Altes Museum

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The Altes Museum (Old Museum) is Berlin's oldest museum. It is part of the UNESCO-listed heritage site known as Museum Island opposite the Lustgarten in Berlin's eastern city centre.

The Altes Museum, built between 1823 and 1830 according to Karl Friedrich Schinkel's designs, is one of the most important buildings of Classicism in Germany. With a clearly structured external form and a precise internal structure based on Greek antiquity, Schinkel is pursuing Humboldt's idea of opening the museum to the public as an educational institution.

Stately architecture

The monumental order of the 18 fluted Ionic columns, the wide vestibule, the rotunda - an explicit reference to the Roman pantheon - and finally the flight of stairs are architectural elements that until then were reserved only for stately buildings.

Greek Treasures in the Altes Museum

Originally created for all Berlin art collections, the Altes Museum has housed the Collection of Classical Antiquities since 1904. Between 1943 and 1945 the building burned down and was badly damaged, and was only reconstructed by 1966. Since 1998, the Collection of Classical Antiquities in the Altes Museum has shown its Greek collection with the treasure chamber on the ground floor of the building.