Stolperstein dedicated to Erich Spalter

The Stolperstein dedicated to Erich Spalter is one of the small brass-topped "stumbling stones" (German: Stolperstein, Czech: Kámen zmizelých) set into the pavement of central Prague, in the Prague 1 district on Biskupská street. Each stone marks the last known home of a victim of Nazi persecution, engraving a name and a handful of dates into public space – a modest but powerful form of Holocaust memorial found across many European cities.

Who was Erich Spalter?

Erich Spalter was born in 1907. In 1941 he was deported to Terezín (Theresienstadt), the fortress town north of Prague that served as a ghetto and transit point for thousands of Czech Jews on their way to further persecution. Erich Spalter was murdered by Nazi Germany. The stone on Biskupská street preserves his name at the address where he once lived, turning an anonymous statistic back into an individual life.

What exactly is a Stolperstein, and how did this one come to be here?

Stolpersteine are the work of German artist Gunter Demnig, an ongoing project since the 1990s that today spans dozens of European countries. The concept is deliberately simple: a small brass plate, engraved with a victim's name, birth year, and the date and fate of their deportation or death, is set into a cobblestone embedded in the pavement outside their last freely chosen home. In the Czech Republic the project is known as Kameny zmizelých ("stones of the disappeared"). The stone for Erich Spalter was among the first ten stones unveiled in Prague 1, in a ceremony held on 8 October 2008 that launched the Stolpersteine program in the Czech capital.

Where exactly is the stone located?

The stone is set into the pavement on Biskupská street, near house number 1276/12, in the Prague 1 district – an area bordering the former Jewish quarter of Josefov and the Vltava riverbank, close to Čech Bridge. Its coordinates are approximately 50.090933 N, 14.420116 E.

Why is this stone worth pausing at?

Stolpersteine are designed to make passers-by "stumble" – not physically, but mentally – over a name underfoot; that is the literal meaning of the German word. Unlike large memorials, this form of commemoration works at the scale of a single person and a single address, insisting that Holocaust victims were not anonymous numbers but neighbors who lived in specific houses on specific streets. Pausing for a moment at Erich Spalter's stone while walking through historic central Prague is a small but meaningful act of remembrance.

Frequently asked questions

Is this the only Stolperstein in Prague? No – Prague today has several hundred Stolpersteine across its districts; this one belonged to the first group of ten unveiled in Prague 1 in 2008.

Is it easy to miss? Yes, the stones are the size of an ordinary cobblestone, so it helps to look carefully at the pavement near the given address rather than search for a large monument.

Are there ceremonies held at the stone? Stolpersteine are periodically cleaned and visited by local communities and schools as part of Holocaust remembrance activities, though no fixed public event schedule is documented for this specific stone.

How do you get there? Biskupská street sits in the heart of Prague 1, within easy walking distance of the Old Town and the Vltava riverbank; the nearest tram stops are around Náměstí Republiky and Právnická fakulta (Faculty of Law).