How many of us from early childhood do not know what a monument is? A culture of memory distinguishes man from all other living things on earth. Thanks to the ability to remember and preserve past social experience, society lives and develops.
But nevertheless, such a simple at first glance concept as a monument also needs to be defined. We will try to give it in this article.
Deciphering the concept
If we open an explanatory dictionary, we learn from it that the term we are studying has several definitions.
Firstly, a monument is called an object of cultural heritage in the broadest sense of the word. These are monuments of architecture or art, writing or history.
Secondly, a monument is any work of art that preserves the memory of certain events (for example, the Battle of Kulikovo Field or the Battle of Borodino) or people (monuments to Peter the Great, Kutuzov, Lenin, Dostoevsky, etc.).
Thirdly, there are monuments that are usually put up near the graves of the dead. In Christian culture, a cross placed on a grave, or a tombstone with the name of the deceased and the dates of his birth and death, becomes such a symbol.
Monument as a science
To understand what a monument is, modern science of monument science helps, which pays special attention to the symbolic meaning of memory in the life of human society. Let's consider it in more detail.
This science suggests that all cultural objects of memory can be studied by highlighting certain criteria for their division into groups:
- According to the typological criterion, these cultural objects can be divided into monuments of nature, architecture, history, culture and monuments of art, etc.
- If possible, these monuments are divided into movable (for example, paintings, statues, etc.) and immovable (for example, St. Isaac's Cathedral in St. Petersburg, the Louvre in France and others).
- According to the magnification of the object, the monuments are divided into statues, triumphal columns, commemorative plaques, memorial complexes, as well as such a specific kind of monuments as the perpetuation of the weapons of war (most often trophy), these are guns, planes, tanks and so on.
What is a monument? The history of the phenomenon
Even our distant ancestors began to build monuments. These include antiquities such as the Egyptian pyramids for the burial of the bodies of pharaohs and members of their families, the pyramids of the Indians of pre-colonial America, tombstones of nomadic peoples, and more.
Such constructions were eagerly erected by the inhabitants of Ancient Greece and Rome, using them to exalt emperors and gods and in the glorification of military leaders.
In medieval Europe, it was customary to establish monuments to monarchs and build magnificent temples, which were the greatest monuments to the Creator God.
This tradition has been preserved in the European culture of modern times. Therefore, each of us knows what a monument is, because modern mankind is surrounded by numerous monuments of past eras.
Monuments and political ideology
Very often, the transition of society to a new type of social structure is accompanied by the demolition of old monuments of former political idols and the installation of new ones. And, as a rule, not ancient monuments erected several centuries ago are destroyed, but statues of those who were exalted only recently.
Our contemporaries remember very well how, even 25 years ago, cultural objects of the Soviet era were successfully destroyed in the country: the statues of Lenin and his associates were demolished, and the stelae and statues of participants in the white movement and all those who suffered from the Bolsheviks were put in their place.
The culture of memory is a very important phenomenon for mankind, not without reason one of the sages said that those who build monuments think about the future. Memorial constructions give us all a moral lesson; they are carriers of certain values and traditions. Therefore, probably, the culture of the monuments will be alive as long as people live on earth.