Transnationalizing fascist martyrs: an entangled history of the memorialization of Ion Moţa and Vasile Marin in Spain and Romania, 1937–41

Abstract This article analyses the memorialization of Ion Moţa and Vasile Marin, two Romanian Legionary movement volunteers who died while fighting for Franco in the Spanish Civil War, as an entangled history of Romanian and Spanish fascisms. The commemoration practices and narratives recounted in t...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:	Historical research : the bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research 2022-05, Vol.95 (268), p.264-286
Main Author:	Zavatti, Francesco
Format:	Article
Language:	eng
Subjects:	Annat forskningsområde Baltic and East European studies Historical Studies Historiska studier Other research area Östersjö- och Östeuropaforskning
Online Access:	Get full text
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Summary:	Abstract This article analyses the memorialization of Ion Moţa and Vasile Marin, two Romanian Legionary movement volunteers who died while fighting for Franco in the Spanish Civil War, as an entangled history of Romanian and Spanish fascisms. The commemoration practices and narratives recounted in the Spanish and Romanian newspapers and archival sources from the period 1937–41 show that commemorating foreign ideological peers and appropriating symbolic elements of foreign fascisms in order to memorialize fallen comrades served as resources for legitimizing the struggle against domestic competitors. Although the totalitarian ambitions of Spanish and Romanian fascists remained unfulfilled, the Spanish-Romanian entanglement contributed to consolidating Moţa and Marin as martyrs of transnational fascism.
ISSN:	0950-3471 1468-2281 1468-2281