Monument to William Tell in the Swiss city of Altdorf
“Monuments in Switzerland – the question should rather be phrased differently, namely, do such things even exist in this country? Switzerland has the Alps and lakes, it has watch factories and textile enterprises of the highest quality, but monuments? Ask anyone, and they will say they have never heard of anything like that in Switzerland.” So said the classic German writer Theodor Fontane more than a century and a half ago when he came to Switzerland.
Indeed, as the portal Swissinfo.ch notes, at first glance, not many monuments have been erected in the Confederation. To whom and for what are monuments erected? For example, to the founding of the state. In Switzerland, the symbol of the country is the Rütli meadow on the shores of Lake Lucerne opposite the town of Brunnen. No monuments have ever been placed there. This fact surprised even Vasily Zhukovsky, who sailed by boat to the Rütli meadow: “There is no monument on it; but the freedom of Switzerland still exists!”
Who usually erects monuments? Politicians? But Switzerland had no tsar, king, dictator, or other “father of the nation” with sufficient resources to immortalize themselves with equestrian, pedestrian, or other statues. Swiss democracy, as can be seen, is poor soil for the emergence of any more or less outstanding examples of monumental propaganda. And the attitude toward existing monuments is special here: no one would think of laying flowers, for example, at the monument to Alfred Escher standing near Zurich’s main train station.
Who else erects monuments? Patrons and businessmen? But in Switzerland, they rather built not statues but buildings, useful and utilitarian. Therefore, in almost every city you can find, for example, a square, bridge, street, or alley named after the “Granary” (Kornhaus), but you will not find statues of local political figures or mayors in these cities, or they will be very small and hidden away in some inconspicuous corner. Serious bewilderment today is caused by the statue of an eagle erected during World War II at the Simplon Pass – it strongly resembles the German eagle of the same era. But to topple this monument? In Switzerland, that would not occur to anyone either.
However, both Swiss and tourists equally warm feelings are evoked by the monument of the dying lion in Lucerne. To glorify the feat of mercenaries who died defending others’ interests? For many, this borders on cynicism, but for the Swiss, it is a monument to loyalty to duty. According to Mark Twain, it represents “the most mournful and most impressive piece of rock in the world.” Every monument needs heroic fallen. In this case, those fallen did exist, but in others?
European wars of the last 150 years have bypassed Switzerland, and its own civil war, which turned 170 years old last year, was not marked by any special monuments, except perhaps a very modest obelisk erected in memory of one of the battles of this war, which took place near the town of Geltwil in the canton of Aargau.
Overall, the Swiss attitude toward monuments (cool and distant) is a reflection of their attitude toward their own national history. Many eras of this history, for example, the period of the unitary, French-imposed Helvetic Republic (1798-1803), were carefully erased from public consciousness. And in general, Swiss history rather breaks down into the history of its individual cantons, regions, and communities, and there, at this grassroots level, other mechanisms of historical memory operate, less pompous, more personal. And allocating money for large monuments, whether for their installation or toppling, usually seems to people here an unproductive waste of already limited financial resources.
Nevertheless, we have found for you 7 of the most notable, strange, interesting, significant monuments in Switzerland.
1. Monument to William Tell in the city of Altdorf. We will not retell the legend again. Probably, this monument most closely matches our idea of what monumental propaganda is. Despite the fact that the never-existent Tell is truly more alive than the living in Switzerland, schoolchildren do not go to him with flowers and are not inducted into the party at his feet.
2. Monument to the soldiers of A. V. Suvorov at the Devil’s Bridge. Erected back in the 19th century near the town of Andermatt. The territory around the monument has been transferred to the jurisdiction of the Russian Federation.
3. The “Dying Lion” monument in Lucerne. The legend associated with the monument is also well known. But few people pay attention to one peculiarity of this monument. The fact is that the sculptor Lukas Ahorn was very dissatisfied with the payment he received for the lion figure, and therefore, as revenge, he carved the outer contours of the cave in which the lion lies in the shape of a wild boar.
4. Monument to Freddie Mercury. Among modern monuments in Switzerland, this is probably one of the most impressive, immediately recognized and appreciated by tourists and locals. It was in Montreux that the already terminally ill singer recorded vocal parts that later became part of the last album of Queen’s traditional lineup, “Made in Heaven.” And it is no coincidence that the silhouette of the monument later adorned the cover of this album.
5. Steel rhinoceros near the building of the Zurich Cantonal Bank. It is possible that the idea of this monument was inspired by the famous bull statue on Wall Street. What could the horn of this animal mean? The unyielding banking secrecy? But since 2018 it has disappeared. Of course, the figure of the rhinoceros can be classified as a monument only very conditionally. But still, one cannot deny its originality.
6. Monument to Louis Chevrolet in Lausanne. Louis Chevrolet was born in Switzerland, in the city of La Chaux-de-Fonds. After emigrating to the United States, he founded the world-famous automobile brand. The brand's logo, shaped like a horizontally elongated Swiss cross, still reminds us of the Swiss roots of the brilliant designer. As for the fact that this monument looks more like a liquid robot terminator from the second part of the immortal franchise, we leave that to the sculptor's conscience.
7. Monument to Sherlock Holmes. No, he was not Swiss, but the famous fight with Professor Moriarty, described by A. Conan Doyle in the story "The Final Problem," took place precisely in the vicinity of the town of Meiringen at the Reichenbach Falls. And since the British, who were the first to open Switzerland to Europeans as a tourist destination, have always been regular visitors to this significant place, the fathers of the town of Meiringen deemed it appropriate to erect a monument to the great detective here. In the background, you can see the English Church, which now houses the Holmes Museum.