I chose to visit Nuremberg for one obvious historical reason, confronting that hard history after discovering that the city holds so much more under that terrible shadow. Since the only organized tour I could find had no availability on any day on which I found myself in Munich, I cobbled together a solo tour to the city Hitler made infamous.
That morning, I left at a reasonable hour thanks to the hour duration of the trip from Munich, arriving just a few minutes before the tourist office opened. As I had learned so far on this trip, maps come in handy while traveling. After finding a decent free one, I made my way towards the first stop which combined an art installation as well as an interesting museum. I wanted to visit the museum but decided not to finalize my choice until I arrived and saw the admission price.
Nuremberg did not meet my expectations. Rather, it surprised me. I had one, obvious, association and made no other hypotheses for what I would see. Thus, the quintessential German medieval-ness of the historic center surprised me. I soaked in it as I ambled towards the first stop.
Beside the Germanisches Museum stands the Way of Human Rights. This installation, which opened in 1993, consists of a concrete archway opening onto a line of 27 round, concrete pillars, each engraved with an article from the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in both German and another world language. At the far end of the line of pillars lies one of the medieval gates to the city. This stark installation brought to mind the idea of atonement, something the city has attempted for decades after the stain of the Nazi Party rallies.
After walking the length of the installation, I stepped into the Germanisches, a museum dating back to the 1800s. This museum holds all sorts of exhibits on Germanic culture dating from prehistoric times until the present day. On another trip with more time in Germany and more money, I would definitely pay the admission price. However, since my day had just started, and I wanted to save enough money to visit both the Kaiserberg and the rally grounds, I decided against a visit, although I did make use of the free restroom.
I filled the morning with touring two beautiful churches as well as passing an ornate 15th century fountain. Apparently the Lutheran Germans held onto more ornamentation in their churches after the break from Rome than the Swiss Reformed. In St. Lorenz, I saw the largest organ in all Protestant German churches as I strolled through the stark concrete gray walls punctuated periodically with triptics and other examples of church art. I also visited St. Sebald, one of the oldest churches in the city. The entry alcove grabbed my attention with its bright, albeit faded, ornate entryway with copious low relief sculptures of saints and biblical figures.
After exiting St. Sebald, I made my way towards the outskirts of the medieval town through a street which with little alteration could form the backdrop for a movie taking place in medieval Nuremberg. I reached the city wall and briefly walked on the outside before ducking back in and looking for somewhere to eat.
The next item on my list, the Kaiserberg, would take significant time to tour and my stomach would not wait. This particular area lacked typical, convenient options so I ended up at the only sit down restaurante that I patronized that whole month overseas. While I did not particularly care for the pasta dish I ordered (though I ate most of it), I savored the cappuccino.
Full and hydrated, I headed the short distance from the restaurant over to the Kaiserberg, one of the two places I knew I wanted to see enough to pay the entrance fee. Nuremberg served as an Imperial city for the Holy Roman Empire during the height of its power and influence. Learning this just confirmed to me my lack of knowledge concerning Germany as well as my tacit joining in the common associations with the city. I loved learning about the centuries long history of the city which, an hour or so later illuminated the history Hitler attempted to co-opt.
Once I made my out of the Kaiserberg, a complex of buildings, I started walking towards the transit stop. Unlike the rest of the stops, the Dokumentationszentrum (Documentation Center) on the site of the Nazi Party Rally Grounds lay outside of reasonable walking distance. Hitler needed immense amounts of land to build his imaginings of deluded grandeur. I felt sprinkles of rain and appreciated the fact that the rain waited to arrive until I reached the indoor portion of my tour.
The rain continued as a drizzle through the twenty minute ride although as soon as I got off the tram, the downpour increased. Thankfully, I did not get too wet. The lobby presented a somber, dimly lit, sparsely populated interior which I understood better after making my way through the Dokumentationszentrum. After purchasing a ticket, only €6, and obtaining an audioguide, I entered unsure of what I would find inside.
As an amateur historian, I look at museum displays more for their historiography rather than to learn completely new information. So much of the story lies in the telling. What does the historian emphasize or omit? How does the historian choose to provide the information, artifacts, photographs, text, or some combination of the three? Does the historian tell the story chronologically, thematically, or comparatively? These questions continue.
The circuit takes the visitor through a chronicling of Hitler’s rise and lets the visitor make their analysis based on primary documents. On the walls or in stands of sorts, the Dokumentationszentrum displays reproductions of primary source material such as newspapers and photographs. There in stark reality, the visitor must confront the insidious way that Hitler’s ideologies took root in the worst desires and fears of the German people and how easily that persuasion could work on others, how we could slow walk our way to depravity.
At the end of the tour, two last artifacts present a powerful juxtaposition. The first artifact, a viewing platform, takes you out above the grand, unfinished theater, where you could stand and contemplate the original, bone-chilling designs for this grandeur. I did not stand there long, only partially due to the rain. Just a few seconds in that context chilled me to the bone, leaving my heart heavy.
The second artifact presents itself to your view as soon as you turn to continue walking towards the exit. On the left, behind glass, stands a length of railroad ties covered with small hexagonal shaped cards. I drew close to the window to discern the purpose and read the name and identifying details. I gasped as I grasped the significance. The audio added more. Upon a significant anniversary of the German railways, they installed this length of railway ties piled with cards to acknowledge the terrible role the company played in the Holocaust. Each card represented six thousand victims. A card for each victim would have required that the display stretch all the way back to the city center, 4 km away.
The exit follows this display. Upon returning my audioguide, I stood for a few minutes processing what I had seen before making a half-hearted attempt to find a gift shop I knew would not exist. Instead, the Dokumentationszentrum has only a small cafe with a limited selection of food, thus preventing the cheapening of the site.
I left the building, exiting to gloomy drizzle, appropriate for the tone of the visit. A tram back to the city waited just across the street when I left the Dokumentationszentrum so I did not have to wait long to make my way back to Nuremberg’s train station and from there back to Munich. The ride back to Munich provided time to decompress through journaling and also provided distance away from the rain so that I could stay dry on the way back to the flat where I packed everything up to prepare for Dachau and the subsequent journey to Vienna.