The Cementerio de Disidentes (Dissidents Cemetery) in Valparaiso, Chile is located on the Cerro Panteón (Pantheon Hill) one of the city’s 42 hills. The site holds the three oldest cemeteries in the city: Cemeteries No. 1 and No. 2 and the Cemetery of Dissidents which lies in front of Cemetery No. 1 and next to Cerro Carcel (Prison Hill), the site of the former prison. The cemetery was created in 1825 to house the remains of residents whose faith differed from the official religion of the State, represented by the Catholic Church and exclusively Catholic until 1883. La plaza memorial del inmigrante (Immigrant’s Memorial Square) was inaugurated within the cemetery in 2011. The ceremony was attended by consular representatives, delegations from the British and German Schools and the Scuola Italiana; and members of the Italian,British, German , American, French , Spanish , Italian , Arabic , and Greek authorities, amongst others.

The insciptions pictured in image 3, reading from the top of the image, are as follows:

 

En memoria de los inmigrantes de Valparaiso.

 

‘Ellos llegaron del mar…

Como olas frescas y aires nuevos…

A los inmigrantes que se quedaron,

Al inmigrante pasajero

Y también a los inmigrantes abandonados.

Inmigrante tu impronta

Vive en nuestros días.

Valparaiso

La tierra puerto de los inmigrantes’.

 

 

And…

 

‘A los hombres y mujeres que llegaron a esta tierra

Con espíritu aventurero de corazones libres

Y grandes sueños.

 

A aquellos que echaron raíces, formaron familia

Y hoy son parte de nuestra patria.

 

A aquellos que yacen aquí pero no tuvieron descendencia

Y sus sepulturas fueron abandonadas.

 

A todos ellos que dejaron huella y les debemos

Una parte de lo que somos, a todos quienes adoraban

Y cantaban el mismo dios, a todos aquellos

Que con valentía y coraje forjaron las bases

De muchas familias que hoy son parte

De nuestra sociedad’.

 

Attribution: Image 1:‘Cementerio de disidentes’ by Felipe Silva Bascuñan is licensed under CC BY 3.0.; Images 2 and 3, with thanks to Leonardo Carrera Airola.