page_title: The Empty Library
section_title: Plaque
hierarchical_section_title: The Empty Library / Design / Plaque
caption_attribution_description: Deutsch: Gedenktafel, Bebelplatz, Bebelplatz, Berlin-Mitte, Deutschland English: Memorial plaque, Bebelplatz, Bebelplatz, Berlin-Mitte, Germany
context_page_description: The Empty Library, also known as Bibliothek or simply Library, is a memorial by Israeli sculptor Micha Ullman dedicated to the remembrance of the Nazi book burning that took place in the Bebelplatz in Berlin, Germany on May 10, 1933. The memorial is set into the cobblestones of the plaza and contains a collection of empty subterranean bookcases.
context_section_description: Several years after the main structure of the memorial was built, a bronze plaque was inlaid into the cobblestones a few feet away. Etched with a quote from German-Jewish author Heinrich Heine's play Almansor (1820), it features the chilling message:
  That was but a prelude;
  where they burn books,
  
  they will ultimately burn people as well.
  Though Heine's words are remarkably prescient within the context of the Holocaust, copies of his works, which were featured on the Nazi literary blacklists, were likely destroyed during the Berlin book burning.
caption: Plaque featuring Heinrich Heine quote
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