Western Front'' (1928), based on his experience in the Imperial German Army during Worl ...
,
Heinrich Heine
Christian Johann Heinrich Heine (; born Harry Heine; 13 December 1797 – 17 February 1856) was a German poet, writer and literary critic. He is best known outside Germany for his early lyric poetry, which was set to music in the form of '' Lied ...
,
Karl Marx
Karl Heinrich Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, economist, historian, sociologist, political theorist, journalist, critic of political economy, and socialist revolutionary. His best-known titles are the 1848 ...
,
Albert Einstein
Albert Einstein ( ; ; 14 March 1879 – 18 April 1955) was a German-born theoretical physicist, widely acknowledged to be one of the greatest and most influential physicists of all time. Einstein is best known for developing the theory ...
and many other authors.
Erich Kästner
Emil Erich Kästner (; 23 February 1899 – 29 July 1974) was a German writer, poet, screenwriter and satirist, known primarily for his humorous, socially astute poems and for children's books including '' Emil and the Detectives''. He received ...
, whose books were also among those burned, was present at the scene and described it with bitter irony in his diary.
The Empty Library, a
Memorial in memory of the burning of books
''The Empty Library'' (1995), also known as ''Bibliothek'' or simply ''Library,'' is a public memorial by Israeli sculptor Micha Ullman dedicated to the remembrance of the Nazi book burnings that took place in the Bebelplatz in Berlin, Germany ...
by
Micha Ullman
Micha Ullman ( he, מיכה אולמן, born 1939) is an Israeli sculptor and professor of art.
Biography
Ullman was born in Tel Aviv to German Jews who immigrated to Mandate Palestine in 1933.Michal Lando''Art that hints at big questions,''The F ...
consisting of a glass plate set into the cobbles that gives a view of a group of empty bookcases large enough to hold all 20,000 burned books; its purpose is to commemorate the book burning. Furthermore, a line of
Heinrich Heine
Christian Johann Heinrich Heine (; born Harry Heine; 13 December 1797 – 17 February 1856) was a German poet, writer and literary critic. He is best known outside Germany for his early lyric poetry, which was set to music in the form of '' Lied ...
from his play, ''
Almansor
Christian Johann Heinrich Heine (; born Harry Heine; 13 December 1797 – 17 February 1856) was a German poet, writer and literary critic. He is best known outside Germany for his early lyric poetry, which was set to music in the form of ''Liede ...
'' (1821), is engraved on a plaque inset in the square: "Das war ein Vorspiel nur, dort wo man Bücher verbrennt, verbrennt man am Ende auch Menschen." (in English: "That was only a prelude; where they burn books, they will in the end also burn people").
Students at Humboldt University hold a book sale in the square every year to mark the anniversary.
Recent history
In 2006, an exhibition of "
United Buddy Bears
''Buddy Bears'' are painted, life-size fiberglass bear sculptures developed by German businesspeople Klaus and Eva Herlitz, in cooperation with sculptor Roman Strobl. They have become a landmark of Berlin and are considered unofficial ambassad ...
" was held in the square, for the third time in Berlin. The exhibition consisted of more than 180 bear sculptures, each in height and designed by a different artist. Due to its difficult past the use of Bebelplatz remains disputed, recently sparked off by a wintry skating rink and a party tent of the Berlin
fashion week
A fashion week is a fashion industry event, lasting approximately one week, where fashion designers, brands or "houses" display their latest collections in runway fashion shows to buyers and the media. These events influence the upcoming fashion ...
.
In 2012 several protests were caused by the announced plan of an underground carpark serving the attendees of the opera to be erected under the square and around the subsurface memorial.
See also
*
Blücher Memorial, Berlin
*
Bülow Memorial, Berlin
The Bülow Memorial on Unter den Linden avenue in Berlin's Mitte district commemorates the Prussian army general and freedom fighter Friedrich Wilhelm Bülow von Dennewitz (1755–1816). Created from 1819 to 1822 by Christian Daniel Rauch in neo ...
*
Gneisenau Memorial, Berlin
*
Scharnhorst Memorial, Berlin
The Scharnhorst Memorial on Unter den Linden avenue in Berlin's Mitte district commemorates the Prussian military reformer and freedom fighter Gerhard von Scharnhorst (1755–1813). Created from 1819 to 1822 by Christian Daniel Rauch in neoclass ...
*
Yorck Memorial, Berlin
References
External links
Panorama Bebelplatz- Interactive 360° Panorama
{{Coord, 52, 31, 00, N, 13, 23, 38, E, region:DE-BE_type:landmark, display=title
Buildings and structures in Mitte
Rebuilt buildings and structures in Berlin
Squares in Berlin