Berolina is the female personification [note 1] of Berlin and the allegorical female figure symbolizing the city. One of the best-known portraits of Berolina is the statue that once stood in Alexanderplatz. [1]
Berolina is the female personification [note 1] of Berlin and the allegorical female figure symbolizing the city. One of the best-known portraits of Berolina is the statue that once stood in Alexanderplatz. [1]
In 1871, emperor William I ordered an 11 m (36 ft) Berolina statue in Belle-Alliance-Platz (today's Mehringplatz), to glorify the homecoming victorious troops of the Franco-Prussian War. [2]
Another statue was designed in 1889 by the sculptors Emil Hundrieser (1846–1911) and Michel Lock (1848–1898) as a decorative element for the state visit of King Umberto I of Italy. [2] The Berolina figure was produced in plaster and was placed on Potsdamer Platz. The statue of 7.55 m (24.8 ft) showed a woman with a crown of oak leaves. The inspiration allegedly was from a painting in the Rotes Rathaus city hall that featured cobbler's daughter Anna Sasse.
Later, in 1895, the gypsum figure by Hundrieser was copper-melted and unveiled in Alexanderplatz on December 17. Weighing five tonnes, it was placed in front of the site where Hermann Tietz erected his department store in 1904.
The statue was damaged in the barricade fights of the German Revolution of 1918–19. It had to be removed during the construction of the U5 underground line in 1927, but was set up again in 1933. The nearby Berolinahaus, built in 1929–32 according to plans by Peter Behrens, was named after the statue. Finally dismantled on 26 August 1942, it was probably melted down in 1944 for war purposes. [2] A model is preserved at the Märkisches Museum.
In 2000, an association named Wiedererstellung und Pflege der Berolina e.V. ('Recreation and Maintenance of Berolina eV') was created with the aim to rebuild the statue. [3]
Many Berliner companies are named "Berolina". A leading German film studio of the 1950s was called Berolina Film. In the past, there were several radio and television broadcasts in which references were made to the city's personification. Today, it is the popular name of central Berlin Police radio. A housing cooperative also bears the Berolina name. [4]
In 1980s, the "Berolina" music awards were organized, sponsored by the TV networks ARD, ZDF and ORF, and hosted on television by Thomas Gottschalk on 27 August 1987 with a total of 15 musicians and bands. [2]
Several songs, poems, and plays are named "Berolina"; as for example, works by Kurt Tucholsky, [5] Günter Neumann, Ulli Herzog, and Alexander von Bentheim.
The Main belt asteroid 422 Berolina, is also named after the city.
Alexanderplatz is a large public square and transport hub in the central Mitte district of Berlin. The square is named after the Russian Tsar Alexander I, which also denotes the larger neighbourhood stretching from Mollstraße in the north-east to Spandauer Straße and the Rotes Rathaus in the south-west.
Potsdamer Platz is a public square and traffic intersection in the center of Berlin, Germany, lying about 1 km (1,100 yd) south of the Brandenburg Gate and the Reichstag, and close to the southeast corner of the Tiergarten park. It is named after the city of Potsdam, some 25 km (16 mi) to the south west, and marks the point where the old road from Potsdam passed through the city wall of Berlin at the Potsdam Gate. Initially, the open area near the city gate was used for military drills and parades. In the 19th into the 20th century, it developed from an intersection of suburban thoroughfares into the most bustling traffic intersection in Europe. The area was totally destroyed during World War II and then left desolate during the Cold War era when the Berlin Wall bisected its location. Since German reunification, Potsdamer Platz has been the site of major redevelopment projects.
U2 is a line of the Berlin U-Bahn. The U2 line starts at Pankow S-Bahn station, runs through the eastern city centre (Alexanderplatz) to Potsdamer Platz, the western city centre and finally to the Ruhleben terminal station.
U5 is a line on the Berlin U-Bahn. It runs from Hauptbahnhof in Mitte eastwards through Alexanderplatz, Friedrichshain, Lichtenberg and Friedrichsfelde, surfaces in Biesdorf-Süd to pass Kaulsdorf and Hellersdorf above ground and finally reaches city limits at Hönow.
Alfred Frederik Elias Grenander was a Swedish architect, who became one of the most prominent engineers during the first building period of the Berlin U-Bahn network in the early twentieth century.
Vinetastraße is a Berlin U-Bahn station in the Pankow district, located on the U2. It was opened in 1930, and for decades was the northern terminus of the U2, until the line was extended to the Pankow S-Bahn station in 2000.
Hammonia is the female personification of Hamburg.
Hans Kollhoff is a German architect and professor.
Leipziger Straße, or Leipziger Strasse, is a major thoroughfare in the central Mitte district of Berlin, capital of Germany. It runs from Leipziger Platz, an octagonal square adjacent to Potsdamer Platz in the west, to Spittelmarkt in the east. Part of the Bundesstraße 1 highway, it is today one of the city's main east–west road links.
Berlin Alexanderplatz is a German railway station in the Mitte district of Berlin's city centre. It is one of the busiest transport hubs in the Berlin area. The station takes its name from its location on Alexanderplatz, near the Fernsehturm and the World Clock.
Mitte is a central section of Berlin, Germany, in the eponymous borough of Mitte. Until 2001, it was itself an autonomous district.
The unbuilt U10 line, of the Berlin U-Bahn, was part of a planned "200-km-plan" extension of the Berlin U-Bahn from 1953–55, which was scrapped in 1977. It would have been a large-profile (Großprofil) metro line running from Falkenberg, in the northeastern part of the city, to Alexanderplatz, and down to Steglitz before terminating at Drakestraße in Lichterfelde. The designated letter name of the line was "F" until 1 July 1972, when it was changed to "Line 10". Because a number of tunnels and stations were constructed to accommodate the proposed line with elements visible at transfer stations and elsewhere, the line is popularly known as the "Phantomlinie".
Berlin's history has left the city with an eclectic assortment of architecture. The city's appearance in the 21st century has been shaped by the key role the city played in Germany's 20th-century history. Each of the governments based in Berlin—the Kingdom of Prussia, the 1871 German Empire, the Weimar Republic, Nazi Germany, East Germany and the reunified Federal Republic of Germany—initiated ambitious construction programs, with each adding its distinct flavour to the city's architecture.
The following is a timeline of the history of the city of Berlin, Germany.
Peter Christian Breuer was a German sculptor.
The Berlin Stalin statue was a bronze portrayal of the Soviet leader Joseph Stalin. A Komsomol delegation had presented the sculpture to the East Berlin government on the occasion of the Third World Festival of Youth and Students in 1951. The monument was formally dedicated on 3 August 1951 after temporary placement at a location on a newly designed and impressive boulevard, Stalinallee, being constructed at the time in what was then the Berlin district of Friedrichshain. Stalin monuments were generally removed from public view by the leadership of the Soviet Union and other associated countries, including East Germany, during the period of De-Stalinization. In Berlin the statue and all street signs designating Stalinallee were hastily removed one night in a clandestine operation and the street was renamed Karl-Marx-Allee and Frankfurter Allee. The bronze sculpture was smashed and the pieces were recycled.
The Berlin U-Bahn originated in 1880 with Werner Siemens' idea to build an urban railway in Berlin. During the nine years after the German Empire was founded, the city's population grew by over one-third and traffic problems increased. In 1896, Siemens & Halske began to construct the first stretch of overhead railway. On 1 April 1897, the company began construction of an electric underground railway. The Berliner Verkehrs Aktiengesellschaft (BVG) was formed in 1928, and took over further construction and operation of the network. In 1938, the company was renamed Berlin Transport Company; the original acronym, however, remained. Since 1994, the BVG has been a public company.
Michel Lock, originally Hubert Michael Lock was a German sculptor.
Preußenpark, also known as Thai Park or ThaiPark Berlin, is a public park in the Berlin quarter of Wilmersdorf, which belongs to the district of Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf. With a size of 55,000 m2, the park is one of the smaller parks in Berlin. North of Fehrbelliner Platz, Preußenpark extends between Brandenburgische Straße and Württembergische Straße to Pommersche Straße.
{{cite web}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)