Buchenwald memorial tower, Memorial bell tower on the Ettersberg, Weimar, Germany

The Buchenwald memorial tower is a 50.73-metre bell tower of light sandstone, designed by sculptor Fritz Cremer and built between 1954 and 1958. Its 6.8-tonne Buchenwald bell is not suspended but mounted on four steel supports at the level of a viewing platform 41 metres up, reached by two stairways.

The tower was built between 1954 and 1958 as the central memorial of the Nationale Mahn- und Gedenkstätte Buchenwald, designed by sculptor Fritz Cremer in light sandstone. It closes the monumental axis that leads from the former camp entrance, the "Blutstraße", along the "Straße der Nationen" past the ring graves. Its inscription above the entrance quotes the Buchenwald oath: destruction of Nazism with its roots as the watchword, a new world of peace and freedom as the goal.

The tower closes the memorial's monumental axis: from the former camp entrance, the "Blutstraße" and the "Straße der Nationen" lined with pylons and fire bowls lead past the ring graves to the tower above a assembly square built for up to 20,000 people. In GDR times the surrounding podium served as a speakers' tribune for state commemorations. Above the entrance an inscription quotes the Buchenwald Oath: "Die Vernichtung des Nazismus mit seinen Wurzeln ist unsere Losung. Der Aufbau einer neuen Welt des Friedens und der Freiheit ist unser Ziel."

The tower stands at the end of the memorial axis: from the former camp entrance, the so-called Blutstraße, the Straße der Nationen lined with pylons and fire bowls leads past the ring graves to the tower. The viewing platform at 41 metres is reached by two stairways. The tower rises above an assembly square built for up to 20,000 people.

The 6.8-tonne Buchenwald bell is not hung but mounted on four steel supports at the height of the 41-metre viewing platform, and it is struck every hour. Two stairways lead up to the platform, from which the layout of the memorial grounds below can be read.