Monument

A monument is a type of structure that was explicitly created to commemorate a person or event, or which has become relevant to a social group as a part of their remembrance of historic times or cultural heritage, due to its artistic, historical, political, technical or architectural importance. Examples of monuments include statues, (war) memorials, historical buildings, archaeological sites, and cultural assets. If there is a public interest in its preservation, a monument can for example be listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

The word "monument" comes from the Latin "monumentum", derived from the word moneo, monere, which means 'to remind' or 'to warn', suggesting a monument allows us to see the past thus helping us visualize what is to come in the future. In English the word "monumental" is often used in reference to something of extraordinary size and power, as in monumental sculpture, but also to mean simply anything made to commemorate the dead, as a funerary monument or other example of funerary art.

A formalist interpretation of monuments suggests their origins date back to antiquity and even prehistory. Archaeologists like Gordon Childe viewed ancient monuments as symbols of power. Historians such as Lewis Mumford proposed that the practice began with Paleolithic landmarks, which served as sites for communication with ancestral spirits. However, these perspectives often project modern uses of monuments onto ancient structures. In art history, monuments are seen as significant sculptural forms; in architecture and urban planning, they are crucial for city organization and mapping. These contemporary interpretations have been retroactively applied to ancient and non-Western structures. This modern concept of monuments aligns with how past constructions are labeled as monuments today. Françóise Choay highlights the distinction between these views: "The historic monument is a precisely datable invention of the West... exported and diffused beyond Europe from the late nineteenth century." Basically, the definition framework of the term monument depends on the current historical frame conditions. Aspects of the Culture of Remembrance and cultural memory are also linked to it, as well as questions about the concepts of public sphere and durability (of the one memorized) and the form and content of the monument (work-like monument). From an art historical point of view, the dichotomy of content and form opens up the problem of the "linguistic ability" of the monument. It becomes clear that language is an eminent part of a monument and it is often represented in "non-objective" or "architectural monuments", at least with a plaque. In this connection, the debate touches on the social mechanisms that combine with Remembrance. These are acceptance of the monument as an object, the conveyed contents and the impact of these contents.

Monuments are frequently used to improve the appearance of a city or location. Planned cities such as Washington, D.C., New Delhi and Brasília are often built around monuments. For example, the Washington Monument's location was conceived by L'Enfant to help organize public space in the city, before it was designed or constructed. Older cities have monuments placed at locations that are already important or are sometimes redesigned to focus on one. As Shelley suggested in his famous poem "Ozymandias" ("Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!"), the purpose of monuments is very often to impress or awe.

Structures created for other purposes that have been made notable by their age, size or historic significance may also be regarded as monuments. This can happen because of great age and size, as in the case of the Great Wall of China, or because an event of great importance occurred there such as the village of Oradour-sur-Glane in France. Many countries use 'ancient monument' or similar terms for the official designation of protected structures or archeological sites which may originally have been ordinary domestic houses or other buildings.

Monuments are also often designed to convey historical or political information, and they can thus develop an active socio-political potency. They can be used to reinforce the primacy of contemporary political power, such as the column of Trajan or the numerous statues of Lenin in the Soviet Union. They can be used to educate the populace about important events or figures from the past, such as in the renaming of the old General Post Office Building in New York City to the James A. Farley Building, after James Farley, former Postmaster General of the United States. To fulfill its informative and educative functions a monument needs to be open to the public, which means that its spatial dimension, as well as its content can be experienced by the public, and be sustainable. The former may be achieved either by situating the monument in public space or by a public discussion about the monument and its meaning, the latter by the materiality of the monument or if its content immediately becomes part of the collective or cultural memory.

The social meanings of monuments are rarely fixed and certain and are frequently 'contested' by different social groups. As an example: whilst the former East German socialist state may have seen the Berlin Wall as a means of 'protection' from the ideological impurity of the west, dissidents and others would often argue that it was symbolic of the inherent repression and paranoia of that state. This contention of meaning is a central theme of modern 'post processual' archaeological discourse.

While many ancient monuments still exist today, there are notable incidents of monuments being intentionally or accidentally destroyed and many monuments are likely to have disappeared through the passage of time and natural forces such as erosion. In 772 during the Saxon Wars, Charlemagne intentionally destroyed an Irminsul monument in order to desecrate the pagan religion. In 1687 the Parthenon in Athens was partially destroyed by a Venetian mortar round, which set off the store of gunpowder kept there by the Turkish defenders.