The Ringtheater was a popular theater in

Vienna Vienna ( ; ; ) is the capital city, capital, List of largest cities in Austria, most populous city, and one of Federal states of Austria, nine federal states of Austria. It is Austria's primate city, with just over two million inhabitants. ...

Austria Austria, formally the Republic of Austria, is a landlocked country in Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine Federal states of Austria, states, of which the capital Vienna is the List of largest cities in Aust ...

. In 1881, it was destroyed in the Ringtheater fire that killed 384 people. The site now houses the federal headquarters of police for Vienna.

Construction

The Ringtheater was built between 1872 and 1874 by Heinrich von Förster, following plans by Emil Ritter. It opened on January 17, 1874, under the direction of Albin Swoboda, Sr. as an 'Opéra Comique', antithetical to the "seriousness" of the

Vienna State Opera The Vienna State Opera (, ) is a historic opera house and opera company based in Vienna, Austria. The 1,709-seat Renaissance Revival venue was the first major building on the Vienna Ring Road. It was built from 1861 to 1869 following plans by ...

, then called the Court Opera ('Hofoper'). Lighting was by gas. However, in September 1878, the focus was shifted to spoken plays, German and Italian opera and variety, and the name was changed to the "Ringtheater".

The Ringtheater fire

Given that the footprint of the theatre was small—and the theatre was intended to hold an audience of 1700—the architect was forced to build high, but with disastrous consequences. On December 8, 1881, a fire broke out due to a problem with the gas lighting system, shortly before a performance of ''

Les contes d'Hoffmann ''The Tales of Hoffmann'' (French: ) is an by Jacques Offenbach. The French libretto was written by Jules Barbier, based on three short stories by E. T. A. Hoffmann, who is the protagonist of the story. It was Offenbach's final work; he died in ...

'',''Zeitzeichen'' auf WDR 5 am 8. Dezember 2006 and at least 384 people were killed. The following year, a new law was passed, regarding the outfitting and safety provisions, including safety curtains, outward-opening doors, and fireproofing of the set.

The site after the fire

An apartment building called the '' Sühnhaus'' was built on the site of the Ringtheater out of Emperor Franz Joseph's private funds; it was a private residence, which supported worthy causes. This was badly damaged by fire in 1945 and eventually collapsed in 1951. Between 1969 and 1974, an office block was erected on the site, in which the federal headquarters for police in Vienna and the general inspectorate of the federal security guards, and police commandos are housed. The fire is commemorated on a plaque on the police building. The

Attic style In classical architecture, the term attic refers to a storey or a parapet above the cornice of a classical façade. The decoration of the topmost part of a building was particularly important in ancient Greek architecture and this came to be ...

statues, which had stood on the

pilaster In architecture, a pilaster is both a load-bearing section of thickened wall or column integrated into a wall, and a purely decorative element in classical architecture which gives the appearance of a supporting column and articulates an ext ...

s, are now in the Pötzleinsdorfer Schlosspark.

References

Sources

Most of the information in this article is taken from the German Wikipedia article. {{Theatre in Austria Opera houses in Vienna Cultural venues in Vienna Former theatres in Vienna Music venues completed in 1874 Buildings and structures in Innere Stadt Theatres completed in 1874 1874 establishments in Austria 1881 disestablishments in Austria-Hungary 19th-century architecture in Austria