Waterloo Column

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Waterloo Column on Waterlooplatz , in the background the Leineschloss , the Marktkirche and the Bredero skyscraper

The Waterloo column is a 46.31 meter high victory column in the Hanover district of Calenberger Neustadt . It was built on Waterlooplatz between 1825 and 1832 based on a design by Georg Ludwig Friedrich Laves . It is crowned with a statue of the goddess of victory Victoria, derived from Roman mythology . Their style is based on classical antiquity and is based on the Doric column order .

description

The memorial commemorates the victory in the Battle of Waterloo , which Great Britain , Hanover and Prussia won together against Napoléon I on June 18, 1815 . The column was built on the initiative of members of the former King's German Legion , but only after almost ten years of discussions and planning that began in 1816. The inauguration took place on June 18, 1832, the anniversary of Napoleon's defeat.

The building rises above a six-step base with a cube-shaped substructure with the inscription: "THE HEROES OF WATERLOO THE GRATEFUL FATHERLAND" . Name boards of the fallen and captured cannons complete the ensemble.

A spiral staircase with 189 steps leads through the hollow fluted shaft with a diameter of 3.75 meters to the square viewing platform with the figure of Victoria standing on a drum and a ball . This statue was made by order of the Duke of Cambridge for the price of 200  Louis d'or using ten hundredweight of copper after a design by the sculptor Heinrich Ludwig August Hengst by the Hanoverian court plumber Conrad Beckmann (1780-1850) and his son Franz (1811 –1876) as well as various "assistants". The artist's signature can be found in a fold of the garment near the left foot of the sculpture, where a separately attached plaque provides information about further details.

Ascents

Until the 1990s, the tourist office (now the Freundeskreis Hannover ) made it possible to climb the platform at the top of the column, but only on Sundays and public holidays and only in good weather. The climb cost a dime. It has not been open to the public since then. The daily newspaper Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung (HAZ) made it possible for a few readers to climb up for four years in December as part of the “Advent door” campaign. On the day of the open monument on September 8, 2013, the column was again open to the public for the first time on the initiative of the HAZ. Due to the strong interest, from 2014 the HAZ and the Hanover Architectural Monument Foundation, as part of the German Foundation for Monument Protection, with the support of the City of Hanover, will open the column for free ascents four times a year, including on the Open Monument Day. Hannover Marketing & Tourismus GmbH has been offering public ascent of the Waterloo Column since 2017, initially on certain dates during the school holidays in Lower Saxony.

  • Draft sketch around 1835 with sections through the building

  • Waterloo column around 1850

  • Waterloof Celebration 1899

  • Victoria on the Waterloo Column

  • Artist signature and additional text near the left foot of the Victoria

Others

Waterlooplatz with Waterloo Column and German flag on Victoria

During the Soccer World Cup in Brazil in 2014 , strangers hung a large German flag on the Victoria statue. Apparently the heavy steel door had not been properly locked after a tour.

On the occasion of her first state visit to the Federal Republic of Germany in May 1965, Queen Elizabeth intended to lay a wreath for the King's German Legion at the Waterloo Column, which the then federal government under Ludwig Erhard refused to do out of consideration for political relations with France.

literature

  • Images from three centuries in Hanover . Described by Gert von der Osten. Recorded by Hildegard Müller. Edited by the Kunstverein Hannover on its 125th anniversary. Bruckmann, Munich 1957, pp. 84-85.
  • Helmut Knocke , Hugo Thielen : Hanover art and culture lexicon , manual and city guide , 3rd, rev. Edition Hanover: Schäfer 1995, pp. 188-189, ISBN 3-88746-313-7 .
  • 190 steps city history in: Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung of December 7, 2010 ( online )

Web links

Commons : Waterloo Column (Hannover)  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Flag flies on the Waterloo Column in: Hannoversche Allgemeine Zeitung of July 2, 2014, last accessed August 8, 2014
  2. ^ Paul Munzinger: Up to the last cartridge. In: Süddeutsche Zeitung: Interview with Brendan Simms . June 18, 2015, accessed July 4, 2020 .

Coordinates: 52 ° 22 ′ 0 ″  N , 9 ° 43 ′ 39 ″  E