The controversy over the Monument to Victory in Bolzano

The controversy over the Monument to Victory in Bolzano is been highly debated over this

century, but in recent years it has been brought up in a project with the idea of a historicisation of

the monument. It has always been in the centre of the rivalry between the two linguistic factions,

the German-speaking and the Italian-speaking, that inhabit the city of Bolzano. It has always been

seen as a symbol of discrimination and inequity against the German-speaking part of the population.

Additionally, the monument has been thought to be a representation of the fascist movement that

governed the country during the First World War.

The debate over this monument started from the instant of its creation in 1928. It was

constructed to commemorate the Italian Soldiers that died in the First World War and to

memorialise the victory of the Italian army over the Austro-Hungarian troops. The monument

represented strong feelings of Italian patriotism in a city were both German-speaking and Italian-

speaking people lived, this caused a rivalry between the two groups that continued until the end of

the Second World War.

The Monument to Victory represented an “explicit fascist propaganda” (Hökerberg 2017, 760) and

generated many polemics by the right-wing and left-wing political parties. It was also an “emblem

of the political-cultural colonization of South Tyrol and the assimilation of its German-speaking

inhabitants into the Italian State” (Scarrocchia, 317, as cited in Hökerberg 2017, 760).

Thusly, this fascist memento was the main cause of the antagonism between the two linguistic

communities that populated Bolzano, as it “remains an affront to South Tyrol's German-speaking

citizens even today” (Gerald Steinacher 2013, 651).

The Monument to Victory was build in 1928 by the architect Marcello Piacentini, under the

instructions of the fascist leader and Prime Minister of Italy, Benito Mussolini. Therefore Piacentini

was proclaimed the “Fascist regime's de facto official architect” (Kirk, 85, as cited in Hökerberge
2017, 761), as he could perfectly symbolize the regime's desires and ideologies; this work led him

into the grace of the Duce himself. Only in recent years, his reputation has been polished and he has

been praised for his exceptional abilities and organisational skills.

Initially, the Monument had to be dedicated to the Italian socialist and patriot Cesare Battisti, who

had been executed by the Austro-Hungarian army during the First World War. Nevertheless, his

widow did not want her husband's name to be associated with a means for fascist propaganda, thus

the Monument was raised in memory of the fallen in the War. Based on Mussolini's thoughts, the

Monument wanted to be a reminder of the superiority of the Italian State over the Austro-

Hungarians, including the German-speaking inhabitants of the city. To accentuate the fascist

ideology, Piacentini wrote a Latin inscription on the facade of the Monument, which translates as:

“Here at the boundaries of the fatherland. Set down the banner! From this point on we educated the

others with language, law, and culture”. This inscription emphasized the dominance of the Latin

culture and civilisation over the German one. This was a violent discrimination of a substantial part

of the population of Bolzano.

After the First World War, during the De Gasperi–Gruber Agreement in 1971, South Tyrol was

proclaimed “Autonomous Province of Bolzano” and learning a second language became mandatory,

thus the whole population would be bilingual. However, the controversy over the Monument to

Victory in Bolzano continued after the War, as it symbolized the oppression of the German-speaking

part of the inhabitants and a fascist propaganda. Some attempts were made in order to dismantle the

building, the most crucial was made in 1978 with dynamite.

The community wanted the State to demolish the arch since it was impossible to be pleased by the

government, they asked to repurpose the monument and dedicate it to peace. As Michael Seeber, a

businessman of Bolzano, stated: “it is a matter of removing the significance and symbolism that

both sides attach to it” (Geral Steinacher 2013, 658).

In May 2010, the Historical Archive of Bolzano suggested a historicisation of the monument by

means of an exhibition that could illustrate the historical memory of it and neutralize the fascist
emblem that it represented. This project was approved in January 2012 by the Minister of Culture,

the State and the Province of Bolzano and it was opened to the public in 2014.

The exhibition did not end the rivalry between the two factions, however both parties agree that it

has given a better connotation to the monument in the contemporary age, as it “had been used to

obscure the memory of the fallen soldiers in the Great War and been repurposed for totalitarian

ends” (Nicolosio, 172, as cited in Hökerberg 2017, 767).

Bibliography

Håkan Hökerberg (2017) The Monument to Victory in Bolzano: desacralisation of a fascist relic,
International Journal of Heritage Studies, 23:8, 759-774, DOI:
10.1080/13527258.2017.1321572
Gerald Steinacher “Fascist Legacies: The Controversy over Mussolini's Monuments in South
Tyrol”