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An Ehrengrab (English language: 'grave of honor') is a distinction granted by certain German, Swiss and Austrian cities to some of their citizens for extraordinary services or achievements in their lifetimes. If there are no descendants or institutions to care for the gravesites, the communities or cities will take responsibility for the graves and for financing their care.
Many Ehrengräber (honor graves) also serve to document cultural history; for example, when a cemetery containing artistically notable graves is closed and the graves are moved at public expense.
The basic details of the awarding, financing and care of honorary graves are similarly handled in all German-speaking countries. Berlin and Vienna maintain the largest number of such sites.
As such, Berlin provides at public expense honorary graves, available to:
Among those who have such tombs of honor in Berlin are Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Bertolt Brecht, Aleksander Brückner, Wilhelm Busch, Theodor Fontane, Valeska Gert, the brothers Grimm, Georg Ludwig Hartig, Heinrich von Kleist, Hildegard Knef, Otto Lilienthal, Herbert Marcuse, Felix Mendelssohn, Marg Moll, Helmut Newton, Ernst Reuter, Joachim Ringelnatz, Heinrich Zille, and Arnold Zweig.
From 1951 to 1989, the German Democratic Republic used the Memorial to the Socialists () at Zentralfriedhof Friedrichsfelde as central memorial site for East Germany's Socialists, Communists and anti-fascist fighters. Decisions whether a person should be buried in the Memorial to the Socialists or the adjacent Pergolenweg section of the cemetery rested solely with the Politburo of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany, and many honoured this way were also given a state funeral. People buried or commemorated here include Wilhelm Liebknecht, Karl Liebknecht, Rosa Luxemburg, Adolf Hennecke and Klaus Fuchs. Under certain circumstances, relatives of people honoured in the Memorial to the Socialists or the Pergolenweg section can still be buried there; one such example is Markus Wolf (died 2006), whose ashes were placed in the grave of his brother Konrad Wolf, who had been awarded an honorary grave in the Pergolenweg section in 1982.
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