Topography of Terror

The permanent exhibition “Topography of Terror: Gestapo, SS and Reich Security Main Office on Wilhelm- and Prinz-Albrecht-Straße” focuses on the central institutions of the SS and police during the “Third Reich” and the crimes that they committed throughout Europe. With the help of mostly photographic material on a “ribbon of panels” and documents (facsimiles) presented at subject-oriented lecterns, visitors are led through the major themes of the exhibition’s five main segments: The National Socialist Takeover of Power (I); Institutions of Terror (SS and Police) (II); Terror, Persecution and Extermination on Reich Territory (III); SS and Reich Security Main Office in the Occupied Countries (IV); and The End of the War and the Postwar Era (V). Computer stations and reading folders provide in-depth information, often addressing subjects beyond the scope of the exhibition. A few audio and film recordings are deployed within the exhibition. The media units contain both temporal and spatial stages of development: Maps show the location of SS and police command stations (Leitstellen) and the sites where atrocities occurred. A diagram of the National Socialist concentration camp system, as the central component of the terror system in the “Third Reich,” is also presented.

The exhibition is presented in both German and English.