page_title: Victor Emmanuel II Monument
section_title: The Altar of the Fatherland
hierarchical_section_title: Victor Emmanuel II Monument / Architectural and artistic works / The Altar of the Fatherland
caption_attribution_description: English: Vittoriano (Rome, 2016)
context_page_description: The Victor Emmanuel II National Monument or Vittoriano, called Altare della Patria, is a national monument built in honour of Victor Emmanuel II, the first king of a unified Italy, located in Rome, Italy. It occupies a site between the Piazza Venezia and the Capitoline Hill. It is currently managed by the Polo Museale del Lazio and is owned by the Ministry of Cultural Heritage and Activities.
  From an architectural perspective, it was conceived as a modern forum, an agora on three levels connected by stairways and dominated by a portico characterized by a colonnade. The complex process of national unity and liberation from foreign domination carried out by King Victor Emmanuel II of Savoy, to whom the monument is dedicated, has a great symbolic and representative value, being architecturally and artistically centred on the Italian unification—for this reason the Vittoriano is considered one of the national symbols of Italy.
  It also preserves the Altar of the Fatherland, first an altar of the goddess Rome, then also a shrine of the Italian Unknown Soldier, thus adopting the function of a lay temple consecrated to Italy.
context_section_description: The Altar of the Fatherland is the most famous part of the Vittoriano and is the one with which it is often identified. Located on the top of the entrance stairway, it was designed by the Brescian sculptor Angelo Zanelli, who won a competition specially held in 1906. It is formed from the side of the Tomb of Italian Unknown Soldier that faces the outside of the building (the other side, which faces inside the Vittoriano, is located in a crypt), from the sacellum of the statue of the goddess Rome (which is exactly above the tomb of the Unknown Soldier) and two vertical marble reliefs that descend from the edges of the aedicula containing the statue of the goddess Rome and which run downwards laterally to the tomb of the Unknown Soldier.
  The statue of the goddess Roma present at the Vittoriano interrupted a custom in vogue until the 19th century, by which the representation of this subject was with exclusively warlike traits. Angelo Zanelli, in his work, decided to further characterize the statue by also providing the reference to Athena, Greek goddess of wisdom and the arts, as well as of war. The great statue of the deity emerges from a golden background. The presence of the goddess Roma in the Vittoriano underlines the irremissible will of the Unification of Italy patriots to have the Rome as the capital of Italy, an essential concept, according to the common feeling, from the history of the peninsula and the islands of Italian culture.
  The general conception of the bas-reliefs located laterally to the statue of the goddess Rome, one to his left and the other to his right, recalls Virgil's Bucolics and Georgics, which complete the triptych of the Altar of the Fatherland with the statue of the Roman divinity.
  The allegorical meaning of the bas-reliefs that are inspired by the works of Virgil is linked to the desire to conceptually render the Italian soul. In the Georgics, the reference to the Aeneid is in fact present, and in both the works the industriousness in the work of the Italians is recalled.
  The bas-relief on the left of the Altar of the Fatherland represents the Triumph of Labour and the one on the right symbolizes the Triumph of the Patriotic Love where both converge scenically towards the statue of the goddess Rome.
caption: One of the two braziers that burn perpetually on the sides of the tomb of the Unknown Soldier. At their base is a plaque bearing the inscription "Gli italiani all'estero alla Madre Patria" ("Italians abroad to the Motherland")
exif: {"Image ImageDescription": "", "Image Make": "SONY", "Image Model": "DSC-HX20V", "Image Orientation": "Rotated 90 CW", "Image XResolution": "350", "Image YResolution": "350", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "DSC-HX20V v1.02", "Image DateTime": "2016:08:04 11:01:26", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image ExifOffset": "298", "GPS GPSVersionID": "[2, 3, 0, 0]", "GPS GPSLatitudeRef": "N", "GPS GPSLatitude": "[41, 53, 8383/200]", "GPS GPSLongitudeRef": "E", "GPS GPSLongitude": "[12, 28, 58721/1000]", "GPS GPSAltitudeRef": "0", "GPS GPSAltitude": "317/10", "GPS GPSTimeStamp": "[10, 1, 26]", "GPS GPSStatus": "A", "GPS GPSMeasureMode": "3", "GPS GPSDOP": "67/50", "GPS GPSSpeedRef": "K", "GPS GPSSpeed": "369/250", "GPS GPSTrackRef": "T", "GPS GPSTrack": "13491/100", "GPS GPSImgDirectionRef": "M", "GPS GPSImgDirection": "178", "GPS GPSMapDatum": "WGS-84", "GPS GPSDate": "2016:08:04", "GPS GPSDifferential": "0", "Image GPSInfo": "38692", "Image PrintIM": "[80, 114, 105, 110, 116, 73, 77, 0, 48, 51, 48, 48, 0, 0, 2, 0, 2, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0, 1, 1, 1, 0, 0, 0]", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail ImageDescription": "", "Thumbnail Make": "SONY", "Thumbnail Model": "DSC-HX20V", "Thumbnail Orientation": "Rotated 90 CW", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail Software": "DSC-HX20V v1.02", "Thumbnail DateTime": "2016:08:04 11:01:26", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "39362", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "10407", "Thumbnail YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/1000", "EXIF FNumber": "16/5", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Program Normal", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "100", "EXIF SensitivityType": "Recommended Exposure Index", "EXIF RecommendedExposureIndex": "100", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0230", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2016:08:04 11:01:26", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2016:08:04 11:01:26", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "2", "EXIF BrightnessValue": "5861/640", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "215/64", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "89/20", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "2592", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "1944", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "39070", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF DigitalZoomRatio": "1", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF Contrast": "Normal", "EXIF Saturation": "Normal", "EXIF Sharpness": "Normal", "EXIF LensSpecification": "[89/20, 89, 16/5, 29/5]"}