Hidden Secrets of the Hofgarten

If you’ve ever been to Munich (for any reason other than Octoberfest), you’ve probably come across the beautiful Royal Palace Hofgarten. I love it there, and since I have posted several times before about this area, I figured I might try to share a few things about the Hofgarten that you may not have known. First of all the entire garden has been redesigned countless times over the centuries to follow the current trends. No renovation was more dramatic though than after the devastation of World War II, when architects restored its original grandeur. They focused on every last detail, even ensuring that the fountains were in the appropriate style and the flower beds included plants typical of the early 17th century. The pavilion that you see pictured is actually the Temple of Diana, named after the Roman goddess Diana, who was goddess of the hunt and later became the moon Goddess. On top of the pavilion is a bronze statue named “Tellus Bavarica” symbolizing the treasures of Bavarian land – grain, game, water and salt – although to see the original you will have to look in the Residence. The Pavilion has eight arches, and from each radiates a footpath that divides the garden into eight individual sections. If you follow those footpaths to the north and west ends of the garden, there is an arcade with 125 arches – designed after the Palais Royal in Paris. Finally, the Hofgarten is the first place to be named in T S Eliot's The Waste Land and is used to symbolize the dying courts of Old Europe and the empty charms of the aristocratic life. Now there had to be something in there that was news to you.