A MURAL dating back to the Spanish Civil War featuring a soldier hammering the heads of dictators Franco, Hitler, and Mussolini on a dragon has been found hidden by whitewash in a factory.
The Centre for Contestano Studies(CEC) stumbled on the rarity when they went to recover some industrial archaeology from the premises in Cocentaina(Alicante province).
CEC president, Pere Ferrer, said: “We are speechless as a mural of this grandeur is not normal.”
SOME OF THE UNCOVERED SLOGANS
“Practically no similar example has been preserved anywhere in Spain and this might be the only such mural,” he added.
Measuring six by three metres, it features slogans from the Republican anti-Franco movement during the war between 1936 and 1939.
The proclamations include ‘Fear the duty and fear Spain, sacrifice’ and ‘Courage, courage children of Spain that the spirit will not give the triumph’.
The centrepiece is the graphic image of a shirtless soldier beating the heads of the three dictators on the dragon.
The work was done by soldiers billeted during the war at Cocentaina who were members of Alicante’s the 6th Rearguard Battalion of Alicante.
Nobody knew of the mural’s existence as it had been covered by whitewash either by the Republicans or Francoist authorities.
Cocentaina’s Democratic Memory councillor, Irene Barrachina, said: “We are delighted with this finding and we will do everything in our power to conserve the mural and collaborate in its study.”
