The entire square originally stretched from Landgraben across Erbprinzenstraße to Kriegsstraße. Around 1800, the garden, which belonged to a small palace owned by Hereditary Prince Karl Ludwig and his wife Amalie, was laid out in the English garden design style. The Erbprinzenstraße, an open civic street that divided the garden into two halves, was given grotto-like walkways at the time, connecting the two parts underground. After the early death of the heir to the throne, the margravine had a memorial to her deceased husband erected in the south of the garden and her own building on Ritterstrasse.
As the Margraves and later Grand Dukes of Baden had amassed diverse collections of coins, weapons, minerals, natural objects, antiquities and books over the centuries, an expansion of the court library and scientific collections was planned in the second half of the 19th century. The architect Karl Josef Berckmüller was commissioned to plan a new building and design the development of the square. In the Renaissance style, the new collection building, today's Natural History Museum, was built on the southern half of the garden and the square was closed off with private houses on the northern and eastern sides. The buildings for entrepreneurs and manufacturers were united on the first floor, which was intended for trade, by a uniform arcade.
A large part of the buildings were destroyed during the Second World War. Initially, one of the collection points for the rubble was set up on the square, before work began in the 1950s to close the building lines again.
Today, the square is often used for events.
