The Oak of the Kleistpark

Berlin's official reason for protecting this oak is beauty. The Naturdenkmal order of 2 March 1993 lists it as 7-15/B, a Stiel-Eiche on the oval lawn east of the Kammergericht, and gives two grounds: Schoenheit, and regional-historical interest. No girth, no height, no age. The city looked at it and decided that was enough. The ground under it has the longer record. Heinrich-von-Kleist-Park was Berlin's first botanical garden, from 1801 until 1903, when the collection was lifted and moved out to Dahlem. A monument on the same lawn still marks what used to stand here. The colonnades and the court building came later, and the lawn stayed open, which is why the oak is visible whole instead of crowded into a hedge. It is not the largest tree in the park. That is the wingnut, and a bald cypress and a ginkgo grow nearby; two further protected trees stand here as well, a catalpa at the Potsdamer Strasse entrance and a mulberry. But a children's tree walk written with the district's own green-spaces office stops at this one and puts it plainly: here we have a thick, large oak, and it is a Naturdenkmal. Nobody has dated it. The Berlin register carries no age field for any of its trees, and no other source has filled the gap. If you know when this one went in, tell us.