The column where Prince Otto von Wittelsbach left for Greece

A sandstone column rises against a backdrop of spruces in the south of Ottobrunn. It is a Doric-style monument topped with a bust of a young man. This is the Ottosäule, a memorial to Prince Otto von Wittelsbach. It stands on a small, four-sided hill along the old road to Rosenheim, which was once a trade and postal route for salt and mail from Munich to Salzburg and Italy.

In 1832, the forest here was dense and uninhabited. A seventeen-year-old prince stood in this woodland to take his leave of his father, King Ludwig I of Bavaria. Otto was not merely traveling; he was departing for a future kingdom. Following the murder of Ioannis Kapodistrias, the Greek National Assembly had elected the young Bavarian prince to lead them. He set out with a retinue of 3,500 people, traveling by land before crossing the sea from Brindisi to Nauplia on a frigate.

Anton Ripfel, a master stonemason from South Tyrol, conceived and designed the monument. He submitted the application in May 1833, but the path to construction was paved with legal and bureaucratic hurdles. The foundation stone was laid in October of that year, yet the unveiling was delayed for over two months by administrative friction. It took a personal intervention from King Ludwig I himself to ensure the column was finally unveiled on February 13, 1834.

While the sculpture was the work of Ripfel, the bust of the youthful prince was executed by one of his workshop employees, Josef Unold. For nearly a century, the land belonged to the Kingdom of Bavaria, which purchased the plot from a local farmer and steam sawmill owner in the late 19th century. The state owned the column for eighty years until the expansion of the Rosenheimer Landstraße in 1976 threatened it with road salt and exhaust fumes. The community of Ottobrunn stepped in, petitioning to take ownership of the site in 1975 to ensure its survival.

Today, the monument remains the only cultural-historical landmark in the municipality. A paved footpath leads from the main road to the base, flanked by a fir tree on each side and a seasonal flower bed. From dusk until midnight, searchlights illuminate the stone, casting a glow over the spot where a teenager once stood on the edge of a new life.

Sources: Wikipedia, OpenStreetMap, Wikidata, Wikimedia Commons