Entrance to the Königsberg gate was only allowed. Seven gates of koenigsberg-kaliningrad

"Unforgettable is my father's city,
established in history for centuries,
I miss you day and night
And I know by heart every stone of Yours...

(Horst Glass "Königsberg")

The ancient gates of Königsberg… Like doors to the past, they invite us to go back several centuries to the good old Königsberg, the capital of East Prussia.

Alas, not every modern Kaliningrader will find today in silent fragments once majestic city something interesting and exciting. People immersed in the bustle of their thoughts and rhythm modern city, habitually rush past the ancient gates, not paying any attention to them. And only nostalgic groups of German tourists tirelessly click the shutters of their cameras to capture the history of Königsberg in the pictures, which continues to this day ...

Back in 2011, I planned to release a series of posts on all the surviving gates of our city, but I never realized this idea. Well, maybe the time has come now? The Königsberg Gate has always been something special for me. Due to my work, I often visit the area of the Royal and Rossgarten gates. And every time they catch my eye again and again, and my imagination draws a picture of past centuries ...

Here is a mustachioed sentry, hiding from the hot July sun in the shade of the gate, checking the documents of a merchant hurrying to the city. Nimble boys run through the gate with lightning, hurrying to plunge into the cool waters of a nearby pond, and a smart lady under a snow-white umbrella is talking animatedly about something with a cheerful soldier ... Peace and tranquility reigns everywhere, the warm sun shines, birds sing in the green trees, and the air is filled aroma from a nearby bakery…

I want to start my story about the gates of Königsberg with a general story about when and why the city gates began to be built, and then I will introduce you to the first gates on our route - Ausfalsky and Zheleznodorozhny.

It is logical that any gate should lead somewhere. So, for example, the very first gates of Königsberg were erected in the XIII century simultaneously with royal castle and led into it courtyard. A century later, when the city grew and was surrounded by a wall, the gate has already become an integral part of the fortress.

A more serious rampart was erected in 1626 - 1634 and surrounded Königsberg from all sides. The fortification consisted of several bastions and semi-bastions, as well as 9 gates. In addition, in 1657, the powerful Fort Friedrichsburg was founded from the sea.

And already two centuries later, King Frederick William IV issued a decree on the beginning of the construction of the Second Rampart, which, on the whole, repeats the contours of the previous one. The powerful towers of the Don and Wrangel, the Kronprinz defensive barracks and the Astronomical Bastion are being built, and new fortified gates are being erected in place of the previous ones. The construction of the King's Gate was the first to begin in 1843, and the construction was completed with the construction of the Friedland Gate in 1862.

However, already at the beginning of the 20th century, the Second Wall Fortification lost its military significance and was partially demolished, freeing up new areas for urban construction in the rapidly developing Königsberg. Thus, the most beautiful Steindamm and Tragheim gates disappeared from the face of the earth, and in their place the Hansa Platz square, now known as Victory Square, was built. Time did not spare the Hollenderbaum Gate either…

02. Not preserved Steindamm Gate of Königsberg.

But the remaining seven gates of the Second rampart bypass have survived to this day, and it is about them that my story will be.

Our route starts from Victory Square - the heart of modern Kaliningrad, where once there were perhaps the most beautiful gates of the city - Steindamm. We will return to these gates, but for now we will head along Gvardeisky Prospekt, which originates from Victory Square, to Victory Park and the memorial complex "1200 Soldiers-Guards".

It is here, across the road from the Astronomical Bastion and a hundred meters from the obelisk, that the most inconspicuous city gates are located - ausfalian. Now on their roof there is a small Orthodox chapel of St. George the Victorious, built in 1995, but the gate itself can be seen by going down to a small lake in the park, formed from a former moat.

03. Chapel of St. George the Victorious on ... the roof of the gate.

Why are the gates below ground level and where do they lead? To do this, we will get acquainted with the history of the construction of these gates.

ausfal gate(German Ausfalltor), in translation meaning "Exit Gate", were designed in the 17th century and were part of the First Rampart of Königsberg. The author of the project is an unknown military engineer.

These gates were exclusively pedestrian and served as a passage through an earthen rampart. On the field side, a small bridge across the moat adjoined the gate. The bridge itself is long gone… only the preserved brick and granite piers still remind us of the past. And if you look closely at the slope overgrown with trees, you can still see (especially in winter), the road that has not yet been destroyed by time, leading to the bridge over the moat.

The Ausfal Gates are not distinguished by their bright pompous architecture and are more reminiscent of a powerful firing point, the casemates of which bristled with numerous embrasures for direct and lateral fire on the enemy. The high walls of the casemates are half lined with granite slabs, protecting the brickwork from water and snow. And the only decoration of the gate was only five brick teeth above the arched passage.

At the beginning of the 20th century, during the modernization of the rampart, the Ausfalsky Gate turned out to be below ground level and was turned into a pedestrian tunnel, and a little later the city part of the gate was completely covered with earth.

During the Great Patriotic War the gates were converted into a dugout command post with sealed concrete rooms. During the hostilities, the Ausfalsky Gate was practically not affected, and already in the post-war period, a warehouse and a bomb shelter for the Kaliningrad Police School (the modern Kaliningrad Law Institute of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Russian Federation), located next door, were arranged in them.

At the moment, it is not possible to get inside the gate, however, in 2007, the Ausfalsky Gate was transferred to the Kaliningrad History and Art Museum, which inspires some hope that these gates will someday be restored and become available for a thorough inspection by tourists. Although, 10 years have already passed, and things are still there ...

11. Once there was a bridge leading to the gate.

The second gate, which we will get acquainted with, is located next to Ausfal. They are called - Railway(German Eisenbahnhof Tor). Through this gate, also designed in the second half of the 19th century by Ludwig von Aster, the old railway to Pillau (Baltiysk) passed.

In architectural terms, the gate has two separate arched spans with barrel vaults. And if from the outside everything was rather modest, then from the side of the city the arches were made in the form of beautiful lancet portals.

On the sides of the gate there are classical casemates, and on the field side the gate is equipped with a guardroom - a guardhouse and two gates, similar to the claws of a giant crab.

Once gates were installed on them, by closing which it was possible to turn this section of the gate into a small patio. It is worth noting that this is the only gate with such an architectural solution.

In addition, there was another one at the gate interesting feature... Rectangular recesses were made in the walls of the arches (from floor to ceiling) - fines. Rectangular beams or sleepers were horizontally laid in them like "blinds", thanks to which it was possible to completely close the passage through the gate.

15. Notches are visible - fines. Archival photo of the author, 2011

Moreover, it was impossible to dismantle such a barrier from the enemy’s side, unless, of course, they shot at it from a direct fire cannon. Therefore, the effectiveness of this fortification barrier in the 19th century was very doubtful ...

When the gate lost its defensive purpose, an automobile road was laid along the top, which turned the gate into a real bridge, across the railway tracks, dismantled only in the early 90s of the XX century.

Currently, the gate is partially fulfilling its function. Cars sometimes pass through them, and mostly residents of nearby houses use the gates, as a footpath to Victory Park passes through them - a great place for cultural recreation. Like the Ausfal Gate, in 2007 railway gate were transferred to the Kaliningrad History and Art Museum.

And recently, in the Railway Gates, a digital Planetarium of the Center for the Popularization of Sciences named after F.V. Bessel. In the future, in one of the arches of the building-monument, the tenants intend to open a gallery, which will exhibit works of astrophotographic artists, photographers, as well as children's creative work. A 14.15 December 21 and 22 at the gate festival will take place scientific cinema, within which the audience will be shown full-length documentaries about science from around the world, created over the past five years.

Of the amusing curiosities associated with this gate, I would like to note a plate from the series "do not believe your eyes", explaining to us that this is not a gate at all, but a 19th-century church ... The plate hung on the wall of the gate for a long time and only after a recent restoration it was removed and replaced to the modern correct one.

This concludes the first part of my story about the gates of Königsberg, and in the second part we will get acquainted with the Friedrichsburg and Brandenburg gates.

To be continued...

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This section will talk about one of the sights of the Kaliningrad region - seven survivors and some information about the completely destroyed gates, which at one time served as entrances to the city of Königsberg.

Sackheim Gate

The Sackheimer Gate (German: Sackheimer Tor) is one of the seven surviving city gates of Kaliningrad. Located at the intersection of Moskovsky Prospekt and Litovsky Val.

The current building of the Sackheim Gate was built in the middle of the 19th century. However, the first gates on this site were built during the construction of the first rampart of Königsberg at the beginning of the 17th century. Until the end of the 19th century, while ramparts existed, the gate served as a checkpoint at the entrance to the city. After the ramparts were torn down, they lost their defensive function and became a kind of analogue of the triumphal arch. At the beginning of the 20th century, the gates were sold by the military department to the city. After that, part of the casemates was demolished and houses were added to the gates.

After the Second World War, the gates began to be used as a warehouse, which function they performed until 2006. At the same time, the gate has the status of a historical monument of federal significance.

In 2006, the restoration of the gate began. After the restoration, the gates will be handed over to the federal state institution "Center for Standardization and Metrology". Laboratories and a small museum will be located here, where you can see scales and other ancient measuring instruments.

Architecture

The Sackheim Gate has one passage in the form of an arch. In the past, there were also smaller arches on the sides, which may have been pedestrian passages, but these have not survived to this day. There are four towers at the corners of the gate: two are round on the side of the city and octagonal on the outside. From the side of the city, the gates were decorated with high reliefs by Johann David Ludwig Yorck and Friedrich Wilhelm Bülow, from the outside - the image of a black eagle (the Order of the Black Eagle was the highest award of Prussia).

royal gate

The Royal Gates are one of the seven surviving city gates of Kaliningrad. Located at the intersection of Frunze Street and Litovskiy Val. In 2005, the Royal Gate was a symbol of the celebration of the 750th anniversary of Kaliningrad. Since the same year, the gate has been a branch of the Museum of the World Ocean. They house an exposition dedicated to the visit to Königsberg by the Great Embassy of Peter I.

The gates are built in pseudo-Gothic style and outwardly resemble a small castle.

german time

The current King's Gate inherited its name from an older gate located on the same site. These first gates were originally called Gumbinnen, since it was in Gumbinnen (now Gusev) that the road that went through them led. In 1811, the gate was renamed the Royal Gate, after the name of the street on which it was located (Koenigstrasse). The name of the street is due to the fact that the Prussian kings followed it, heading from the Königsberg castle to military reviews on the outskirts of Devau.

At the end of the first half of XIX century in Königsberg began the modernization of city fortifications. Then the old gates were demolished, and new ones were built in their place, which have survived to this day.

King's Gate in the 19th century

The ceremonial laying of the new Royal Gate took place on August 30, 1843 in the presence of King Frederick William IV, and construction was completed in 1850.

At the beginning of the 20th century, the defensive structures, which included the King's Gate, became outdated, lost their military significance and were sold to the city by the military department. In 1910, the ramparts adjacent to the gate on the sides were torn down. Thus the gate became a free-standing, island structure. Now they performed the function of a kind of triumphal arch.

It is not known whether the King's Gate was used as a defensive structure during the assault on the city by Soviet troops during the Great Patriotic War. At least in the chronicles of hostilities and in memoirs they are not mentioned.

The gates were damaged by artillery and bombing, but this does not mean that they were the target, because the entire city was subjected to shelling and bombing.

Soviet time

Nothing is known about the history of the gate between 1945 and 1960. The first official post-war document related to the Royal Gates is Resolution of the Council of Ministers of the RSFSR No. 1327 of August 30, 1960. This document established a list historical monuments cities taken under state protection.

However, the only consequence of this decision was that the gate was decorated with a sign "The monument is registered and protected by the state." No restoration or even conservation work was carried out at that time.

By that time, there was no longer a through passage through the gate.

For another fifteen years, nothing happened in the history of the gate. They were not restored, they were not written about. The gates were gradually destroyed.

In 1975, the Ministry of Culture of the RSFSR and the Department for the Protection of Historical and Cultural Monuments received the following letter, signed by the chairman of the Kaliningrad City Executive Committee V. V. Denisov:

The Kaliningrad City Executive Committee informs that repair and conservation work at the "King's Gate", located along Frunze Street - Litovsky Val and which is an architectural monument of national importance, will be completed in the coming years. In the future, this building will be adapted for the cultural needs of the city.

However, in reality, these good intentions did not cause any consequences. On the contrary, soon a new threat loomed over the gates:

“... We ask for your permission, as representing neither historical nor national value, to demolish the following sculptural images, high reliefs, bas-reliefs and medallions: a) sculptural images of Frederick I, Duke Albrecht and Ottokar II from the Royal Gate, b) medallions with images of generals from the Brandenburg Gate Astaire and Boyen and the coat of arms of Prussia ... ".

The author of this letter, sent to the State Inspectorate for the Protection of Historical and Cultural Monuments in 1976, was a person who, according to his position, was supposed not to destroy, but to preserve cultural monuments, namely the head of the Department of Culture of the Kaliningrad Regional Executive Committee V.K. Glushkov.

However, the Moscow experts did not give the go-ahead for the “hewing” of the gate.

In the same year, for the first time since the end of the war, the gates began to be used: they housed a bookstore.

In subsequent years, attempts by local authorities to destroy the gate did not stop. In the issue of January 8, 1978, the Kaliningradskaya Pravda newspaper wrote that the gate should have been demolished. It is unlikely that this article was an accident, since at about the same time the Kaliningrad City Executive Committee sent an official request to the Ministry of Culture and the Central Council of the All-Union Society for the Protection of Historical and Cultural Monuments to remove state protection from the Royal Gate.

Fortunately, this time the initiative of the Kaliningrad authorities to destroy evidence of the pre-war history of the city did not meet with support in Moscow. An article from Kaliningradka caught the eye of the head of the Department for the Protection of Historical and Cultural Monuments of the Ministry of Culture of the RSFSR A. N. Kopylov, who sharply criticized the initiative.

In order to resolve the question of the value of the Royal Gates, a special commission was sent to Kaliningrad by the Ministry of Culture. She worked in the city from 10 to 16 September 1978. As a result, the protected status of the gate was confirmed, and a letter was sent to Kaliningrad from the Ministry of Culture, which substantiated the historical and cultural significance of the gate, and denied the request to remove the status of a protected monument from them.

By the beginning of perestroika, the bookstore at the gate ceased to exist. They again became an ownerless structure, which no one cared for, and which was gradually destroyed. For some time the gate was used as a warehouse.

As noted above, by 1991 the gate was abandoned. Over the next ten years, this situation did not change, despite the fact that there were many options for their restoration and further use.

A turning point in the history of the gate was the celebration of the 750th anniversary of the city, which was celebrated in 2005. The Royal Gate became not only one of the many objects restored for the anniversary, it was this building that became the main symbol of the anniversary.

The anniversary symbol was a silhouette of the gate against the background Russian flag with the inscriptions "Kaliningrad" and "750".

In the autumn of 2004, 20 million rubles were allocated from the federal budget for the restoration of the gate, but then the cost more than doubled, to 49 million rubles.

Restoration work began in November 2004. By this time, the state of the gates left much to be desired, because they were damaged during the war and stood without maintenance for almost sixty years. The bas-reliefs were damaged: the heads of Frederick I, Duke Albrecht and Ottokar II were beaten off

The progress of the restoration of the gate was supervised by the high level, since the organizing committee for the preparation of the celebration of the 750th anniversary of Kaliningrad was headed by Russian Minister of Economy German Gref. In February 2005, he stated that if by July 3 (the last day of the anniversary celebrations) the gates were not completely restored, then a "Royal Gallows" would be installed next to them for the officials responsible for the restoration.

However, there was no need to resort to such drastic measures: the gates were ready on time. Their opening after restoration took place on July 1.

The restoration of the bas-reliefs of the "three headless kings", as they were called in Kaliningrad (although one of them, Albrecht, was not a king) was a particular difficulty. There was practically no documentation, and one could only judge how they looked before the war from photographs. It was extremely difficult to send the figures for restoration to Germany, where there is a lot of experience in such work, because of Russian laws, which provide for a complicated procedure for issuing a permit for the temporary export of cultural objects abroad. In this regard, it was decided to restore the figures on the spot.

To restore the figures, masters Alexei Kadyrov and Sergei Bugaev arrived in Kaliningrad from St. Petersburg, sculptors-restorers who had previously restored the Singing Chapel. Glinka in St. Petersburg. Vyacheslav Mozgovoy, the leading restorer of the State Hermitage, was also invited to restore the bas-reliefs.

The difficulty of the restoration was, among other things, that the figures were made of sandstone of a special breed, and a special composition had to be created to strengthen the heads.

It was not without curiosities: when the heads were almost ready, detailed photographs of the figures were found in one of the Polish archives. The heads had to be redone. Now, in case the kings lose their heads again in the future for some reason, they can be replaced with spares.

On November 10, 2005, a message to posterity was immured into the wall of the Royal Gate - a glass case with the book "The City of My Dreams", from which the Kaliningraders of the future will learn how their time was imagined by the Kaliningraders of 2005. One of the entries in the book was made by Russian President Vladimir Putin on July 2, during his visit to the anniversary celebrations.

The creation of a message to posterity was an initiative of the Museum of the World Ocean.

On February 10, 2005, the gate was handed over to the Museum of the World Ocean. It houses an exposition dedicated to the Great Embassy of Peter the Great to Europe.

Gate architecture

Like the rest of the gates of Königsberg, the Royal Gate was built in the neo-Gothic style, but it is in the Royal Gate that the style is most pronounced. Gate material - brick.

The King's Gate consists of one passage 4.5 meters wide, on the sides of which there are former casemates. From the side of the city, the casemates had windows and doors, and from the outside - loopholes. On the outer side of the gate was the so-called guardhouse - a courtyard, shot through from all sides.

The vertical division of the gate consists of three equally wide parts, two lateral parts of the division contain casemates, while the middle one belongs to the passage. The horizontal division is indicated by a cornice that divides the gate into two tiers. Casemates have a height of one tier, the middle part of the gate (the part with passage) rises above them to the height of another tier. On the edges of the roof of both the casemates and the central part there are teeth. At the four corners of the high central part is located along the tower. There are four similar towers on the outer corners of the lower tier, so the gate has eight towers. Now all eight towers look the same, but in the 19th century the towers of the lower tier were in the form of turrets - stylized watchtowers. Most likely, the towers of the lower tier acquired their current appearance when the gates were rebuilt after they were sold to the city.

The first tier of the gate is decorated with three portals, the second - with three niches, in which bas-reliefs of King Ottokar II of the Czech Republic (left), King Frederick I of Prussia (in the middle) and Duke Albrecht I of Prussia (right) are installed. Their family emblems are placed under the figures. Above the niches are the coats of arms of the Prussian lands - Samland and Natangia.

The front walls are two meters thick, the vaults are 1.25 m thick. Thus, the gate walls could withstand the shelling of the then artillery. The coverings of the tiers and the ceilings between the tiers are made in the form of a system of cross vaults. Since these vaults caused a strong thrust, buttresses were arranged on the side faces of the gate.

During its existence, the architecture of the gate has undergone changes. Back in 1875, the northern casemate was converted into a passage for pedestrians, and later the same thing happened with the southern casemate. After the sale of the gate to the city, the guardhouse and some other elements necessary for the defensive structure, but unnecessary for the gate - the triumphal arch, were demolished. The end sides of the gate were rebuilt, which styles are visible after the removal of the rampart.

Gates as a possible hiding place for lost cultural property

During the war, cultural values stolen by German troops in museums, archives, libraries and churches of the Soviet Union were sent to Königsberg. In the spring of 1945, these valuables, along with valuables from Königsberg museums and other cultural institutions, were buried in various caches. Often such caches were arranged in fortifications.

There are versions that the valuables were hidden in the gates of Koenigsberg, including the Royal.

Basically, the expedition's search was focused on the Rostgarten Gate, as there was other evidence that valuables were hidden there. The search was mostly limited to a visual inspection of the premises. The expedition did not have its own instruments; they used instruments taken for temporary use at the military engineering school. Although these devices were not designed for such use, the search engines had no choice.

Rossgarten Gate

The Rossgarten Gate is one of the seven surviving city gates of Kaliningrad. Located at the intersection of Chernyakhovsky and Alexander Nevsky streets, next to Vasilevsky Square and the Amber Museum.

The current building of the gate is located in the place where the gate of the same name was located, which belonged to the first rampart fortification of the city (beginning of the 17th century).

The gate building that has survived to this day was built in 1852-1855 according to the project of the Hauptmann engineer and director of fortification construction Irfugelbrecht and lieutenant engineer von Heil in Königsberg. The project for the facade of the gate was developed by the secret supreme building councilor August Stüler, head of the Technical Building Deputation in Berlin. The author of sculptural decorations is Wilhelm Ludwig Stürmer.

The first gate project was developed in 1852 by the department of fortresses in Königsberg. This project was significantly revised by Privy Councilor Stüler. Stüler himself worked out the design of the facade, giving it pronounced Gothic forms.

After the war, the gate was restored and began to be used as a cafe-restaurant "Sun Stone".

Architecture

The gates have only one passage four meters wide. On both sides, on the sides of the passage, there are three casemates. Thus, the facade of the gate consists of seven openings. Casemates have windows from the side of the city, and loopholes from the outside.

Above the facade of the gate there is a row of battlements, divided into two halves by an elevated central part. On the sides, the central part is framed by two high octagonal turrets, which end with decorative machicolations. Between the turrets there is a high arch, which precedes the actual entrance to the gate. Above the arch is an observation platform, fenced with battlements. To the right and left of the arch are arcades, consisting of arches supported by columns.

On the sides of the main arch are two portrait medallions depicting the Prussian generals Scharnhorst and Gneisenau.

While the city side of the gate features beautiful decorations, the outer side has no decorative decorations. From the outside, the passage is covered with a blockhouse, from which it is possible to conduct circular rifle and artillery fire, and a guardhouse, from the embrasures of which it was possible to conduct frontal and flank fire. The guardhouse had swing gates. In front of the guardhouse there was a moat, across which a drawbridge was thrown.

ausfal gate

Ausfalsky gate (also: exit gate, from it. Ausfalstor, gate for sorties) is one of the seven surviving city gates of Kaliningrad. Located in the southwestern corner of the intersection of Guards Avenue and Gornaya Street, in close proximity to the monument to 1200 guards.

Of all the surviving gates, the Ausfalsky was rebuilt to a greater extent.

The first gates, approximately on the site of the current ones, were built in the twenties of the XVII century, during the construction of a defensive rampart around the city. Later, in 1866, the gate was rebuilt in brick Gothic style. Built in the 19th century, the Ausfal Gate allowed only pedestrians to pass through, and were less significant in relation to the rest of the city gates (as evidenced, for example, by poorer architectural design). The new Ausfal Gate was designed by the architect Ludwig von Aster.

From the very beginning, the gates crashed into the shaft and were actually below ground level. In the 20th century, the only passage of the gate was blocked. Like all other city gates, in 1910 the Ausfal Gate was sold to the city by the military department.

During the war, the Ausfal Gate was converted into a command post for military units. The vast inner spaces of the gate were divided into separate compartments by concrete walls. The passages between the compartments were closed with hermetic protective doors.

After the war, the gate was used as a warehouse, later as a bomb shelter for a nearby police school, and later a sewage collector was located in the gate.

In 1993, on the upper covering of the gate, which is located flush with the level of the carriageway of Gvardeisky Prospekt, an Orthodox chapel of St. George was built, dedicated to Soviet soldiers who died during the assault on Königsberg.

In the spring of 2007, the Ausfalsky and Railway Gates were transferred to the Kaliningrad History and Art Museum. It is planned to restore the gates and place museum expositions in their premises. Together with the monument to 1200 guardsmen and Victory Park, the gate should become part of the military-historical complex.

Architecture

The Ausfal Gate has only one passage, to which a staircase and a rather narrow bridge (traces of which are still preserved) led from the outside, which confirms that the gate only let pedestrians through. On the sides of the passage are casemates with loopholes for frontal and flank fire. The passage is blocked in an arc by a beam arch, which is decorated with a platband with teeth. The lateral outer walls of the gate facing the moat are lined with granite slabs, decorated with square rustication.

Above the passage is a combat platform with a battlement parapet.

ABOUT appearance nothing is known about the inner (facing towards the city) facade of the gate, since it was covered with earth, and no photographs or drawings of it have been preserved.

Railway gates (Kaliningrad)

The railway gate is one of the seven surviving city gates of Kaliningrad. The gate is located under the roadway of Gvardeisky Prospekt, next to the monument to 1200 guardsmen. A pedestrian path passes through the gate leading to the park located behind the monument.

On the gates there is an inscription with the date of their construction - 1866-1869. It is located on the keystone of the gate. The Railway Gate was designed by the architect Ludwig von Aster (he is also the author of the Ausfal Gate project).

The railway leading to Pillau (now Baltiysk) passed through these gates. After the fortifications of the city center were removed, Deutschordenring Street (now Gvardeisky Prospekt) was laid along the former rampart. Thus, since then, the gate has been hardly noticeable, and rather resembles a tunnel through a road embankment.

After the Second World War, traffic on the railway passing through the gate ceased, as a new railway line was built. Still rails from old road persisted until the late nineties.

Later, along the route of the former railway a footpath was laid that leads from Moskovsky Prospekt through the Zheleznodorodnye Gate to the park behind the monument to 1200 guardsmen.

In the spring of 2007, the Railway and Ausfal Gates were transferred to the Kaliningrad History and Art Museum. It is planned to restore the gates and place museum expositions of military-historical subjects in their premises. Together with the monument to 1200 guardsmen and Victory Park, the gate should become part of the military-historical complex.

Architecture

The railway gates have two spans, decorated with lancet arches. The portals of the gates are decorated with vasonic figured bricks. Casemates with loopholes are placed on the sides of the arches. On the outer side of the gate there is a guardhouse with powerful embrasures.

The gates end with parapets with wrought iron bars, which enclose Gvardeisky Prospekt passing through the gate.

A feature of the gate are the so-called shtrabs. They are vertical double notches of square section arranged in the walls of arches. In the case of defense, strong bars should have been laid from them. The barrier formed in this way resembled blinds. It was impossible to disassemble the fines from the outside.

Other railway gates in Königsberg

There were also other railway gates in Königsberg. The first were built after 1853, they were located next to the Brandenburg Gate. The railway leading to Berlin passed through this gate. There were also several other railway gates. All of them were demolished by the twenties.

Brandenburg Gate (Kaliningrad)

The Brandenburg (Berlin) Gate is one of the seven surviving city gates of Kaliningrad. Located on Bagration Street. The Brandenburg Gate is the only city gate in Kaliningrad that is still used for its intended purpose.

The Brandenburg Gate was built in Königsberg in 1657 on the southwestern section of the First rampart at its intersection with the road leading to Brandenburg Castle (now the village of Ushakovo). Due to lack Money and the corresponding project, the organizers limited themselves to the construction of wooden gates placed under the roof and abutting against an earthen rampart. For reliable cover, a moat was dug in front and filled with water.

A hundred years later, by order of the Prussian King Frederick II, the dilapidated building was demolished, and in its place a massive brick building was built with two spacious driveways with lancet completion. New strong gates completely blocked the road to the south (now Suvorov Street) and served as a reliable defense of the city. Thick walls well covered a small garrison of guards, who were housed in the inner casemates. There were also office, utility, storage rooms and lifts. During the restoration work of 1843, the gates were significantly rebuilt (almost rebuilt on the same site) and decorated with gabled decorative pediments, cross-shaped sandstone flowers, stylized leaves on tops, coats of arms and medallions. On the gate are sculptural portraits of Field Marshal Boyen (1771-1848), Minister of War, participant in the reforms in the Prussian army; on the right - Lieutenant General Ernst von Aster (1778--1855), chief of the engineering corps, one of the authors of the Second rampart fortification.

The Brandenburg Gate is the only Königsberg Gate that has survived to this day and performs its former transport function. The building has been restored and is protected by the state as architectural monument decorating Bagration Street in Kaliningrad.

Architecture

The gate has two passages. Although all the gates built in the middle of the 19th century in Königsberg belonged to the neo-Gothic style, Gothic motifs are especially pronounced in the Brandenburg Gate. The arrow-shaped pediments stand out, which give the essentially low building a sense of height. The gates are richly decorated with decorative elements such as high reliefs and stylized stone flowers.

Friedland Gate

The Friedland Gate is one of the seven surviving city gates of Kaliningrad. Located at the crossroads of Kalinin Avenue and Dzerzhinsky Street, adjacent to Yuzhny Park ( former park 40th anniversary of the Komsomol). There is a museum at the gate.

The name of the gate is associated with the city of Friedland, the current Pravdinsk. The first Friedland Gates were built in the 17th century, but they were not located on the site of the current ones.

The now preserved Friedland Gate became the last gate of Königsberg (that is, it was built last). The exact date of their construction is unknown, approximate dates are 1857-1862. It is also not known who their architect was. At the beginning of the 20th century, the gates, outdated and no longer of military importance, together with the entire second rampart, were sold by the military ministry to the city. Then the movement of traffic through them was stopped, since part of the defensive rampart that had become unnecessary was torn down, and the road to Friedland (the current Dzerzhinsky Street) began to pass on the side of the gate.

After the war, the gates were empty for a long time, then they housed a warehouse. In the late 80s, work was carried out in South Park to clear the territory and clean the bottom of the park's numerous ponds. During these works, many old objects were found. Soon a museum was organized at the gate, the basis of the collection of which was the objects found in the park.

Architecture

Like all the gates of Königsberg, the Friedland Gate was built in the Neo-Gothic style. The name of the author of the project is unknown, sometimes the authorship is attributed to Stüler.

The facade of the gate from the side of the city is divided into six parts by five buttresses. The buttresses end with pointed double-slope decorative turrets, which protrude above a decorative parapet with battlements. All external openings of the gate (driveways, windows, doors) are made in the form of lancet arches and are decorated with perspective portals.

The two central parts of the gate are occupied by driveways. The dimensions of the driveways are 4.39 m wide and 4.24 m high. Parts along the edges are occupied by casemates.

The surface of the facade of the gate is decorated, as it were, with a grid, which is a rhombic ornament. The "threads" of this grid are made of bricks of a different color.

The facade of the gate was decorated with a statue of the great commander Friedrich von Zollern, which has not survived (disappeared after the war). Another statue depicting Grand Master Siegfried von Feuchtwangen is located on the outside of the gate. This statue has been preserved, but its head has been broken off. On the outer side of the gate there is a guardhouse.

The Friedland Gate Museum was founded by Alexander Georgievich Novik (1956-2001). Initially, the museum was actually private and had no official status. Only in 2002 the museum was officially established by order of the director south park. Formally, the museum opened on October 22, 2002.

The basis of the museum's exposition is objects found during the cleanup of the park and its reservoirs. In the museum you can see old bottles, dishes, household items, cart and carriage wheels, etc. Another exposition tells about the fortifications of Königsberg.

In 2007, the museum took second place in the fourth All-Russian competition "A Changing Museum in a Changing World". Four hundred museums took part in this competition, the Friedland Gate was second only to the Tretyakov Gallery. Prize money will be used to modernize the museum.

Unpreserved city gates of Kaliningrad

In addition to the seven city gates that have survived to this day, there were other gates in Königsberg that are now lost.

Tragheim Gate

The Tragheim Gate was located in the area of the current Victory Square. They were demolished in 1910, after the defensive structures of the second bypass became obsolete, lost their defensive significance and were sold to the city by the military department.

Steindamm Gate

As well as Tragheim, these gates were located in the area of the current Victory Square. They were demolished in 1912.

Hollanderbaum

These gates were located at the intersection of the current General Butkov Street and Marshal Bagryamyan Embankment, next to the two-tier bridge over the Pregolya. The gate was named after the area in which it was located (Hollenderbaum, "Dutch tree"). Nearby was a railway station with the same name. The gate was demolished at the beginning of the 20th century.

In Soviet chronicles, Koenigsberg is called nothing more than a "fortified city" - and for good reason. Founded as a metropolis of a foreign and hostile land, at the gates of the restless east, growing around the castle for centuries, Königsberg could not but be a fortress. The oldest walls of the 14th century, a kind of "zero belt", covered, and two towers survived from them by the war. The first belt was built in 1626-34 already covered Vorstadt, and the Second belt grew in 1843-62, and partially coincided with the first - in the aggregate, what was left of them is known as the Inner Ring. Finally, the third belt (Outer Ring) was built in the 1870-90s, runs approximately along the current bypass, and has been used for its intended purpose up to the present day. The inner ring, which had lost its defensive significance by the beginning of the 20th century, is in fact the center of Königsberg, the edge of the "donut hole", into which two stations are also woven. It is also impressive that the British aviation, having burned the city center to the ground, spared the transport hubs and fortifications - the Inner Ring has been preserved almost entirely from the pre-war period, its main losses are associated with the development of Koenigsberg in the early twentieth century.

I will divide the hike along the ring (which in practice was not continuous) into three parts, and in the first we will examine the South Station, the adjacent old Haberberg district and the part of the fortifications that covered it. I will also make a reservation in advance that I am a layman on the topic of fortification, I get confused even in terminology, so I count on corrections and comments.

On the introductory frame - the Friedland Gate, extreme point route. To the right is Lomse Island, the bridge to which is a little further, and I didn’t go there anymore, so let’s go counterclockwise. Most of the objects marked on the diagram survived, except for the Hollenderbaum Gate, the section from the Krausek Bastion to the Tragheim Gate inclusive, and individual bastions along the entire length of the ring. The South Station is located approximately on the site of the Brandenburg Bastion. I put the green stripes on the diagram (photographed at the Friedland Gate) myself, and they indicate the "boundaries" of my posts:

We will start the trip not from the Friedland Gate, but from the South Station, which has been the main one since its foundation in Königsberg and Kaliningrad. As already mentioned in the post, the railway came to Königsberg in 1857, and in 1862 it joined the Russian railways. Königsberg was an important transport hub, but it did not have a pronounced Main Station - only a few small stations, some of which, existing and disappeared, we will meet again. Conventionally, the complex of the East and South stations could be considered the main one - the oldest in the city, they were quite far from the current South.

In general, it was no longer an ordnung, but some kind of mess, so in the 1920s the Königsberg transport hub underwent a comprehensive reconstruction. The South Station in its current form opened in 1929, and its structure is clearly visible on the Google map:

In front of the station - a huge (420x160m) and empty Kalinin Square, and a simple but stylish station building in the style of "new materiality" - the most impressive object on it:

On the facade is the coat of arms not of the Soviet Union, but of the individual RSFSR. Pretty rare I guess?

5a.

Inside, it seemed to me, the station is cramped, but very civilized:

Its main attraction is a huge (180 by 120 meters) three-span landing stage with the words "Welcome Kaliningrad Welcome" on the ends. Similar landing stages have been preserved in former USSR back in Moscow (Kyiv and Kazansky railway stations), St. Petersburg (Vitebsky railway station), and in our time it has also acquired a landing stage. In Germany, this was a common thing. And as you can see, such a relatively fragile contraption survived both August 1944 and April 1945:

The station is located not in the middle, but at the northern end of the landing stage. The second entrance is through the tunnel from the other end:

The landing stage is not very high (in Lviv it is noticeably higher, not to mention Moscow-Kievskaya), but it seems immensely wide. long distance trains Now something like three couples go from here (to Moscow every day, to St. Petersburg every other day and sometimes to Adler), suburban ones - a dozen and a half. And here, perhaps, the greatest variety of routes: not only are both diesel and electrified (to Zelenogradsk and Svetlogorsk) - there is also a Stephenson track (the Kaliningrad-Gdansk-Berlin train used to run).

The station here is purely passenger, freight tracks do not enter it (the huge Kaliningrad-Sortirovochny station is visible on the satellite image):

10.

The northern exit is marked by a very stylish control room:

11.

Yuzhny - a small railway museum, which hangs exactly over the platforms of the bus station. The bus station here is typical, small, but busy. In general, the bus service in the region is organized very competently.

12.

The ensemble is completed by a German viaduct, the "tunnel" under which is depicted with surprisingly high-quality graffiti:

13.

The plots are very different. Take a closer look - a gray creature pulls a train from its belly:

14.

In general, one of the most impressive stations that I have seen ... as well as the North. But the transport mosaic of Koenigsberg is not exhausted by these two stations...
And from the overpass we will go first clockwise - to the Friedland Gate. The railway goes south, and our path is along Kalinin Avenue, along the rampart, on which and under which, at the end of the 19th century, was broken, sorry for the name, South Park:

15.

In which there are two ravelins. Closer to the train station - Haberberg:

16.

17.

18.

Between them is an obelisk. Under the Nazis, the park was named after Horst Wessel, a young activist, author of the NSDAP anthem, who was killed by the communists back in 1930. Under the Soviets, the park was renamed the 40th anniversary of the Komsomol, and on the spot where the monument to Wessel stood, a stele to Komsomol members was erected.

19.

20.

And finally - the Friedland Gate, the youngest on the Inner Ring (1857-62). Gates with the same name were also on the first ring, but were located somewhat closer to the center, the name in both cases was from the town of Friedland (now Pravdinsk), located on that side. At the old Friedland Gate, the Germans held back Napoleon's army for several days, giving the Russians time to retreat behind the Neman.

21.

You can climb the gate, but you can’t approach it from the outside:

22.

Two sides of the gate are decorated with sculptures of the Teutonic Commander Friedrich von Zollern (1412-16) and the Grand Master Siegfried von Feuchtwangen (who moved the capital of the Order to Marienburg), recreated in 2005.

23.

The fact is that since the 1990s, the gate has been occupied by a museum founded by the enthusiast Alexander Novik, and only in 2002 received official status. For Kaliningrad, this was a breakthrough - if the World Ocean Museum proved to be an effective organization, then this museum is an example to follow. It was the first museum that specialized in pre-war Königsberg. In 2007, at the All-Russian competition "Changing Museum in a Changing World", he took second place after the Tretyakov Gallery.

24.

Munchausen on the wall:

24a.

I, however, was not lucky - a large (and most interesting) part of the museum is now under reconstruction, so I was somewhat disappointed. But that the museum is tastefully done - you can see:

25.

Between the railway and Bagration Street, the former district of Haberberg ("Ovsyanaya Gora") stretches along the rampart. It is believed that there was either a pasture here, or planting oats for the Teutonic cavalry, and the Haberberg suburb took shape at the same time as Rossgarten and Tragheim - in the 17th century: in 1613 a community was formed, which by 1652 had grown to a full-fledged suburb, which in 1724 , like others, became part of the united city. My understanding is that the 17th century rampart Haberberg did not cover, which was corrected when the second rampart was built.

26.

In Haberberg, cemeteries were "evicted" from the overpopulated center, so a small area on the outskirts had as many as three churches. The Haberberg Trinity Church has been known since 1652, Kant was baptized in it... and when the church burned down and was rebuilt in 1748-52, according to legend, it was Kant who suggested equipping it with a lightning rod. She stood not far from the current Kalinin Square:

27.

Kirche Luther with a 67-meter tower was built in 1907-10, and was located near the barracks shown above. The church had a reinforced concrete dome, an organ and steel bells with a very unusual "heavy" ringing. This is the last church of Königsberg, purposefully demolished under the Soviets - in 1976. Perhaps, in general, the last temple destroyed by the Soviet authorities ...

28.

Finally, the Catholic Church of the Holy Family (1904-07) is located on the same line with the already mentioned obelisk of the Komsomol. Since 1980, it has housed the Philharmonic and the Organ Hall.

29.

Architecturally, this is perhaps the best stylization of the "Hanseatic Gothic" among the surviving Kaliningrad churches:

30.

I walked in this area in the evening of the first day - the train arrived at the South Station at about half past five, and I had an hour and a half. The following frames are no longer Haberberg, but Vorstadt, partially shown in. Vorstadt stands out among other areas with gloomy architecture, shabby and invariable red color.

31.

31a.

32.

33.

34.

Especially good is this house in Maly Lane - the former telegraph office:

35.

Or rather, its gate in the style of "new materiality" is one of my favorite works of Old Königsberg:

36.

And the whole quarter of the Kaliningrad Marine Fishery College:

37.

In the yard - some visual aids:

38.

And the horned main building is the former St. George's Hospital (1894-97), founded already in 1329 as a leper colony, and in subsequent centuries it was repeatedly destroyed and revived:

39.

I forgot to photograph one landmark building on Leninsky Prospekt (which connects the South and North Stations) - the Directorate of Railways in Königsberg, which since 1895 occupied an apartment building, built, by the way, on the site of the school where Kant studied in the 1730s. Snapshot from Wikipedia, 2002:

40.

And this is Haberberg again, the end of Lenin Avenue:

41.

We return to the station. Adjacent to it is an extremely (like the whole complex) stylish railway post office (pay attention to the portal):

42.

View from the same gate. The shot was taken in full view of the employees - no one said a word. They probably thought they were German...

43.

The railway station buildings stretch for another couple of hundred meters:

44.

On the contrary - a brick fence of the Altstadt and Kneiphof cemeteries, as already mentioned, "evicted" here in the 18th century:

45.

Apart from the wall, nothing remains of them:

45a.

Nearby is the Brandenburg Gate (just like in Berlin!) Above Bagration Street. Brandenburg (now Ushakovo) - a castle by the bay, on the way to Balga ... and then just the same Barndenburg, where Potsdam and Berlin are. These gates are the only ones in the Inner Ring that are passable, even with tram tracks.

46.

However, we do not go under the gate, but parallel to it - the road rises to the overpass, parallel to which the railway bridge runs. Below - the paths of the freight station, somewhere on its right side was the Vostochny Station:

47.

Some of the warehouses here are still German, and high-rise buildings are already behind Pregolya:

48.

Further - a noisy road and a dull industrial zone. At the railway embankment, which looks so much like a rampart, there is another stunningly stylish tower, marked on wikimapia as "South Station's mechanical centralization point".

49.

And behind it you can see the railway bridge (1915-27) ... about which in the next part.

FAR WEST-2013

Leaving behind the Railway Gate, I went out to the street. General Butkov (formerly Ausfalltor Straße), and then to Guards Avenue (formerly Deutschordenring). My further path lay in the direction of the automobile and railway bridge across the Pregolya River.

After a couple of hundred meters, a huge bulk of a two-tiered bridge appeared in front of me, and a building was visible a little to the right. former station Holländerbaum, which has survived to this day. Now the Kaliningrad Regional Customs is located in this building.

But, before stepping onto the bridge, I decided to go to the edge of the embankment to admire the view of the Pregol River, still ice-bound and powdered with snow shining in the sun.

The weather was quite clear and the opposite shore was clearly visible. There, proudly rising above the low warehouse buildings, one could see the powerful towers of the Friedrichsburg Gate. It is these gates that are the next stopping point of our journey.

After taking a few shots that could be seen on the opposite bank of the gate, I headed for the rumbling two-tiered bridge (former Reichsbahnbrucke). The original bridge was blown up by the retreating Germans in 1945, but already in 1959-60. The bridge has been completely restored and rebuilt. The unique mechanism, which unfolds a 1000-ton colossus in just 2.5 minutes, was irrevocably destroyed, so the modern bridge acquired a new, already vertical, adjustable mechanism, which still works properly to this day.

It is worth noting that here, not far from the bridge, at the intersection of St. General Butkov (formerly Ausfalltor Straße) and the Marshal Baghramyan Embankment (formerly Holländerbaum Straße), previously there was another gate - Hollenderbaum, which was demolished at the beginning of the 20th century.

After crossing the bridge, turn left onto St. Portovaya (former Friedrichsburger Straße), where, among numerous warehouses and auto centers, are located, of interest to us, Friedrichsburg Gate(German Friedrichsburg Tor). Looking ahead, I will say that these gates are not related to the city gates of Koenigsberg, since they did not lead to the city, but to a small fort, but, nevertheless, they are beautiful and interesting in their own way.

Long ago, in 1657, on the left bank of the Pregel, to protect Koenigsberg from the sea, as well as to control the waterway to the Pillau fortress, by order of the Elector of Brandenburg Friedrich Wilhelm, the Friedrichsburg fortress was laid, and the gate of the same name, built a little later, was carried out throughput function through the protective rampart of the fortress.

The fortress was designed by the Prussian engineer and mathematician Christian Otter (1598-1660). He owns the invention of the Dutch system of building fortresses, which he successfully applied in the construction of the Friedrichsburg fortress, surrounding it with a wide moat filled with water. The construction of the fortress was led by Georg Neumann. The first commandant of the Friedrichsburg fortress was the Dutch engineer Colonel Gerhard von Belgulm.

The shape of the small fortress resembled a regular square, protected from four sides by earthen bastions. Inside the fortress there were barracks, a prison, food and weapons depots, a customs service and a small church. In 1858, the modernized fortress, which received the status of a fort, became part of the Second rampart fortification. At the same time, according to the project of Friedrich August Stüler, the brick Friedrichsburg Gate was attached to the fort from the side of the city.

The gate, striking in its heaviness, was built of burnt clinker bricks in the Tudor style - the English neo-Gothic movement. The vaults of the through passage are made in the traditional barrel style, and the casemates located on the sides of the gate are in the cross style.

If you take a closer look at the gates, you will see that the walls, as well as complex architectural decorations above the entrance arch, are made of bricks of various colors and shapes, which indicates the high skill of the builders of the 19th century. On the front facade of the gate, the black Gothic inscription "Friedrichsburg" and the high relief of the Prussian eagle have survived to this day.

To the left and right of the arched passage are massive round towers, decorated with decorative battlements. The names of the towers are unusual and interesting: "Ruby", "Pearl", "Diamond" and "Smaragd (Emerald)". Each tower has six round and four lancet windows - loopholes.

On August 23, 1910, the fort ceased to be a military facility, and was transferred to the management of the Imperial Railway, and after 10 years the bastions were completely dismantled, and the ditches were filled up to make room for the railway lines of the freight station and not interfere with the construction of the railway bridge.

After the Great Patriotic War, the gates were badly damaged and were under threat of demolition, but in 1960 they nevertheless received the status of an architectural monument, but this did not save them from further destruction and abandonment.

And now, quite recently, finally, a bright period has come in the post-war history of the gate. The collapsing gate was taken under its wing by the Museum of the World Ocean. More than 20 million rubles were allocated under the Federal Target Program "Culture" for restoration and giving the gates its original architectural image. The difficulty lies in the fact that for the restoration of the gate, a special brick is required, purchased in Latvia, and the necessary figured elements are cut out of it on the spot.

Alexander Feshchenko, director of Azimut-Stroy LLC, which performs the restoration of the gate, says that, in comparison with the Royal Gate, things are much more complicated here, since 46 types of different bricks are required for numerous elements.

Upon completion of all work, the gate will receive long-awaited guests already in the status of a branch of the Museum of the World Ocean. It is planned that museum squares will be dedicated to the history of shipbuilding, a center for the restoration of underwater archaeological finds will be opened, the square in front of the gate will be decorated with a beautiful fountain, and there are plans to open a mini-cafe.

In conclusion of the story about the Friedrichsburg Gate, I want to note one more interesting historical fact. In 1697, Peter the Great visited Friedrichsburg Fortress to learn artillery skills.

Brandenburg Colonel von Sternfeld, who acted as a teacher, highly appreciated his student. Upon his return to Moscow, Peter I received a certificate stating: “ Pyotr Mikhailov to be recognized and honored as a perfect in throwing bombs, a careful and skillful firearms artist»

For the last time looking around at the snow-covered gates, between the towers of which the rays of the winter sun peeped, I headed further along the street. Portovoy and, soon, turned onto the street. Serpukhov (formerly Knochen Straße), which in turn took me to the street. Bagration (formerly Alter Garten Straße).

The following gates on our route are located on this street − Brandenburg(German Brandenburg Tor) are the only of the seven surviving city gates of Königsberg that still perform their transport function to this day.

The name of the gate comes from the Order Castle Brandenburg on the Frisching River, the ruins of which are still preserved in the modern village. Ushakovo, Bagrationovsky district. It was through these gates that the cobbled road from Königsberg went towards Brandenburg Castle.

The date of construction is 1860. The author of the project for the facade of the Brandenburg Gate, as well as the Friedrichsburg Gate, is a talented military engineer Friedrich August Stüler. The gate became part of the Second rampart fortification and served to allow pedestrians and vehicles to pass through the earth rampart at the Brandenburg bastion.

These gates, made in the neo-Gothic style, are slightly more lightweight in architectural terms, in comparison with the rest of the city gates. On both sides of the two symmetrical arched openings for passage, there are small casemates with loopholes. Previously, these premises served for security and customs services, and now they house the well-known store "Frames and Frames" in the city.

The walls of the casemates are made of clinker bricks; the plinth is lined with granite slabs using the square technique, and the facades are decorated with carved stone and small plastic.

Above the two arched arches, the gates are decorated with very beautiful "vimpergas" - Roman pediments with faceted turrets - "phials".

The pediments along the edges are decorated with stylized sandstone flowers - “crabs”, and the tops - with “crucifers”. The half-turrets are interconnected by battlements.

"Tympanums" (fields of pediments) are decorated with high reliefs from the side of the city, from the other side - coats of arms. The author of sculptural plastics is Wilhelm Ludwig Stürmer.

High reliefs of the gate depict portraits of military generals, Russia's allies in the fight against Napoleonic France: military engineer Hermann von Boyen (left) and Lieutenant General Ernst Ludwig von Astaire (right).

Herman von Boyen was born in the city of Kreuzburg (modern village of Enino, Bagrationovsky district) and is known for taking an active part in the wars against Napoleon, fought in the battles of Leipzig, Lyon and Paris. With his participation in Prussia, a system of conscription was introduced. On the site of his family estate, there is still a forgotten and dilapidated monument to this outstanding person ...

The second high relief belongs to Ernst Ludwig von Aster, also an active participant in the battles with Napoleonic France. However, the work on the project of fortifications of the Second rampart brought him the greatest fame.

During World War II, the Brandenburg Gate suffered relatively little damage. In the post-war period, they were used as a warehouse and were in general neglect. And only in 1960, by a decree of the Council of Ministers of the RSFSR, the Brandenburg Gate was declared a monument of urban planning and architecture of republican significance ...

The bright, but still cold February sun illuminated the ancient walls of the gate - silent witnesses of the rich history of Königsberg. The soaring pediments looked beautiful against the blue sky, probably the same as a century and a half ago, riveting the eye of a casual passerby.

I wanted to look at the gates and the line of cars passing through them for an infinitely long time, but my path lay further - towards the South Station, where, a hundred meters from the gates, on a section of an old wall, there are memorable high reliefs informing us that here in the 19th century they were laid to rest professors - rectors of the Königsberg University "Albertina".

This is the philosopher Christian Jacob Kraus (1753-1807) (German Christian Jacob Kraus), the anatomist and physiologist Karl Friedrich Burdach (1776-1847) (German Karl Friedrich Burdach), whose name is given to the nerve bundle in the posterior columns of the spinal cord, which provides touch and deep sensitivity of the lower extremities and lower parts of the trunk and philologist Liudvikas Reza (1776-1840) (German: Liudvikas Gediminas Rėza).

By the way, in the high relief of the famous Lithuanian poet, an unforgivable mistake was made in the name (LudviGas instead of LudviKas), but let it be on the conscience of the author of this memorial sign. I will also add that in Kaliningrad in 2000, in the square of the Lithuanian sister cities at the intersection of st. Chestnut Alley and Victory Avenue, the monument to Ludvikas Reza, sculptor A. Sakalauskas, was solemnly opened.

And in the meantime, bypassing the beautiful building of the South Station, I went out to Kalinin Avenue and headed for the next gate on our route - Friedland. Also in the third part, I will introduce you to one more city gate of Königsberg - Sackheim.

To be continued...

Last Sunday in Kaliningrad turned out to be warm and sunny. On this occasion, for the first time this year, I released my bicycle from the basement and went on a bike tour around the 8 city gates of Königsberg-Kaliningrad, which have survived to this day.

The first defensive bypass of Königsberg was built in the 17th century. Then ramparts were poured, gates and other fortifications were erected. At the end of the 19th century, a second defensive bypass was created, partially repeating the first. Well, in the 20th century, all the defensive and fortifying buildings were sold to the city, having lost their military significance.

I started my journey on upper lake(Pond Oberteich) - one of the few places in Kaliningrad where there are bike paths. Having traveled around the lake clockwise and passed through a small door, I found myself in front of the Amber Museum, located in the former defensive tower Don. By the way, on the other side of the pond is the twin tower of Dona, which is called Wrangel.

Plump Dona

Next to the museum is my first destination: Rossgarten gates (crossroads of Chernyakhovsky and Alexander Nevsky streets). They no longer perform their function, it is impossible to pass through them. But it is quite realistic to imagine them in action. Now there is a fish restaurant "Solnechny Kamen" at the gate. It used to be very tasty there, now I don’t know - I’ll check it out if I have a chance.

Rossgarten Gate

It's time to move on. My path lies along the Litovsky Val street. And there really is a shaft here, poured centuries ago - it's scary to imagine! Along the way, I meet many old fortifications, which are now used for a variety of purposes.

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And here is the second gate - the Royal (crossroads of the Lithuanian shaft and Gagarin street). They got their name in 1811, and before that they were called Gumbinnensky, as the road to Gumbinnen (now Gusev) led through them. For a long time, the Royal Gates were abandoned and slowly destroyed. But for the 750th anniversary of Koenigsberg-Kaliningrad in 2005, they were finally restored. Now the gate houses a branch of the Museum of the World Ocean - the "Great Embassy", which tells about the history and development of the city.

The three figures at the top are Ottokar II (the Bohemian king and founder of Königsberg), Frederick I (the king of Prussia) and Duke Albrecht (the last Grand Master of the Teutonic Order and the first Duke of Prussia). Their heads were beaten off, and restoration became a whole problem due to the lack of necessary photographs. But everything went smoothly and the three kings look at their city again.

In the meantime, I drive further along the Litovsky Val, reach Moskovsky Prospekt and see the Sackheim Gate. For the past few years, they have housed the Gates art space, which I dearly love, so I stop by there for a cup of coffee. Since I didn't bring a bike lock, I'm kindly allowed to put one inside. There is a cafe "Bread and Turk" in the "Gate"; exhibitions of Kaliningrad and not only artists, photographers and other creative personalities are regularly held, as well as co-working "Table and Chair". I highly recommend taking a look!

The coffee is drunk, the cake is eaten, the rest time is over, and I continue on my way - again along Litovskiy Val, which becomes narrow and calm after Moskovsky Prospekt. I am moving towards the recently restored Tributs embankment in order to get to the bridge along it and cross to the other side of the Pregolya River, where the next three gates are located.

Previously, this bank of the Pregolya was unkempt, overgrown with willows and covered with garbage, but now it’s nice to take a walk here.

embankment Tributs

In front of me is the second Kaliningrad overpass, which would lead me directly to the Friedland Gate, but it seems to me that riding a bicycle on it in windy weather is not a good idea, so I make a detour through Oktyabrsky Island.

I see along the way Cathedral- one of the main symbols of the city, and I pass the Fishing Village - it was built in 2005, also for the 750th anniversary of the city. Someone says that this is a terrible remake, but I am very glad that the embankments are acquiring a new life.

The Friedland Gate is located at the intersection of Kalinin Avenue and Dzerzhinsky Street. Here is the museum of the same name, the exposition of which is dedicated to the history of pre-war Königsberg. The gate is named after the city of Friedland (now Pravdinsk), and the figure on the facade is Siegfried von Feuchtwangen, the founder of Marienburg Castle (now Malbork, Poland).

Friedland Gate

Then I go towards the only gate that still performs its gate function. These are the Brandenburg Gates, they are located at the opposite end of Kalinin Avenue at the place where Bagration Street turns into Suvorov Street. By the way, did you know that the father of the commander Alexander Suvorov, Vasily Suvorov, was the governor-general of East Prussia for 2 years? And here!

The Brandenburg Gate was named not in honor of the Brandenburg that the land is in Germany, but in honor of the Brandenburg Castle (now the village of Ushakovo). I really like how these gates look - almost like a gingerbread house 🙂

Next on my list are the Friedrichsburg Gates (Portovaya Street). Once it was a whole fortress, which Peter I, who arrived in Königsberg with the Great Embassy, was very inspired by. Following the example of Friedrichsburg, which guarded the river entrance to the city, Kronstadt was built.

Friedrichsburg Gate

The fortress was demolished back in 1910 because it had lost its significance. And the gates have been preserved, into the Second world war were damaged and, like the King's Gate, were not needed for a long time. But in the early 2000s, the authorities undertook their restoration, and in 2010 (if I'm not mistaken) another branch of the Museum of the World Ocean was opened here. The museum itself, by the way, is right across the river. I have not been here since the opening and was pleasantly surprised to see how the territory has changed.

This museum is solidly called the Historical and Cultural Center "Ship Sunday" and is dedicated to the history of shipbuilding. And the Königsberg cat also lives here - in my opinion, this is a very important fact!

In the meantime, there are only 2 items left in my program. To put a tick in front of them, you need to cross the Pregol again. This time I got the most interesting bridge in Kaliningrad - a two-tier one. Trains pass along the upper tier, and cars and pedestrians move along the lower tier. This is a drawbridge: its middle span rises. I happened to see the drawing of this bridge only once in my life. Maybe you'll have better luck?

The last gates of those eight that have been preserved in Kaliningrad - Ausfalsky and Zheleznodorozhny - are located not far from each other on the territory of Victory Park, next to the monument to 1200 guards - a memorial and mass grave soldiers who died during the assault on Koenigsberg.

The railway gates are located under Guards Avenue. At first I drove straight through them, and then went down the stairs. These gates have retained their functions to some extent: a footpath leads through them. Previously, a railway line to Pillau (now Baltiysk) ran through them, hence the name. Now the Railway Gates are being restored, they say they will house a museum exposition.

The Ausfal Gate is located at the intersection of Guards Avenue and Gornaya Street. It is very difficult to recognize them as gates. From the very beginning, they were cut into the shaft, were below ground level and allowed only pedestrians to pass. And in the 20th century, the passage through them was closed and the command post for military units was located at the gate. Now an Orthodox chapel has been built on the Ausfal Gate.

My little excursion is over - it turned out 16 kilometers. I’m going home, and you can cross Gornaya Street, sit on a bench near the Astronomical Bastion, look at the monument to the heroes of the First World War and go along Guards Avenue to Victory Square, where you definitely won’t get lost.