Treptow Soviet Memorial, Berlin, Germany

Three great Soviet memorials were erected in Berlin after the war, which not only serve as memorials, but also as war cemeteries. The facility in the Treptower Park is the central memorial and with 100,000 square metres the largest of its kind in Germany. The facility, also serving as cemetery for 5,000 Soviet solders, was built between 1946 and 1948 on the site of a large playing and sports field. Memorial slabs and frescos depicting the course of the war are arranged in long tiers of straight lines. The imposing figure on top of the mausoleum shows a soldier carrying a rescued German child. It is a memorial for the app. 80,000 Red Army soldiers killed during the conquest of Berlin in World War II. 40,000 cubic metres of granite were used in the construction. Aside from the war cemetery in Niederschönhausen, the facility is the largest Soviet war cemetery in Germany as well as the largest anti-fascist memorial in Western Europe.

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User Reviews

Faris Baidoun (9 months ago)
Was an ok autumn walk and nice to see the memorial sites. It is close to the riverside were many food like huts are close to the river side and you can enjoy while you walk beside the river bank, also many boat rides to choose from here.

Konstantin Zolotareff (12 months ago)
Greatest Memorial for WWII USSR Army in Germany

Paul Martins (13 months ago)
Well kept memorial on a grand scale. Easy walk through the park from the train station and a pleasant walk back along the river bank with lots of local snack bars too.

Marcus Sasse (14 months ago)
Nice place to chill and watch grannies on bike

CZMaestro (14 months ago)
A truly exceptional monument. It will exceed your expectations. The scale of it alone is incredibly impressive. Peaceful and reverent for the most part. Like all public monuments, some people forget where they are and are not completely appropriate, but for the most part it's quite quiet and peaceful.

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Broch of Gurness

The Broch of Gurness is an Iron Age broch village. Settlement here began sometime between 500 and 200 BC. At the centre of the settlement is a stone tower or broch, which once probably reached a height of around 10 metres. Its interior is divided into sections by upright slabs. The tower features two skins of drystone walls, with stone-floored galleries in between. These are accessed by steps. Stone ledges suggest that there was once an upper storey with a timber floor. The roof would have been thatched, surrounded by a wall walk linked by stairs to the ground floor. The broch features two hearths and a subterranean stone cistern with steps leading down into it. It is thought to have some religious significance, relating to an Iron Age cult of the underground.

The remains of the central tower are up to 3.6 metres high, and the stone walls are up to 4.1 metres thick. The tower was likely inhabited by the principal family or clan of the area but also served as a last resort for the village in case of an attack.

The broch continued to be inhabited while it began to collapse and the original structures were altered. The cistern was filled in and the interior was repartitioned. The ruin visible today reflects this secondary phase of the broch's use.

The site is surrounded by three ditches cut out of the rock with stone ramparts, encircling an area of around 45 metres diameter. The remains of numerous small stone dwellings with small yards and sheds can be found between the inner ditch and the tower. These were built after the tower, but were a part of the settlement's initial conception. A 'main street' connects the outer entrance to the broch. The settlement is the best-preserved of all broch villages.

Pieces of a Roman amphora dating to before 60 AD were found here, lending weight to the record that a 'King of Orkney' submitted to Emperor Claudius at Colchester in 43 AD.

At some point after 100 AD the broch was abandoned and the ditches filled in. It is thought that settlement at the broch continued into the 5th century AD, the period known as Pictish times. By that time the broch was not used anymore and some of its stones were reused to build smaller dwellings on top of the earlier buildings. Until about the 8th century, the site was just a single farmstead.

In the 9th century, a Norse woman was buried at the site in a stone-lined grave with two bronze brooches and a sickle and knife made from iron. Other finds suggest that Norse men were buried here too.

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