Obligation to the Past
In the footsteps of the past into the future
Nuremberg, the city of the Nazi Party Rallies, the city of the racial laws, the city in which the trials against those primarily responsible from the national socialist regime were held. How does Nuremberg deal with this past? How does the city integrate guests into its activities? How do you responsibly and without sensationalist headlines present the traces of this past? Under the principle of “commitment to the past“, the city of Nuremberg has now for many decades been facing up to this past, at the same time structuring its present and future as a “city of peace and of human rights“.
Tribune former party rallye ground (Photo: Uwe Niklas)
About delusions of grandeur and true greatness
The National Socialists discovered Nuremberg for themselves at an early stage and in 1935 it became once and for all the city of the Nazi Party Rallies. The city that had long been so significant in the first German Reich, that is, the period from 800 to 1806, was also to become a symbol of eternal glory for the Third Reich as well. Monstrous building plans were drawn up for the Nazi Party Rally Grounds, and it was only the end of the 2nd World War that put an end to this architectural megalomania. The documentation centre Nazi Party Rally Grounds in the Congress Hall shows the effects of the regime on the city of Nuremberg and on its citizens. At the location of the Nuremberg Trials, the Nuremberg Law Courts, the Memorium Nuremberg recalls the events of the Jury Courtroom 600.
The starting point for a tour through the new Nuremberg, the “City of Peace and of Human Rights“, certainly ought to be the “Way of Human Rights“ next to the German National Museum. This walk-through work of art acted in recent years as a kind of catalyst to ignite a whole series of large and small activities, such as the Nuremberg Human Rights Award, the colourful Street of Children's Rights in the Stadtpark (City Park) or the Nuremberg International Human Rights Film Festival.
Further information
Obligation to the Past
Themes and Events
Dokumentationszentrum Reichsparteitagsgelände
Documentation Centre Nazi Party Rally Grounds: In the Third Reich Nuremberg was the "City of the Nazi Party Rallies". The north wing of the unfinished Congress Hall on the former Nazi Party Rally grounds, designed by the...[more]
Straße der Menschenrechte (The Way of Human Rights)
The Way of Human Rights is entered through a stylized triumphal arch from the Kornmarkt and lined by 27, 9-meter-high concrete pillars.
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Memorium Nürnberger Prozesse (Memorium Nuremberg Trials)
In the criminal court of the Nuremberg Palace of Justice world history was written: On November 20, 1945 the trial against the "main war criminals" began in the criminal court, "Courtroom 600". 21 leading...[more]
Reichsparteitagsgelände (Former Nazi Party Rally Grounds)
Former Nazi Party Rally Grounds and remaining structures: the unfinished Congress Hall, the main stand at the Zeppelinfeld and the Grosse Strasse (parade road) stand as mute witnesses to National Socialist megalomania.
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