The Hallesches Tor was located in today's

Berlin Berlin ( ; ) is the Capital of Germany, capital and largest city of Germany, by both area and List of cities in Germany by population, population. With 3.7 million inhabitants, it has the List of cities in the European Union by population withi ...

district

Kreuzberg Kreuzberg () is a district of Berlin, Germany. It is part of the Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg borough located south of Berlin-Mitte, Mitte. During the Cold War era, it was one of the poorest areas of West Berlin, but since German reunification in ...

south of

Mehringplatz Mehringplatz is a round plaza (or circus)A circus is "circular open space at a street junction" at the southern tip of the Friedrichstadt neighborhood of Kreuzberg district, Berlin. It marks the southern end of Friedrichstraße. Until 1970 b ...

. Today, as a historic monument listed

underground station A metro station or subway station is a train station for a rapid transit system, which as a whole is usually called a "metro" or "subway". A station provides a means for passengers to purchase tickets, board trains, and evacuate the syste ...

on the site of the former gate bears the name ''Hallesches Tor''. It is a major transfer point for the underground lines / (here as Hochbahn) and as well as the bus lines 248 (Berlin Ostbahnhof - Breitenbachplatz via Südkreuz) and M41 (Hauptbahnhof via Potsdamer Platz - Baumschulenstraße). The station is connected by the ''Hallesche-Tor-Brücke'' with the ''Blücherplatz'' to the south. The

Amerika-Gedenkbibliothek The Amerika-Gedenkbibliothek (AGB; ) is one of the largest public libraries in Berlin, Germany. It was co-financed by a donation from the United States. The building was designed by American and German architects, including Fritz Bornemann and Wi ...

and the nearby

Jewish Museum A Jewish museum is a museum which focuses upon Jews and may refer seek to explore and share the Jewish experience in a given area. Notable Jewish museums include: Albania * Solomon Museum, Berat Australia * Jewish Museum of Australia, Melbourn ...

contribute to the heavy visitor traffic in the area around the ''Hallesches Tor''.

History

It is named after the historic and no longer existing ''Hallesche Tor'' of the

Berlin Customs Wall The Berlin Customs Wall (German: "Berliner Zoll- und Akzisemauer", literally ''Berlin customs and excise wall'' the German term had been originally "Akzisemauer" / excise wall but with the fading knowledge of the term "excise" most references ...

, which replaced the ''Berlin city wall'' in the 18th century. The gate was located in the south of Berlin between the Wassertor and the Potsdamer Tor and formed the exit gate to the

Prussia Prussia (; ; Old Prussian: ''Prūsija'') was a Germans, German state centred on the North European Plain that originated from the 1525 secularization of the Prussia (region), Prussian part of the State of the Teutonic Order. For centuries, ...

Halle an der Saale Halle (Saale), or simply Halle (), is the second largest city of the German state of Saxony-Anhalt. It is the sixth-most populous city in the area of former East Germany after (East) Berlin, Leipzig, Dresden, Chemnitz and Magdeburg as well as t ...

. Until the Jewish Edict of 1812, the gate was the only one in southern Berlin that

Jews Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...

were allowed to pass, and they had to register. In the north they were only allowed to enter the city through the Rosenthaler Tor - from 1750 through the Prenzlauer Tor.Ralf Gänsrich: ''König Friedrich II. ließ 5 Windmühlen errichten''. In: ''Prenzlberger Ansichten'', 21. Jg., September 2013, S. 8 Since the beginning of the 18th century, several

cemeteries A cemetery, burial ground, gravesite, graveyard, or a green space called a memorial park or memorial garden, is a place where the remains of many dead people are buried or otherwise entombed. The word ''cemetery'' (from Greek ) implies th ...

have been built outside the former city in front of the ''Hallesches Tor''. The area was named ''Am Halleschen Thore'' around 1848. In the years 1876 to 1879,

Heinrich Strack Johann Heinrich Strack (6 July 1805, Bückeburg – 13 June 1880, Berlin) was a German architect of the '' Schinkelschule''. His notable works include the Berlin Victory Column. Life and work His father, , was a painter of portraits and vedu ...

erected arcaded residential and commercial buildings and the ''Belle-Alliance-Brücke'' as a representative entrance to the city centre of Berlin instead of the gate. The complex was decorated with four groups of figures depicting trade and traffic. After severe war damage and post-war demolition, the bridge was restored in the 1950s and 1980s and two groups of figures were reassembled.

References

{{coord, 52, 29, 52, N, 13, 23, 28, E, region:DE-BE_type:landmark, display=title Buildings and structures in Friedrichshain-Kreuzberg