Monument : nm (word from latin monumental).
The word “monument” has several meanings:
1. Work byarchitecture, sculpture, intended to perpetuate the souvenir of someone, something.
Commemorative monument: triumphal arch, column, trophy, etc. (memorial).
Funerary monument, erected on a tomb (mausoleum, sepulchre, stele, stupa, tomb, tumulus).
monument to dead, and the greater , memory of the dead of the same community, or victims of the same disaster.
2. Building, standing stone or heap of stones, which has a valeur religious, symbolic.
Science ancient monuments (archaeology).
Megalithic, prehistoric monuments.
Historic monuments en France.
3. Common meaning: Building remarkable by its interest archaeological, HISTORY ou aesthetic
(building, cathedral, edifice, church, Palace).
Monument HISTORY , class.
Monument public.
Visit monuments of a city.
– Quotation from the French philosopher, literary critic and semiologist Roland Barthes (1915-1980): “The humanity of the country is disappearing to the exclusive benefit of its monuments”.
Familiar: Subject huge.
This cabinet is a true monument.
4. Figurative and literary meaning: Work imposing, vast, worthy of last.
– Quote from the French writer and philosopher Voltaire (1694-1778): “The Encyclopedia is a monument that honors France”.
5. Familiar: A monument of…: a person, a thing remarkable for the intensity of…
– Quotation from the French journalist and historian Jacques Bainville (1879-1936): “The Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle has passed for a monument of absurdity”.