A statue of someone at the Brandenburg Gate
A statue of someone at the Brandenburg Gate
The Quadriga on top of the gate
The Quadriga
The Brandenburg Gate (German: Brandenburger Tor) is a former city gate and one of the main symbols of Berlin and Germany. It is located west of the city center at the junction of Unter den Linden and Ebertstraße, immediately west of the Pariser Platz. It is the only remaining gate of a series through which Berlin was once entered. One block to the north stands the Reichstag building. The gate is the monumental entry to Unter den Linden, the renowned boulevard of linden trees which formerly led directly to the city palace of the Prussian monarchs. It was commissioned by King Frederick William II of Prussia as a sign of peace and built by Carl Gotthard Langhans from 1788 to 1791. Having suffered considerable damage in World War II, the Brandenburg Gate was fully restored from 2000 to 2002 by the Stiftung Denkmalschutz Berlin (Berlin Monument Conservation Foundation). Today, it is regarded as one of Europe's most famous landmarks.
Design and History
In the time of Frederick William (1688), shortly after the Thirty Years' war and a century before the gate was constructed, Berlin was a small walled city within a star fort with several named gates: Spandauer Tor, St. Georgen Tor, Stralower Tor, Cöpenicker Tor, Neues Tor, and Leipziger Tor. Relative peace, a policy of religious tolerance, and status as capital of the Kingdom of Prussia facilitated the growth of the city.
The Brandenburg Gate was not part of the old fortifications but one of 18 gates within the fiscal excise wall (German: Akzisemauer), erected in the 1730s, including the old fortified city and many of its then suburbs. Between 1788 and 1791 the prior simple guard houses siding the gate were replaced by the current construction. The Gate consists of twelve Doric columns, six to each side, forming five passageways. Citizens originally were allowed to use only the outermost two. Atop the gate is the Quadriga, a chariot drawn by four horses driven by Victoria, the Roman goddess of victory.
The Gate's design is based upon the Propylaea, the gateway to the Acropolis in Athens, Greece and is consistent with Berlin's history of architectural classicism (first, Baroque, and then neo-Palladian). The Gate was the first "Athens on the River Spree" by architect Carl Gotthard von Langhans. The capital Quadriga was sculpted by Johann Gottfried Schadow.
The Brandenburg Gate's design has remained essentially unchanged since its completion even as it has played different political roles in German history. After the 1806 Prussian defeat at the Battle of Jena-Auerstedt, Napoleon took the Quadriga to Paris.
After Napoleon's defeat in 1814 and the Prussian occupation of Paris by General Ernst von Pfuel, the Quadriga was restored to Berlin and Victoria's wreath of oak leaves was supplemented with a new symbol of Prussian power, the Iron Cross. The Quadriga faces east, as it did when it was originally installed in 1793. Only the royal family was allowed to pass through the central archway, as well as members of the Pfuel family, from 1814 to 1919. In addition, the central archway was also used by the coaches of Ambassadors on the single occasion of their presenting their letters of credence to the monarch.
When the Nazis ascended to power they used the Gate as a party symbol. The Gate survived World War II and was one of the damaged structures still standing in the Pariser Platz ruins in 1945 (another being the Academy of Fine Arts). The gate was badly damaged with holes in the columns from bullets and nearby explosions. Following Germany's surrender and the end of the war, the governments of East Berlin and West Berlin restored it in a joint effort. The holes were patched, and were visible for many years following the war.
In 1990, the Quadriga was removed from the gate as part of renovation work carried out by the East German authorities.
On December 21, 2000, the Brandenburg Gate was privately refurbished at a cost of six million dollars (U.S.).
On October 3, 2002, the twelfth anniversary of German Reunification, the Brandenburg Gate was once again reopened following extensive refurbishment.
The Brandenburg Gate is now again closed for vehicle traffic, and much of Pariser Platz has been turned into a cobblestone pedestrian zone.
A Soviet flag flew from a flagpole atop the gate from 1945 until 1957, when it was replaced by an East German flag. Since the reunification of Germany, the flag and the pole have been removed.
Berlin Wall and its fall
Vehicles and pedestrians could travel freely through the gate, located in East Berlin, until the Berlin Wall was built, 13 August 1961. Then one of altogether eight Berlin Wall crossings was opened on the eastern side of the gate, usually not open for East Berliners and East Germans, who from then on needed a hard-to-obtain exit visa. On 14 August West Berliners gathered on the western side of the gate to demonstrate against the Berlin Wall, among them West Berlin's Governing Mayor Willy Brandt, who had spontaneously returned from a West German federal election campaigning tour in West Germany early the same day.
Under the pretext that Western demonstrations required it, the East closed the checkpoint at the Brandenburg Gate the same day, 'until further notice', a situation that was to last until 22 December 1989. The Wall was erected as an arc just west of the gate, cutting off access from West Berlin. On the eastern side, the "baby Wall", drawn across the eastern end of Pariser Platz rendered it off limits to East Berliners as well.
When the Revolutions of 1989 occurred and the Wall fell, the gate symbolized freedom and the desire to unify the city of Berlin. Thousands of people gathered at the Wall to celebrate its fall on 9 November 1989. On 22 December 1989, the Brandenburg Gate crossing was reopened when Helmut Kohl, the West German chancellor, walked through to be greeted by Hans Modrow, the East German prime minister. Demolition of the rest of the Wall around the area took place the following year.
Brandenburg Gate became the main venue for the 20th anniversary celebrations of the fall of the Berlin Wall or "Festival of Freedom" on the evening of 9 November 2009. The high point of the celebrations was when over 1000 colorfully designed foam domino tiles, each over 2.5 meters tall, were lined up along the route of the former wall through the city center. The domino "wall" was then toppled in stages converging here.
Political history at the gate
In 1963, U.S. President John F. Kennedy visited the Brandenburg Gate. The Soviets hung large red banners across it to prevent him looking into the East. In the 1980s, decrying the existence of two German states, West Berlin mayor Richard von Weizsäcker said: "The German question is open as long as the Brandenburg Gate is closed."
On June 12, 1987, U.S. President Ronald Reagan spoke to the West Berlin populace at the Brandenburg Gate, demanding the razing of the Berlin Wall. Addressing CPSU General Secretary Mikhail Gorbachev, Reagan said,
“ General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here to this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall! ”
On July 12, 1994, U.S. President Bill Clinton spoke at the Gate about peace in post–Cold War Europe.
On November 9, 2009, Chancellor of Germany, Angela Merkel, walked through Brandenburg Gate with Russia’s Mikhail Gorbachev and Poland's Lech Wałęsa as part of the 20-year celebration of tearing down the Berlin Wall
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