ABSTRACT
A remarkable detail of the architecture of Milan is represented by the funeral chapels widely diffused in the fields, called “Riparto”, of Cimitero Monumentale, a municipal cemetery built after the Italian Unification (C. Machiachini, 1866). This new cemetery was little by little filled by hundreds of funeral chapels or monuments mainly in the form of church-like constructions or in the form of simple statues and tombstones. The owners of the chapels were the wealthy families of industry and trade; several architects (C. Maciachini, L. Beltrami, U. Stacchini, F. Reggiori, E. Pirovano, A. Minali, M. Piacentini, P. Portaluppi, G. Muzio, etc.) and sculptors (E. Butti, A. Wildt, E. Bazzaro, G. Castiglioni, L. Fontana, etc.) were involved for more than seventy years. The stone materials employed in these constructions are the same employed in the contemporaneous civil and religious architectures of Milan: from Baveno to Ghiandone, from Viggiù to Botticino, from Rosso Verona to Angera dolostone, from Anzola black gabbro to Larvikite from Norway with a particular grey-blue shimmering on polished surfaces.
