In stone and in all places

Monuments to the fallen were not trivial matters. The materials used to build them were taken very seriously, as was their siting. Both aspects were key to ensuring that the memory of the fallen and the civil war endured and, in this way, to carving out a ‘New Spain’ arising from the ‘Crusade’ against the enemies of the fatherland. Stone was the preferred material for monuments to the fallen. They were intended to memorialise the ‘heroes and martyrs’ of a nation presumed to be eternal. Accordingly, materials had to be both solid and long-lasting, defying the passage of time and oblivion. At the same time, Spain could hardly be represented with a pliable material. It would be neither sober and monumental nor worthy. Elsewhere in Europe at that time, buildings, landscapes, and monuments placed in public spaces became agents of post-war reconstruction, conveying meanings related to particular conflicts. ¹ In Spain, monuments loomed over the public, contributing to Spain’s reconfiguration and nationalisation. In towns and cities, they sat in places where local life unfolded, on large avenues, next to the most prominent churches, in well-known and emotive places. The symbol of the fallen from the civil war thus became the epicentre of the memory that Francoism and its supporters sought to construct.