The Solovetsky Stone is a monument to the victims of political repression in the Soviet Union and to those who have fought and fight for freedom. It stands in Troitskaya (Trinity) Square in Saint Petersburg, near several other buildings directly related to political repression in the Soviet era—the House of Tsarist Political Prisoners; the prison and necropolis of the Peter and Paul Fortress; and the Bolshoy Dom or headquarters of the NKVD, both in the city and the surrounding Leningrad Region. Nowadays, the Stone also serves as a focus for commemorative events and for gatherings related to current human rights issues. The monument consists of a large boulder brought from the Solovetsky Islands in the White Sea, where the Solovki prison camp opened in 1923. The camp was the malignant cell which, in Solzhenitsyn's metaphor, metastasized to create the entire Gulag network of forced labour camps. The Stone is a fitting symbol of the Gulag and the related practices of political terror. The Memorial society in Petersburg was behind the creation of the monument. It was designed by Yuly Rybakov and Yevgeny Ukhnalyov, both political prisoners during the Soviet period.
Design and symbolism
The monument comprises the Solovki Stone, a massive granite slab from the Solovetsky Islands, where the Solovki concentration camp operated in the 1920s and 1930s. The prison camp's diminutive name "Solovki" became shorthand in Russian for a punitive network of camps that already held more than 100,000 inmates in the 1920s. Between the 1930s and 1950, it has been estimated, the number of people who passed through the Gulag (as it later became known) reached 18 million, at least 1,500,000 of whom died in the camps. The Gulag traumatized the population and had a lasting impact on several generations; it left its imprint on many aspects of society and culture. The granite slab was selected from among the boulders near the Savvatiyev Skethe (hermitage), which was used to house political prisoners in the 1920s. There on 19 December 1923, guards and a special firing squad shot and killed protesting prisoners. The massacre marked a new stage in the repressive measures employed by the Soviet regime, and set an important precedent for resistance. Some sources assert that the stone was taken from Mount Sekirna, a hill in the vicinity of the Skethe. The Voznesensky Skethe (hermitage) on Mount Sekirna was used as a punishment block and execution yard. As an artefact from "that very place", keeping in touch with "the spirit of our ancestors", the Solovki Stone symbolizes a pre-Christian idea of continuity and the hereditivity of existence. In its designers conception, the stone's rough aesthetics endow it with a "backbone of personality that endures despite confronting faceless evil". The monument design is minimalist and it has a non-religious, secular character. It features a crude granite slab, 1.7 m (5 ft 7 in) high, mounted on a square granite pedestal (0.35 m × 2.35 m × 2.3 m [1 ft 2 in × 7 ft 9 in × 7 ft 7 in]), itself based on a concrete impost surrounded by granite footings.0.2 m (7.9 in) high. The edges are oriented on the four cardinal points of the compass. From a certain angle, the stone resembles an elephant, which in Russian ('слон', 'slon') sounds like the abbreviation S.L.O.N. [Соловецкий лагерь особого назначения], the formal title of the "Solovetsky Special Purpose Camp".
Inscriptions and location The monument also conveys its meaning through the inscriptions on the pedestal. Its north face reads, "To the inmates of the Gulag" [Узникам ГУЛАГа]; the west face reads, "To those who fight for freedom" [Борцам за свободу]; and the east face reads "To the Victims of Communist Terror" [Жертвам коммунистического террора]. The south face carries words from Anna Akhmatova's long poem Requiem: "I would like to recall them all by name". The monument does not list any names, because not all the victims are yet known. Yuly Rybakov, one of the designers, consider the western inscription the most important because it commemorates not only the victims, but also all who have fought against the repressive system. The lines on the east face explicitly name those responsible for the terror, a rare thing among similar monuments in Russia. The direct mention of communism as the reason for this catastrophe, believes historian Alexander Etkind, makes the monument of universal significance. The text on the Solovki Stone says nothing about its background. Its authors believe this should stir the interest of passers-by and make them curious to find out more. The monument is dedicated to all who were "shot, arrested, exiled, banned, broken by the Communist regime—whose graves are lost and fate unknown". The Memorial Society in St Petersburg, which initiated and sponsored the monument's creation, offered the following description of its significance:
"This monument is a gift to the city on its 300th Anniversary from former political prisoners, who treasure freedom and human dignity more than personal safety and well-being. The Solovetsky Stone in Troitskaya Square is the symbol of free social thoughts, political and civic liberties. This monument pays tribute to all the victims of purposeless terror, it commemorates our fellow citizens, who suffered from political repression. It honors those who fought for human dignity among triumphant cruelty and didn't succumb to evil, preserving inner personal freedom and remained human in an inhuman world. This monument shows how a strong individual can overcome the totalitarian regime; it rejects violence and xenophobia. We live in an unstable country, which cannot guard our rights and freedom. So let this stone serve our freedom."
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