MONUMENTS, PRESERVATION OF (Lat. monumen tum or monirnentum; from monere, to advise, bring to mind, remind; the German equivalent is Denkmal), literally, that which serves to keep alive the memory of a person, an event, or a period. The word is thus applied to a column, statue or building erected for that particular purpose; to all the various memorials which man throughout the ages has raised over the buried dead, the bar rows and cairns of prehistoric times, the representation of the living figure of the dead, brasses, busts, etc., or the varying forms, allegorical or otherwise, taken by the tombstones of the modern cemetery. In a wider sense "monument" is used of all survivals of prehistoric man—dolmens, menhirs, remains of lake dwellings, stone circles and the like, buildings large and small, with cities, castles, palaces, and examples of domestic architecture which have any interest, historic or artistic, as well as movable artistic or archaeological treasures either existing in private or public collec tions or newly discovered by excavation, etc. In a more restricted sense the word "monument" is also applied to a comprehensive treatise on any particular subject—such as the Monumenta typo graphica, or an historical collection such as the Monumenta Ger maniae historica. In the English law of conveyancing a "monu ment" is an object fixed in the soil, whether natural or artificial, and referred to in a document, and used as evidence for the delineation of boundaries or the situation of a particular plot of land, etc.
For a description of various kinds of monuments see such arti cles as ARCHAEOLOGY; STONE MONUMENTS, PRIMITIVE; EFFIGIES, MONUMENTAL ; SCULPTURE ; BARROW ; CROMLECH ; etc. ; many particular monuments such as Stonehenge, are treated under their respective names, or in the articles on the towns, etc. in which they stand ; while the preservation of monuments in various coun tries is dealt with under the different headings of those countries, e.g., EGYPT, GREECE.
The present article deals with the preservation, by government action, local or central, of the evidences and remains of past history and civilization; for reference to similar action extended to sites and places of natural beauty and interest, which are known in Germany as Naturdenkmiiler (natural monuments), consult Lileyers Lexicon, s v. In 1897 was issued a report (C. 8443, Mis
cell Rcports, 2) from British representatives abroad as to "the statutory provisions existing in foreign countries for the preser vation of historical buildings"; while in 1905 The Care of Ancient Monuments, by G. Baldwin Brown was published containing an ample bibliography for each country and giving many references to various periodicals in different languages : reference may also be made to The Care of Natural Monuments (Cambridge, 1909) by H. Conwentz, Prussian State Commissioner for the Care of Natural Monuments.
The chief question at issue is, how far does the national artistic or historic interest of a monument, in the widest sense of the word, justify the interference of the State with the right of a private owner, whether corporate body or individual, to do what he likes with his own? Nearly every European country has given a decided answer to this question, and it may be noticed, as show ing the extreme reluctance to State interference in Great Britain, that a clause, laying on an owner of a monument scheduled under the Monument Act of 1882 the obligation of offering it for pur chase to the State if he wished to destroy it, was struck out of that Act.
The main lines followed by legislation or regulation for the preservation of monuments may be briefly indicated. Central organizations of commissions and conservators, with a staff of architects, inspectors, and archaeological or artistic experts for consultation, are established. These may have wide legal powers of enforcing their decisions, or may act chiefly by advice or per suasion. The national treasures are catalogued and scheduled, and the value estimated in an exhaustive inventory, in many cases supplemented by local inventories, a course of procedure that has to a large extent prevented the continuance of the destruction of valuable monuments through ignorance of their value.