The Monumento a los Caídos por España (Monument to the Fallen for Spain), popularly known as the 'Obelisco' ("Obelisk") or the 'Monumento a los Héroes del Dos de Mayo' ("Monument to the Heroes of the Second of May"), is a monument in Madrid

Madrid

Madrid is the capital and largest city of Spain. The population of the city is roughly 3.3 million and the entire population of the Madrid metropolitan area is calculated to be 6.271 million. It is the third largest city in the European Union, after London and Berlin, and its metropolitan...

, Spain

Spain

Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...

 located in the Plaza de la Lealtad, between the Madrid Stock Exchange Building

Bolsa de Madrid

Bolsa de Madrid is the largest and most international of Spain's four regional stock exchanges that trade shares and convertible bonds and fixed income securities, and both government and private-sector debt...

 and the Ritz Hotel, next to the Paseo del Prado

Paseo del Prado

The Paseo del Prado is one of the main boulevards in Madrid, Spain. It runs north-south between the Plaza de Cibeles and the Plaza del Emperador Carlos V , with the Plaza de Cánovas del Castillo lying approximately in the middle...

.

The monument is built on the place where General Joachim Murat

Joachim Murat

Joachim-Napoléon Murat , Marshal of France and Grand Admiral or Admiral of France, 1st Prince Murat, was Grand Duke of Berg from 1806 to 1808 and then King of Naples from 1808 to 1815...

 ordered the execution of numerous Spaniards after the Dos de Mayo Uprising

Dos de Mayo Uprising

On the second of May , 1808, the people of Madrid rebelled against the occupation of the city by French troops, provoking a brutal repression by the French Imperial forces and triggering the Peninsular War.-Background:...

 of 1808. After various attempts to create a memorial as an homage to the participants of the uprising, the inauguration of the monument took place on May 2, 1840, the anniversary of the event. On November 22, 1985, King Juan Carlos I re-inaugurated the monument as a memorial to all those who gave their life for Spain, including those that died in conflicts other than the Peninsular War

Peninsular War

The Peninsular War was a war between France and the allied powers of Spain, the United Kingdom, and Portugal for control of the Iberian Peninsula during the Napoleonic Wars. The war began when French and Spanish armies crossed Spain and invaded Portugal in 1807. Then, in 1808, France turned on its...

. Since then, a flame fuelled by gas has been constantly burning on the front of the monument. This parallels other war memorials around the world of national symbolic importance, frequently known as the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier

Tomb of the Unknown Soldier

Tomb of the Unknown Soldier refers to a grave in which the unidentifiable remains of a soldier are interred. Such tombs can be found in many nations and are usually high-profile national monuments. Throughout history, many soldiers have died in wars without their remains being identified...

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