The Walpurgis Hall (german: Walpurgishalle) is a hall on the Witches' Dance Floor near

Thale Thale () is a town in the Harz district in Saxony-Anhalt in central Germany. Located at the steep northeastern rim of the Harz mountain range, it is known for the scenic Bode Gorge stretching above the town centre. Geography The town is situated ...

in the

Harz mountains The Harz () is a highland area in northern Germany. It has the highest elevations for that region, and its rugged terrain extends across parts of Lower Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, and Thuringia. The name ''Harz'' derives from the Middle High German ...

, Germany, built in the

Old Germanic Proto-Germanic (abbreviated PGmc; also called Common Germanic) is the reconstructed proto-language of the Germanic branch of the Indo-European languages. Proto-Germanic eventually developed from pre-Proto-Germanic into three Germanic bran ...

style by Hermann Hendrich and

Bernhard Sehring Ernst Bernhard Sehring (1 June 1855 in Edderitz, Anhalt – 27 December 1941) was a German architect. Life Sehring came from a petty-bourgeois village background and was the son of a Dessau construction foreman. He was boarded by Professor Ha ...

. The hall was opened in 1901 and is a museum today. Whilst Sehring designed the architecture of the building to Hendrich's guidelines, Hendrich himself was responsible for the five large paintings in the interior of the hall. These portray scenes of the

Walpurgis Night Walpurgis Night (), an abbreviation of Saint Walpurgis Night (from the German ), also known as Saint Walpurga's Eve (alternatively spelled Saint Walburga's Eve), is the eve of the Christian feast day of Saint Walpurga, an 8th-century abbess ...

from

Goethe's Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (28 August 1749 – 22 March 1832) was a German poet, playwright, novelist, scientist, statesman, theatre director, and critic. His works include plays, poetry, literature, and aesthetic criticism, as well as tre ...

Faust Faust is the protagonist of a classic German legend based on the historical Johann Georg Faust ( 1480–1540). The erudite Faust is highly successful yet dissatisfied with his life, which leads him to make a pact with the Devil at a crossroa ...

known as the: ''Will-o'-the-Wisp Dance'', ''Mammon's Cave'', ''Witches' Dance'', ''Bride of the Wind'' und ''Gretchen's Appearance'' (''Gretchen's Tragedy'').

Paintings

Walpurgishalle Irrlichtertanz.jpg, Will-o'-the-Wisp Dance Walpurgishalle Mammonshöhle.jpg, Mammon's Cave Walpurgishalle Hexentanz 2.jpg, Witches' Dance Walpurgishalle Windsbraut.jpg, Bride of the Wind Walpurgishalle Gretchenerscheinung.jpg, Gretchen's Appearance

External links

''Walpurgishalle''. Painting by Hermann Hendrich
Buildings and structures in the Harz Museums in Saxony-Anhalt Cultural infrastructure completed in 1901 Walpurgis Night Goethe's Faust {{SaxonyAnhalt-struct-stub