National Monument for the Wars of Liberation
In memory of the soldiers of the Prussian army who fell in the Wars of Liberation from 1813 to 1815, King Friedrich Wilhelm III. from 1818 to 1821 erect the 18.83 meter high national monument for the wars of liberation on the Kreuzberg near Berlin . The neo-Gothic building is reminiscent of important battles; of victories, but also of defeats such as the battle of Großgörschen .
history
The idea of donating a memorial to the fallen originally came from the citizens of Berlin and was taken up by the monarch. Initially the plan was to build a Gothic cathedral in front of the Potsdamer Tor , but this was rejected for reasons of cost. On the highest point of the Tempelhofer Berg, Friedrich Wilhelm III. on September 19, 1818 the foundation stone of the national monument for the victories in the Wars of Liberation . The architect was Karl Friedrich Schinkel . The sculptures were made by Christian Daniel Rauch , Friedrich Tieck and Ludwig Wichmann . The casting was taken over by the Royal Prussian Iron Foundry , which had also made the Iron Crosses . It is a typical example of Fer de Berlin by the foundry Conrad Geiß . The inauguration of the monument took place on March 30, 1821, the anniversary of the storming of Montmartre . The Russian Tsar Alexander I also attended the ceremony. On the same occasion the hill was given its current name Kreuzberg.
The monument remained the highest point in Kreuzberg until the founding period in the 1870s. When other buildings wanted to overtake the monument in the course of the city expansion, this was prevented by the police. A client's lawsuit then leads to the “ Kreuzbergerkenntnis ”, a groundbreaking judgment by the Prussian Higher Administrative Court . Kaiser Wilhelm I had the almost 20-meter-high and 200- tonne monument lifted hydraulically onto an eight-meter-high platform in 1878/1879 under the direction of the civil engineer and civil servant Johann Wilhelm Schwedler . This was done with twelve hydraulic presses, each with a water pressure of 30 atmospheres and a lifting force of 16 tons. Originally the monument was laid out in an exact north-south or west-east orientation. When it was raised, the monument was rotated by 21 ° so that it was now aligned exactly in one axis with Großbeerenstraße . The substructure was based on plans by Johann Heinrich Strack and now houses a bat colony and a lapidarium .
From 1888 the Viktoriapark was created at the foot of the monument with a 24-meter-high artificial waterfall, which is modeled on the Zackelfall in the Giant Mountains .
description
The monument was designed in the form of a Gothic tabernacle and is crowned with an iron cross. On the twelve outer sides of the cross-like floor plan are twelve cast iron genii , each symbolizing a battle of the Wars of Liberation and portraying Prussian military leaders and members of the royal family. The four most prominent outwardly are Groß-Görschen May 2, 1813, Leipzig October 18, 1813, Paris March 30, 1814 and Belle Alliance June 18, 1815 ( Battle of Waterloo ). The following battles are remembered in the corner niches: Battle of Wartenburg , Battle of Kulm , Battle of La Rothière , Battle of Laon , Battle of Bar-sur-Aube , Battle of Großbeeren , Battle of Dennewitz , Battle of the Katzbach . The dedication under the plaque "Groß-Görschen" was written by the classical philologist August Boeckh on behalf of the king :
“The king to the people who
generously offered
good and blood to the fatherland at his call .
The fallen for memory,
the living for recognition,
the future generations to emulate. "
description | image | statue | Designed by | Modeled by | Facial resemblance |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Leipzig , October 18, 1813 |
center |
Genius in ancient Greek armor , crowned with a crown of rays, his hands rest on a shield with the coats of arms of the three allies Prussia, Austria and Russia | smoke | Wichmann | Wilhelm of Prussia , brother of the king |
Battle of Dennewitz , September 6, 1813 |
Right |
Genius in the armor of a Landwehr soldier, holding a sword in his left hand in front of his chest; in his right instead of over his head a laurel wreath | smoke | Wichmann | Friedrich Wilhelm Bülow von Dennewitz |
Battle of Kulm , August 30, 1813 |
Left |
Genius in the form of Hercules , wearing the skin of the Nemean lion , leaning with his left hand on a club resting on the head of the Cretan bull , with a view of the laurel wreath | Triangle | Wichmann | King Friedrich Wilhelm III. |
Groß-Görschen , May 2, 1813 |
Genius in ancient Greek armor with a sword and a laurel wreath | Triangle | Wichmann | unknown, or Leopold von Hessen-Homburg , because he died in the battle, possibly also Wilhelm von Prussia | |
Battle of the Katzbach , August 26, 1813 |
Right |
Genius in ancient Greek armor with a laurel wreath in hand | Wichmann | Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher as a young man | |
Battle of Großbeeren , August 23, 1813 |
|
Adolescent genius in armor of the Landsturm , with the Berlin coat of arms on his chest armor, his lance rammed into the ground with sprouts from bay leaves | Triangle | Friedrich Wilhelm IV. , Son of the king | |
Battle of Belle Alliance , June 18, 1815 |
Genia in a tunic , symbolizes the peace of Paris ; as the fruit of this last battle it shows an olive branch | smoke | Charlotte of Prussia , daughter of Friedrich Wilhelm III., Wife of Grand Duke Nikolaus Pawlowitsch | ||
Battle of Laon , March 9, 1814 |
Right |
Genius in old German armor and cloak, stabbing a dragon's head under his feet | Triangle | Wilhelm of Prussia , brother of the king | |
Battle of Bar-sur-Aube , February 27, 1814 |
center |
Young genius in ancient Greek armor with a lance and shield with the Prussian coat of arms | Wichmann | Wilhelm I , son of the king | |
Paris March 30th 1814 |
center |
Genia crowned by a laurel wreath | smoke | Luise of Mecklenburg-Strelitz | |
Battle of La Rothière , February 1, 1814 |
Right |
Genius in Nordic armor, walks forward, a branch of laurel in his left hand | smoke | Wichmann | Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher |
Battle of Wartenburg , October 3, 1813 |
Left |
Genius in ancient Greek armor, a step in a bark as part of a pontoon bridge | smoke | Wichmann | Ludwig Yorck von Wartenburg |
Network of monuments
The national monument in Berlin is the central and last point of other monuments of this kind. In a simplified form, this monument was erected by Schinkel on seven battle sites in 1817, five of which have been preserved. The inscription reads “The fallen heroes gratefully honor the king and fatherland. You rest in peace. [Place of slaughter and date] ”.
place | battle | monument | Status | Specialty |
---|---|---|---|---|
Großgörschen | Battle of Großgörschen | Schinkel tabernacle from Großgörschen | receive | Relocated in 1985 |
Haynau | Battle at Haynau | Destroyed by Polish pioneers in 1945 | ||
Large berries | Battle of Großbeeren | Schinkel tabernacle from Großbeeren | receive | 1853–1982 standing on a column |
Wartenburg | Battle of Wartenburg | Schinkel tabernacle from Wartenburg | partially preserved | built in 1863 |
Bellwitzhof (pl: Bielowice) | Battle of the Katzbach | Schinkel tabernacle from Bellwitzhof | not received | with disability house |
Varvažov (Telnice) | Battle of Kulm | Schinkel tabernacle from Kulm | receive | standing on sandstone pillar |
Niedergörsdorf | Battle of Dennewitz , | Schinkel tabernacle by Dennewitz | receive | Thoroughly renovated in 2002 |
Planzenoit | Battle of Belle Alliance | Schinkel tabernacle from Belle Alliance | receive | Damaged in 1832 |
Kulm monument in Varvažov
Dennewitz monument in Niedergörsdorf
Belle Alliance memorial in Plancenoit
literature
- Michael Nungesser : The monument on the Kreuzberg by Karl Friedrich Schinkel , Arenhövel (1987), ISBN 3922912192
- Elevation of the warrior memorial on the Kreuzberg near Berlin . In: Journal of Construction . Volume 29 (1879), col. 417–424, plates 58–60. Digitized in the holdings of the Central and State Library Berlin .
- The victory monument on the Kreuzberge near Berlin. Berlin: Haberlandt, around 1880. Digitized by the Central and State Library Berlin. http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:kobv:109-1-8348575
Web links
- Entry in the Berlin State Monument List
- National Monument for the Wars of Liberation (Kreuzberg Monument). In: arch INFORM .
- Andreas Kopietz: General Blücher is back at his old place. In: Berliner Zeitung of December 17, 1999
- German embassy in Brussels
Individual evidence
- ↑ Kathrin Chod, Herbert Schwenk and Hainer Weißpflug: Berlin district lexicon Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg . Haude & Spener, Berlin 2003, ISBN 3-77590-474-3 , p. 234.
- ^ Karl-Eugen Kurrer : The half-timbering conquers the third dimension: 150 years of the Schwedler Dome. Momentum Magazine, January 31, 2013, accessed January 20, 2020 .
- ↑ National monument on the Kreuzberg . In: www.luise-berlin.de, Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg, Berlin's lexicon from A-Z . Retrieved February 18, 2017.
- ↑ The treasure in Kreuzberg . In: tagesspiegel.de . 2nd June 2016.
- ^ Edition Luisenstadt: Wasserfall, Kreuzberg
- ↑ Krünitz 1839 books.google , luise-berlin.de , parlament-berlin.de ( Memento of the original from March 11, 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ Michael Nungesser, The monument on the Kreuzberg by Karl Friedrich Schinkel , Arenhövel (1987), p. 48. ISBN 3-922912-19-2 .
Coordinates: 52 ° 29 ′ 15.4 " N , 13 ° 22 ′ 53.4" E