Brandenburg Gate

Until modern times it was just a city gate - expanded in the familiar way shortly after the French. Revolution. Here the Elector rode west from the castle to his private hunting area, the zoo. The original gate of peace, however, took on a completely different meaning after the Napoleonic occupation around 1805: Napoleon had the Quadriga, the four-horse carriage, transported to Paris with the goddess of peace. After the victory of the Allies over France, she came back in a great triumphal procession - as a return carriage. Since then crowned with an eagle with a cross in its claws as a sign of victory. - During the division of the city, the war-torn environment was cleared away and remains (Hotel Adlon) were blown up - and suddenly the gate stood alone, inaccessible from the west through the wall, separated from the east by fences and barriers. It was not until the turning point, the fall of the wall, that the gate became a symbol again - for the German. reunion

Reichstag Building

Wilhelmine splendid building, although it was rebuked as a booth or monkey house. Therefore built outside and away from the city. Historically valuable, after all, the Red Army soldiers placed their flag on the building as a sign of victory. Even if the famous photo of it is only reproduced. Then for decades rather unnoticed in the so-called free West Berlin - only 5 m from the wall, it was not allowed to be used for official Bundestag meetings. If it did, for example to elect the Federal President, there was an immediate reprimand from East Berlin. Completely gutted in the nineties and completely redesigned for the reunited Bundestag with now over 700 deputies. Not to forget the iconographic wrapping action by the artist Christo. The Reichstag dome, put on a new glass after the architect had only planned a kind of gas station roof instead, now represents the new Berlin