Visiting the Topography of Terror
The Topography of Terror is a free museum in Berlin dedicated to the atrocities committed by the Third Reich and its state police between 1933 and 1945. The museum experience is split between indoor and outdoor sections. The site itself is located exactly where the official headquarters of the Gestapo, the SS, and the Nazi Party security forces once stood.
A free outdoor exhibition in the heart of Berlin
The Topography of Terror is a significant site of remembrance because it sits on the very ground where many decisions to exterminate Jewish, Roma, and Sinti populations were made by Adolf Hitler and his lieutenants. The 15 outdoor information stations are positioned at the site of the former Gestapo cellars, the exact place where political prisoners were tortured before being sent to concentration or extermination camps.
The open-air exhibition traces the timeline of the Nazi Party rise to power in Germany and across Europe starting in 1933. You will also find standing fragments of the Berlin Wall, which divided the area between 1961 and 1989.
A place to remember crimes committed by the Nazis
The documentation center, built in 2010 and adjacent to the outdoor grounds, collects numerous artifacts that detail the planning and execution of crimes committed by the Third Reich. The exhibit is divided into five chronological and thematic sections: the rise of the National Socialist Party, the institutions of terror, the history of persecutions conducted within the Reich, the exterminations committed across occupied European territories, and finally, the end of the war and the post-war period.
A third permanent exhibition focuses specifically on the consequences of the Nazi Party rise to power for Berlin and its residents.
Opening hours
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This memorial site is an absolute must-visit if you come to Berlin. It consists of open-air exhibits that are free to access, recalling Germany's past during the Second World War. It is a place of remembrance rich in emotion. A true duty to remember when visiting Berlin.