Obelisco a Los Mártires, National monument in Los Mártires district, Bogotá, Colombia.
The Obelisco a Los Mártires is a 17-metre stone obelisk standing in the centre of Plaza de Los Mártires, on Avenida Caracas between calles 10 and 11 in Bogotá's Los Mártires locality. Its walls carry the names of Colombia's independence martyrs. Architect Thomas Reed designed it and Mario Lambardi executed the work, inaugurated on 4 March 1880.
The monument was built to honor independence fighters who were executed between 1816 and 1819 during Spanish colonial rule. It was completed in 1880, decades after the events it commemorates.
The obelisk carries the names of independence martyrs such as Mercedes Abrego, Camilo Torres Tenorio and Francisco José de Caldas, shot by Pablo Morillo's Spanish army. The site was renamed Plaza de Los Mártires in 1850, when the city ordered a stone obelisk with those names inscribed at its center.
The obelisk stands in the middle of Plaza de Los Mártires, on Avenida Caracas between calles 10 and 11, in the Los Mártires locality of central Bogotá. The avenue splits the square in two, and the monument now sits on the western side next to the Basílica del Voto Nacional. It is outdoors and can be viewed at any hour while walking past.
The structure was moved multiple times as the city developed and new roads like Avenida Caracas were built around it. Its current location reflects how urban growth has shaped and reshaped the surrounding area over many decades.
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