Buchenhalle, Forest clearing with beech trees in Naumburg, Germany.

Buchenhalle is a broad, level clearing of pale, sunlit earth on a sloping beech-forest floor above Bad Kösen, on the road toward the Rudelsburg. Tall, straight beeches with smooth greyish bark frame it on the left, right and rear, their branches closing into a high canopy of green and yellow-green leaves. Low dark wooden railings line the left side, and the ground rises toward the back and edges.

First documented in 1848, when the Privilegirte Jenaische Wochenblätter reported a meeting of constitutional associations with 5,000 participants on 9 July, chaired by Pforta professor Karl August Koberstein. Pupils of the Landesschule Pforta hiked here, and open-air services and secular festivals followed. After 1945 the clearing was no longer used, became overgrown and was forgotten.

The name comes from the beech trees around the clearing and from the Romantics: Joseph von Eichendorff used "Buchenhallen" in an 1836 poem, which Justus Wilhelm Lyra set to music in 1843 as a student song. The clearing served as a meeting place for open-air services and secular festivals, and in 1848 a gathering of constitutional associations with 5000 participants was held here.

The clearing lies on the wooded slope beside the path from Bad Kösen up to Rudelsburg, on the side of the beech high forest. The ground is bare, uneven earth that rises toward the back and edges, so sturdy shoes help. After the Second World War the site was no longer maintained and grew over with scrub, so the open floor is easiest to make out where it has been cleared again.

Well-known artists of the 19th century documented scenes of crowds gathering at this woodland space. Their paintings reveal how important this forest clearing became for public meetings and social encounters.