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| The Cimitero Monumentale, "Monumental Cemetery", Milan. |
The Cimitero Monumentale ("Monumental Cemetery") is one of the two largest cemeteries in Milan, Italy, the one being the Cimitero Maggiore. The Monumentale is noted for the abundance of artistic tombs.
It was designed by the architect Carlo Maciachini (1818-1899). The structure was planned to consolidate a number of small cemeteries that used to be scattered around the city into a single location, at that time being removed from the central city area.
It opened in 1866 and since then has been filled with a wide range of both contemporary and classical Italian sculptures as well as Greek temples, elaborate obelisks, and other original works such as a scaled-down version of Trajan's Column. Many of the tombs belong to noted industrialist dynasties, and have been designed by renewed artists such as Giò Ponti, Arturo Martini, Lucio Fontana, Medardo Rosso, Giacomo Manzù, Floriano Bodini, and Giò Pomodoro.
The main entrance is through the large Famedio, a massive Hall-of-Fame-like Neo-Medieval style building of marble and stone that contains the tombs of some of the city's and the country's most honored citizens, including that of novelist Alessandro Manzoni.
The Civico Mausoleo Palanti designed by the architect Mario Palanti is a tomb built to house the dead famous "Milanesi" not enough for admission to the memorial chapel, but representative of some merit had in life. The memorial of about 800 Milanese killed in Nazi concentration camps is located in the center instead, just get off the stairs of the memorial chapel, and is the work of the group BBPR, formed by leading exponents of Italian rationalist architecture, one of which (Gianluigi Banfi) died in Mauthausen in 1945. The cemetery has a special section for those who do not belong to the Catholic religion, and a Jewish section.
Near the entrance is an exhibit of prints, photographs, and maps outlining its historical development. The exhibit includes two battery-operated electric hearses built in the 1920s.
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