Brandenburg Gate facts for kids

The Brandenburg Gate

The Brandenburg Gate (German: Brandenburger Tor) is a structure in Berlin, Germany. It is the only remaining gate through which people used to enter Berlin. It was built between 1788 and 1791. It is located between the Platz des 18. März and the Pariser Platz. Nearby to the north is the Reichstag building. During the Cold War, the Reichstag was in West Berlin, and the Brandenburger Tor in East Berlin.

The Brandenburg Gate has twelve columns, six on the entrance side and six on the exit. The columns form five roadways, citizens originally were allowed to use only the outer two. This is rather like Admiralty Arch in London, the central roadway is reserved so that royal and important traffic is not delayed. On top of the gate is the Quadriga. This is Viktoria, the goddess of victory driving a Quadriga, a type of horse-drawn chariot.

After 1806, when Prussia was defeated at the Battle of Jena-Auerstedt, Napoleon stole the Quadriga and took it to Paris. When Napoleon was beaten in 1814 Prussian General Ernst von Pfuel occupied Pais and took the Quadriga back to Berlin, the olive wreath was changed to an Iron Cross. The Goddess Viktoria became Nike, goddess of victory.

When the Nazis came to power, they used the Gate as their symbol. The Gate was damaged but not destroyed during World War II. The governments of East Berlin and West Berlin restored it but it was closed when the Berlin Wall was built in 1961. The gate was in the middle of the death strip.

In 1963, U.S. President John F. Kennedy visited the Brandenburg Gate. The Soviets hung large banners across it to prevent him from looking into the East. In the 1980s West Berlin mayor Richard von Weizsäcker said:

The German question will remain open as long as the Brandenburg Gate is closed.

In 1987, U.S. President Ronald Reagan gave his famous speech "Tear down this wall!" outside of the gate.

Von Weizsäcker was the President of Germany at the reunification.

The Gate then symbolized the freedom to unite the City of Berlin. On the 22nd of December 1989, the Brandenburg Gate re-opened when Helmut Kohl, the West German Chancellor, walked through to be greeted by Hans Modrow, the East German Prime Minister.

On December 21, 2000, the Brandenburg Gate was privately refurbished at a cost of US$3 million.

Photo gallery

Images for kids

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  The original Brandenburg Gate in a 1764 engraving, 30 years before its neoclassical reconstruction.

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  The Berlin Customs Wall with its eighteen gates

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  Quadriga on the Brandenburg Gate at night

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  The environs of the Brandenburg Gate in 1889, by Christian Wilhelm Allers.

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  View over Pariser Platz, June 1945

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  Bernard Montgomery and Soviet marshals Georgy Zhukov and Konstantin Rokossovsky leave the Brandenburg Gate on 12 July 1945 after being decorated by Montgomery.

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  The Brandenburg Gate as seen from Unter den Linden in East Berlin in July 1981.

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  A crane removes a section of the Berlin Wall near the Brandenburg Gate on 21 December 1989.

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  The Gate on a 2014 morning

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  The Gate at midnight in 2014

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  Napoleon passing through the Brandenburg Gate after the Battle of Jena-Auerstedt (1806). Painted by Charles Meynier in 1810.

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  The Gate in 1928

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  The Gate in the 1930s

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  In 1984, East Berliners and others were kept away from the Gate, which they could view only from this distance.

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  The Berlin Wall in front of the Brandenburg Gate, shortly before its fall in 1989

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  Gate with Pariser Platz

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  The Brandenburg Gate as seen from the rooftop terrace of the Reichstag building, with the United States Embassy in the background

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  The quadriga with skyscrapers of Potsdamer Platz

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  Dark silhouette impression at sunset, 2010

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  The Gate lit up with the colors of the French Flag, after the November 2015 Paris attacks

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  The Gate illuminated with the colors of Belgian flag, after the 2016 Brussels bombings

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  The quadriga at night

See also

In Spanish: Puerta de Brandeburgo para niños