snow in march?, you will probably exclaim when looking at these pictures. why, yes, indeed! and it wasn't even in early march when we were surprised with all of this snow, but the middle of it! while by that time i was actually ready for spring to start, it was still really beautiful to explore the main cemetery of frankfurt in a setting like this. i visited this city oasis together with my bestie from frankfurt and i think we both loved it more than words can actually describe.
the main cemetery of frankfurt was opened in 1828 after the former city cemetery of saint peter's church got too small for burials. in relation to that small cemetery the new one was huge, at least 4 times as much space as before. ( in my humble opinion, lol ). there are a lot of notable names you can find across the cemetery, and beautiful historic burial places. i was especially smitten with the vault corridor and the war memorial. we also visited the old jewish cemetery right next to it, but i wasn't as impressed, maybe due to the derelict state some of the tombs were in. there was a lot of warning tape wrapped around the graves, because they were unstable - and that is a huge factor when you want to enjoy the vibe of a historically important jewish burial site. modern yellow&black tape is not exactly what i call aesthetic ^^; nonetheless, it's always interesting to visit jewish burial grounds and contemplate how jews were treated in the past and are treated today, in times of the alarming growth of right-wing forces - with all the complexities that come up.
anyhow, i don't have that much to say, and as always i'd rather let the pictures speak for themselves.
when you enter the cemetery you face this big crossing where you can decide which way you want to go. i liked how the dug out pathways also formed a cross.
let's get it off my chest right away: gravestones buried under snow is absolutely next-level when it comes to cemetery aesthetics :D
the grave of the family of alfred de neufville - who was a well-known financier in frankfurt.
i don't have a lot of information to offer on some of the graves, even though they are probably of well-known people. i'm always more interested into the architectural aspects of graves, not really the family history. this art nouveau grave spoke to me on an almost otherworldly level. you rarely find art nouveau graves, so it feels like hitting a jackpot if you finally do.
the gold details of the diadem was a favourite a detail of mine.
eerie relief iron work of jesus. i like how industrial this picture is, with the steel tubes in the background.
slightly better look at the jesus head.
this beauty 😍
she looked so graceful!
love for love.
a lyre playing youngling.
members of the guaita family are buried here, one of them a former mayor of frankfurt: georg friedrich v. guaita.
it's a rather lovely grave monument.
graves of more members of the guaita family.
was especially enamoured with the bronze enclosure.
a withering beauty.
hanging jesus. against the wintery backdrop this feels even more dramatic.
nice contemplation mood going on here.
this was such a cute grave memorial! strikingly beautiful: the mosaic night sky and the angels floating in it.
this grave was probably built in the 80ies, and its abstractness kind of intrigued me.
the vault corridor. behind those arches there are 57 vaults and just by looking at it from this point of view you wouldn't think it'd be anything special. let's enter for a better view and some surprises ;) the vault corridor was built in 1828 by friedrich rumpf.
behind those arches you will enter this beautiful neo-classical hallway with several sepulchral niches, and some of them still have beautiful sculptures left inside them. unfortunately a lot of them are missing their heads, which is really sad, but kind of contributes to a melancholic atmosphere. in the front you can peak the grave of the family of erlanger.
it looks so clean & virginal.
ethereal relief on the von marx family memorial.
this was absolutely breathtaking! such a masterful piece of work!
the softness in her face...it blew me away.
the sculpture is part of another erlanger vault. that family was highly influential in frankfurt. they were a family full of financiers.
this beautiful vault cover belongs to the graves of the family of gottschalk. strong art nouveau elements!
the corresponding grave to the vault cover. unfortunately seriously damaged. ( but still so freaking gorgeoussssss )
another wonderful jesus relief.
this lovely grave belongs to the bethmann family, another very influential frankfurt family. i absolutely adore the gemstone cross & the reliefs.
a lovely cast-iron angel door that's part of the northern pavilion ( there are two attached to the vault corridor ). the vault inside belongs to the bethmann family, too!
this one is another bethmann vault. it's very sad that the head is not on its place anymore, but i also feel that the missing of it provides a special aura to the sculpture. your attention immediately goes to the details of the dress and how beautifully it is draped around the body. it always amazes me how you can sculpt such details out of stone.
the grounds of the world war memorial. the actual rotunda in the back was erected in 1928 in memoration of the fallen soldiers in world war one. after world war two they enlarged the memorial with the setup of more graves - partly for soldiers, partly for bomb victims and partly for victims of the NS regime. this area exudes a very eerie atmosphere, but at the same time you feel an emotion that's close to devotion. you feel sad and horrified and smothered, but also really glad that those wars are behind you and that you need to remember them, in order to not forget how precious our current 'peace' is. that wars only bring pain, for all the generations of human beings in the past and present and in the future. we need to work on freedom & peace and in order to do so, we shall not forget the past. in my opinion those memorials are very important in those aspects. they are warnings! of course you might say that it's shitty to let following generations feel guilty about things that people did in the past, by resurging those horrible histories, but you know what? it's not about the guilt. these structures were not built to let you feel guilty, they were built so you will hopefully do it differently than your ancestors and don't fall into the traps they fell into. you are responsible to work on a present and a future that's not full of hate, populism, shaming different cultures or greed. that's what i see in those memorials: all the people who had to die for something that was devoured by hate and prejudice, by entitlement and privilege. do we really want to live in such a world again? where everyone distrusts everyone and denunciations are on the day's agenda? why does it feel sometimes like humans still haven't learned one single bit out of their histories? and why is it, that they tend to make 100 steps back, even though we should be like 100 steps into the future with leaving behind all those bad ideals & fear.
sometimes i wonder if people are addicted to drama. if it's in human nature to punish themselves in order to then fight for betterment - but 100 years away from that they still fall back into those old pathways.
of course things are not that black & white - they are many grey spaces inbetween and we surely made some progress in one way or another. but sometimes, looking at the present situation in particular, hope can feel stale and bitter, and it's hard to believe in the good of humans when so many openly run into a field of knives and grabbing one with the intention to weed out 'the scum' without batting an eye. even though they formerly announced themselves as wanting the best for everyone ( when in fact they just look out for themselves and not with other people's pain in mind ).
how does one remain hopeful in times where evil peaks up around every corner?
nearing the rotunda.
majestic plane tree.
inside the rotunda you can find a sculpture of a dead soldier, haggard and decaying and it's a harrowing sight. there's real good accoustics inside the rotunda and we played a little bit of mourning music and sat down to commemorate all that has been.
this grieving dude was another sculpture i found exceptional in its sadness.
it's called hiob and was created by gerhard marcks. marcks was a bauhaus member and his sculptures are super inspired by this style.
we made our way to the old jewish cemetery after our visit of the world war memorial. it was opened together with the completion of the main cemetery. there were 40.000 jewish burials here before the city closed the cemetery down in 1928.
there are some opulent graves you can find here, which is actually quite untypical for jewish graveyards. this was probably due to the many influential jewish families of frankfurt like the rothschild's or oppenheim's. of course they needed more representative gravesites ;)
strong as death is love. i think it's a very beautiful & powerful mourning saying.
the graves always are in very close proximity to each other, which strikes me as very distinctive on jewish cemeteries.
i wish i could translate what is written here, but i don't understand hebrew at all. i really loved the green withering patina though and how mystic those hebrew characters look.
what you can also always find on jewish cemeteries are graves with a lithic tree trunk attached. apparently they are often used when someone died young.
quite elaborate gravestone.
grave site of the family of l. a. hahn, another frankfurt financier.
really detailed gravestone with lots of flowers.
these butterflies are symbols of the soul and its resurrection. i'm not sure if they are explicitly jewish, because i have found lots of butterflies on grave stones that were not of jewish origin.
ah, the growing of lichen on stone is such a delight to my eyes.
on the wall encasing the jewish cemetery this blackbird was singing loud & bright. we stood there for a while and watched it and it wasn't even bothered by us.
on our way back we stumbled upon this peculiar grave, a collective grave for freemasons. the pyramid is a very well-known symbol for freemasonry.
joachim kreutz was the creator of this special grave site.
and then we left the main cemetery of frankfurt through the neo-classical main portal. there's still some parts of the cemetery left that we didn't explore, all the more reason to return in the future.
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