Funerary Monument to Dr. Gabriel Riesser (1806–1863) at Ohlsdorf Cemetery, Hamburg (1865)

    Fig. 1: Gabriel Riesser’s headstone at Ohlsdorf cemetery, Hamburg, Frontal view.

    Fig. 2: Gabriel Riesser’s headstone at Ohlsdorf cemetery, Hamburg, View of front and left side.

    Fig. 3: Gabriel Riesser’s headstone at Ohlsdorf cemetery, Hamburg, View of front and right side.

    Fig. 4: Gabriel Riesser’s headstone at Ohlsdorf cemetery, Hamburg, Right side with biographical dates Jewish.

    Fig. 5: Gabriel Riesser’s headstone at Ohlsdorf cemetery, Hamburg, Left side with biographical dates Christian.

    Fig. 6: Gabriel Riesser’s headstone at Ohlsdorf cemetery, Hamburg, Back view.

    Fig. 7: Gabriel Riesser’s headstone at Ohlsdorf cemetery, Hamburg, in the Ehrenhain.

    Fig. 8: Gabriel Riesser’s headstone at Ohlsdorf cemetery, Hamburg after its translocation and redesign by Fritz Block, undated; State Archive Hamburg, photo album dated May 26, 1941 given on the occasion of Leo Lippmann’s 60th birthday by the Jüdischer Religionsverband Hamburg e. V. board and its rabbi.

    Picture 1-7: © Annabelle Lienhart, 2014. Picture 8: State Archive Hamburg, 622-1/55 Lippmann, A 24. With the kind permission of State Archive Hamburg.

    Source Description

    Three-tiered classicist funerary monument made of sandstone and white marble, ca. 400x170x100 cm (without foundation). A base made of Oberkirchen sandstone supports the marble middle section featuring a frontal mid-relief framed by four Corinthian columns bearing a gabled roof with six acroteria. The relief block shows a half-dressed female figure raising herself above a snake stretched out at her feet while holding a sword in her right hand – possibly an allegory on truth’s triumph over falsehood, although it has also often been interpreted as a depiction of “Justitia” or “Libertas.” The front of the base and the back of the middle section bear the name of the deceased, “Dr. Gabriel Riesser,” engraved in relief while the dates of his birth and death are engraved on the sides of the middle section – on the beholder’s left according to the Christian calendar and on the right according to the Jewish calendar.
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    Recommended Citation

    Funerary Monument to Dr. Gabriel Riesser (1806–1863) at Ohlsdorf Cemetery, Hamburg (1865) (translated by Insa Kummer), edited in: Key Documents of German-Jewish History, <https://dx.doi.org/10.23691/jgo:source-25.en.v1> [April 20, 2024].