Google apologizes for Berlin map gaffe echoing Third Reich

Google has apologized after someone discovered a popular spot in Berlin had somehow been temporarily renamed in the company's online map service for the particluarly infamous character to whom it was once dedicated: Adolf Hitler.

The eerie error was apparently discovered by Nico Hagenburger, who posted a screenshot of the mistake to Twitter. The gaffe was first reported by German paper B.Z.

"How could this happen?" bellowed top-selling German daily Bild.

The street is actually called Theodor-Heuss-Platz, in honor of the man who served as president of the Federal Republic of Germany from 1949 to 1959.

The popular Berlin square was called Adolf Hitler Platz for 14 years of the Third Reich era. It was to have played a major role in Hitler's planned "Germania," a reimagining of Berlin as an international capital under Nazism, Raw Story reported.

Google has since apologized for the error, NBC News reports.

From NBC News:

“We were made aware of a wrong and inappropriate Berlin street name on Google Maps and have corrected this as quickly as possible,” the Internet search giant said in an email to NBC News. “We apologize for this error.”

NBC News spoke with "German Internet expert and blogger" Sascha Lobo, who told the agency the mistake might have been the result of a "simple error over the order of names."

Follow Mike Krumboltz on Twitter (@mikekrumboltz).