The Italian Charnel House, Kobarid (Italian : Sacrario militare di Caporetto; Slovene : Italijanska kostnica nad Kobaridom) is an Italian military shrine in Kobarid, Slovenia. [1] [2] Sited on the battlefield of Caporetto, it houses the remains of 7,014 Italians who fell during the battles of the Isonzo. [3]
The work was initiated by the Italian state in 1936, during the period when Kobarid was in Italian territory. The Extraordinary Commissioner for the Honouring of the War Dead Ugo Cei commissioned Costruzioni Marchioro di Vicenza to build a series of ossuaries and war memorials, including Kobarid as well as Redipuglia and Monte Grappa. Work was completed at Kobarid in September 1938. [4]
At the core of the site is a small chapel on the Gradič hill dedicated to Saint Anthony of Padua and consecrated in 1696. The chapel contained frescoes by a local artist, Luna Šarf, but these were mostly lost during the adaptation of the site to the new memorial, and only the fresco depicting universal judgement remains. [5]
Beneath this the architect Giovanni Greppi built three octagonal modern structures rising below the baroque chapel and the sculptor Giannino Castiglioni carved the fourteen Stations of the Cross on the winding road that leads up to the shrine from the main square of the town. [3] [6] [5]
The remains of Italian soldiers who had fallen between it:Monte Rombon and Tolmin were removed from the existing military cemeteries of the area, including Drežnica, Drežniške Ravne, Gabrje, Kamno, Smast, Bovec and Kobarid, and collected in the new shrine. [5] Among the 7,014 remains are those of 1,748 unknown soldiers, collected in six tombs placed on the sides of the central stairways. The names of those who are known are set in serpentine marble panels. [3]
The memorialisation of Caporetto was problematic for Mussolini's government, as it was for Italy in general. [7] The defeat was regarded as a stain on the national character, and an acceptable national interpretive framework was needed in order to account for it, preserving both the dignity of the commanders and the admirable qualities of the ordinary troops. [8] : 50–51
Initially the simplest way of reconciling these requirements was often just to avoid the topic of Caporetto as much as possible. The 1934 film Gloria:Documentazione Cinematografica Della Guerra 1915-1918 by Roberto Omegna celebrated courage and national pride, but scarcely mentioned Caporetto at all. [4]
However a second narrative also developed, which regarded the defeat at Caporetto as a critical moment in the foundation of the new Italy. The Fascist party referred to Caporetto as the moment of its birth, and all aspects of commemorating the war were subsumed into a new fascist narrative. [8] : 54
Mussolini disliked melancholy or mourning sentiments, so the grand war memorials he commissioned were intended to be assertive statements of the dignity of Italy's fighting men. They were also conceived of as sentinelle della patria (“watchtowers of the nation”). At the charnel house, as at Redipuglia, the names of the dead appear under the heading ‘Presente’, as if they were still on duty. [4] In building these memorials, Mussolini remobilised the Italian war dead and deployed them in a commemorative landscape of monumental fascist structures. [9]
The charnel house commemorates Caporetto as a national Calvary, bringing together the symbolism of the Catholic Passion with the monumental elements of fascist style. The pillars which mark the start of the winding road up to the summit bear, on one side, the cross, and in the other, the star of Italy. The road itself is a sort of pilgrimage route, and those venturing along it may stop to pray and contemplate each of Castiglioni's sculptures, which is provided with a bench for the purpose. [8] : 56
The charnel house was inaugurated by Benito Mussolini on 20 September 1938. Mussolini was undertaking a tour of the northeast; on the same day as the ceremony at Kobarid he had also inaugurated the Italian ossuary at Oslavia, laid the first stone in the building of a new Autonomous Fascist Institute in Gorizia, opened a new underground power station in Doblar and a new aqueduct in Volče. Two days earlier, as part of the same tour, he had announced fascist Italy's first racial laws in Trieste and inaugurated the giant ossuary at Redipuglia. [5] [10] [11]
The Slovenian anti-fascist group TIGR planned to assassinate Mussolini during the inauguration of the shrine and a young man from Bovec was ordered to blow him up. However the plot was discovered and the attempt was foiled. [5]
The charnel house is the only war memorial maintained today by the Italian state which does not stand on the soil of Italy. [3] The remains of all other Italian war dead who fell on Slovenian soil were moved to the ossuaries of Redipuglia and Oslavia in Italy. [3] Every year a ceremony is held at Kobarid to honour the dead. [12]
The Soča or Isonzo is a 138-kilometre (86 mi) long river that flows through western Slovenia and northeastern Italy.
Kobarid is a settlement in Slovenia, the administrative centre of the Municipality of Kobarid.
An ossuary is a chest, box, building, well, or site made to serve as the final resting place of human skeletal remains. They are frequently used where burial space is scarce. A body is first buried in a temporary grave, then after some years the skeletal remains are removed and placed in an ossuary. The greatly reduced space taken up by an ossuary means that it is possible to store the remains of many more people in a single tomb than in coffins.
The Battle of Caporetto was a battle on the Italian front of World War I.
Adone Alvaro Ugo Natale Camillo Zoli was an Italian politician who served as the 35th prime minister of Italy from May 1957 to July 1958; he was the first senator to have ever held the office.
Bovec is a town in the Littoral region in northwestern Slovenia, close to the border with Italy. It is the central settlement of the Municipality of Bovec.
The First Battle of the Isonzo was fought between the Armies of Italy and Austria-Hungary on the northeastern Italian Front in World War I, between 23 June and 7 July 1915.
San Biagio di Callalta is a comune (municipality) in the province of Treviso, Veneto, north-eastern Italy.
Affile is a comune (municipality) in the Metropolitan City of Rome in the Italian region of Lazio, located about 50 kilometres (31 mi) east of Rome.
Jevšček is a small settlement in the Municipality of Kobarid in the Littoral region of Slovenia, right on the border with Italy.
The Municipality of Kobarid is a municipality in the Upper Soča Valley in western Slovenia, near the Italian border. The seat of the municipality is the town of Kobarid.
The Asiago War Memorial is a World War I memorial located in the town of Asiago in the Province of Vicenza in the Veneto region of northeast Italy. Surrounded by mountains that were the site of several World War I battles, the monument houses the remains of over 50,000 Italian and Austro-Hungarian soldiers and is a popular destination for travelers to the region. In Italian the memorial is typically called Sacrario Militare di Asiago or Sacrario Militare del Leiten. Leiten is the name of the hill on which the memorial sits.
Giannino Castiglioni was an Italian sculptor and medallist. He worked mostly in monumental and funerary sculpture; his style was representational, and far from the modernist and avant-garde trends of the early twentieth century.
The Opera Nazionale Combattenti was an Italian charitable organisation set up to provide assistance to veterans of the First World War. It was established in December 1917, in the immediate aftermath of the disastrous Italian defeat at the Battle of Caporetto, and was intended both to improve the morale of soldiers in the army and to provide for their eventual return to civilian life. Francesco Saverio Nitti and Alberto Beneduce were influential in its establishment, and Beneduce was the first president.
The Sacrario dei Caduti Oltremare is a World War II memorial located in the city of Bari, in the Apulia region of Southern Italy. The shrine, inaugurated in 1967, houses the remains of 75,098 Italian soldiers killed overseas in both World Wars as well as in Italy's colonial wars.
The Redipuglia War Memorial is a World War I memorial located on the Karst Plateau near the village of Fogliano Redipuglia, in the Friuli Venezia Giulia region of northeastern Italy. It is the largest war memorial in Italy and one of the largest in the world, housing the remains of 100,187 Italian soldiers killed between 1915 and 1917 in the eleven battles fought on the Karst and Isonzo front.
The military memorial of Monte Grappa is the largest Italian military ossuary of the First World War. It is located on the summit of Monte Grappa between the provinces of Treviso and Vicenza, at 1,776 meters above sea level. Access to the memorial is via the Strada Cadorna, built by the army on the orders of General Luigi Cadorna to bring construction materials for the fortification on Monte Grappa in 1917.
The Oslavia War Memorial is an Italian monument to soldiers who fell in battle during the battles of the Isonzo, particularly those who died during the taking of Gorizia in 1916. It stands on a 150m hill in the village of Oslavia, on the outskirts of Gorizia. The hilltop was on the front line as Austro-Hungarian troops defended the salient around Gorizia during the first, third and fourth battles of the Isonzo.
Ugo Cei was an Italian general and politician, who particularly distinguished himself during the First World War as brigade commander. In February 1935 he was appointed extraordinary Commissioner for honors for those who had died in war in Italy and abroad, and on March 25, 1939 he was made a Senator of the Kingdom. His decorations included the Knight Grand Cross and Officer of the Military Order of Savoy, three Medals of Military Valor and the War Cross of Military Valor.
Giovanni Greppi was an Italian architect best known for having designed some of the most famous military shrines in Italy.
Coordinates: 46°14′50″N13°35′02″E / 46.247102°N 13.583974°E