Gavin Stamp

The Thiepval Memorial to the Missing is the principal, tangible expression of Britain's defining experience in the Great War—the first day of the Battle of the Somme. It bears the names of 73,000 soldiers whose bodies were never found at the end of that bloody and futile campaign. Visited by tens of thousands of tourists, it holds notable elements of the 20th century while casting a shadow into the future, extending beyond the dead of the Holocaust to the "disappeared" of South America and Tianenmen. A brilliant study to arguably the finest structure erected by any British architect in the 20th century, the origin of this marvel is revealed here in the context of commemorating the fallen, considering its historical significance, and touching on its resonances today.

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