Valhalla: The German Hall of Fame

Rather, the cult site for Germany's poets and thinkers corresponds to the probably primal human need to give plastic expression to the fascination for leading cultural figures in the literal sense of the word. At about the same time that its future owner, Bavarian King Ludwig I, was considering the idea of a temple with sculptures of German intellectual greats, Marie Tussaud exhibited her collection of wax figures for the first time in London in 1802. With overwhelming success. Since then, the lifelike 3-D replicas of prominent personalities in Tussaud's waxworks in London, Paris and Vienna have lost none of their tourist appeal.

The Rock'n'Roll Hall of Fame in Cleveland, USA, which only opened in 1995, can also boast the same appeal. As in the case of Valhalla, the desire to erect a temple to style-defining artists was the father of the building idea, albeit more than 120 years later.

Just as generations later millions were enamored with Elvis and Co., Bavarian King Ludwig I was enthusiastic about ancient Greece and its grandiose intellectual past - and with his Hellenic passion fit right in with the neoclassical image of his time. The idea for the "German Temple of Honor" came to the romantic Wittelsbach during a trip to Greece.

Ludwig expressed his passion for the past not only with the Valhalla. But also with the revival of medieval noble titles and, above all, with numerous buildings that have become an integral part of Munich's cityscape. These include the Siegestor, the State Library, the Alte Pinakothek and many others.

Like many of his contemporaries, the tradition-conscious monarch felt the final dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire (German Nation) in 1806 as "Germany's deepest disgrace". The domination of large parts of Germany by the French under Napoleon also made his patriotic heart bleed. Nevertheless, Ludwig I should not be placed in a nationalistic corner: The comprehensively educated art lover is well versed in ancient history, at home in French, Italian and Spanish literature and knows Russian. And as far as the allocation of places in the Valhalla was concerned, Ludwig I was less concerned with the warlords than with humanists of the caliber of Goethe, Schiller and Erasmus of Rotterdam.

Under these circumstances, the Valhalla was intended to have a therapeutic function: it was to act as an analgesic for the cracked German self-confidence. As early as 1807, while still Crown Prince, Ludwig commissioned series of busts of "gloriously distinguished Germans," as they were to adorn Valhalla decades later.

In 1810, when Ludwig unintentionally founded the Oktoberfest with his wedding on Munich's Theresienwiese, the architect Carl Haller von Hallerstein, who was also versed in archaeology, set off for Athens with a grant from Ludwig in his pocket to conduct architectural studies on the Parthenon on the Acropolis, which was proclaimed the model for Valhalla.

Five years later, the scholarship holder produced a good two dozen drawings, only to die an early death in 1817 without having achieved anything. In 1819, architect Leo von Klenze acquired the bequeathed sketches and used them as the planning foundation for his Valhalla designs.

Its realization was still a long time coming. The foundation stone for the "Temple of Glory" was laid in 1830 on the 17th anniversary of the Battle of Leipzig, and construction began a year later. The construction period for the soccer field-sized architectural colossus, 125 meters long and a proud 55 meters high, lasted until 1842, and another twenty years passed before it was formally opened in 1862.

When this is finally accomplished, the Bavarian king has already abdicated and has long been interested in other things, "overwhelmed by the events of 1848 as well as by his passion for the beautiful Lola Montez," as literary scholar Claudio Magris notes in his epoch-making "Danube" book.

The year 1862 is significant for Hellenic-Bavarian relations for another reason: It is the year in which Ludwig's son Otto is forced to abdicate as King of Greece and goes into a well-known exile - home to Bavaria. This is the conclusion of an episode that is as unique in history as Valhalla. It begins when Greece wins its independence from the Ottoman Empire in 1830, but stands headless in 1831 after the assassination of its first regent.

As signatory powers of the young nation, Russia, France and Great Britain get the Greek National Assembly to elect a European prince as king. After the rejections of two desired candidates, the choice falls on Otto, still a minor, who keeps his appanage as a Bavarian prince and enters Athens with 3,500 Bavarian soldiers and a handful of administrators.

In Passau, Minister Rudhard embarks directly for Athens. In keeping with all the clichés, he is just as unwilling to do without his beloved Bavarian beer as his colleagues. On the Danube voyage, Rudhard supplies himself from a beer barrel that he has brought with him. In Athens, the white-blue officials then have a large brewery built with matching beer ponds. In doing so, they turn the Greek metropolis "into a suburb of Munich," as Wastlhuber, the secret ministerial office recipient, pointedly remarks.

The "Bavarocracy" creates the foundations for a modern state with numerous laws and regulations - among others, the Bavarian purity law for beer - but antagonizes the Greek population with its absolutist understanding of authority.

Otto, on the other hand, will hold on to his enthusiasm for all things Hellenic until his death with the handed down last words "Greece, my Greece, my dear Greece" like his father. In exile in Bamberg, Otto and his wife Amalie take a Greek lesson every day, and every evening what is left of the court gathers in Greek costume for a two-hour Greek conversation.

With Valhalla, Ludwig bequeathed to his descendants not only by far his most expensive project, but also a host of challenges. The idea of exhibiting sculptures of living poets and thinkers in the so-called "Hall of Expectation" in the basement and carrying them up to Olympus on the ground floor in a ceremonial procession after their death was rejected during Ludwig's lifetime. But from now on, the question will arise as to who will be entitled to a place in Valhalla in the future - and how a republican democracy should deal with such a monumental legacy, whose image values were severely damaged by National Socialism.

In the struggle for the hero status of various intellectuals, Martin Luther is given his place in Valhalla just five years after its opening. In 2003, the bust of the young resistance fighter Sophie Scholl is placed in the prominent last place next to the door. In 2007, the mathematician Carl Friedrich Gauss followed in Valhalla, and in 2009 the bust of the nun, philosopher and women's rights activist Edith Stein, who was murdered in Auschwitz. The last appointment to Valhalla to date is quite piquant: Heinrich Heine, one of its harshest critics, will make his home in the temple on the banks of the Danube in 2010. It remains exciting who will keep him company in the future: Four places are still available.