King Felipe VI to Attend Rafael Altamira's Interment in El Campello

His Majesty King Felipe VI will attend the commemorative events in February for the interment of the writer Rafael Altamira and his wife Pilar Redondo at the cemetery in El Campello. The City Council thus fulfills the humanist's last wish to rest in his native land. The council initiated the exhumation and repatriation of both from the Federal District cemetery in Mexico to the Alicante municipality, and the Generalitat announced a grant of 60,000 euros to cover the expenses.

Finally, this February, the burial will take place in the pantheon that the City Council has prepared in his honor at the municipal cemetery. An event that His Majesty Felipe VI will also attend.

In El Campello, the final touches are being made to the pantheon that will house the writer's remains, within a monument dedicated to the humanist. The municipal cemetery staff has been responsible for erecting the dividing wall, excavating the grave where the funeral urns will be placed, and cementing the space.

The location chosen by the mayor, Juanjo Berenguer, and the Cemetery Councilor, Cristian Palomares, in agreement with the Altamira family, is situated in the central part of the first avenue leading to the cemetery, under a large cypress tree.

The remains of the illustrious figure, who was twice nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, were exhumed and repatriated last December from Mexico City, fulfilling the jurist, writer, and humanist's wish to rest in the municipality where he spent many happy moments, and where his parents (José Altamira Moreno and Rafaela Crevea i Cortés) and grandparents (Juan Altamira Malaver and Francisca Moreno Gaytano) are already buried.

The monument will be "simple in design," with dimensions of 2.2 meters deep, 2.2 meters wide, and 2.17 meters high. The materials will be travertine marble—a "versatile and elegant" natural stone formed in hot springs and limestone caves—and Baltic green granite.

It will have inscriptions engraved with the names of the six people who will rest underground—Rafael Altamira and Pilar Redondo Tejerina, in addition to the writer, jurist, and humanist's parents and grandparents, who have been resting in the Municipal Cemetery for decades.

Rafael Altamira, born in Alicante in 1866, died in Mexico in 1951, where he lived in exile with his family since 1944. He was a jurist, humanist, historian, and educator who worked in favor of dialogue, education, and democracy.

He was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize on two occasions, in 1933 and 1951, and was appointed one of the ten permanent judges of the Permanent Court of International Justice, which later became the International Court of Justice in The Hague, where he was re-elected for consecutive terms from 1921 to 1940.

In an interview with the newspaper 'El Día' on May 2, 1935, Rafael Altamira stated: "When I am removed from official life, I will retire to the corner of my most cherished loves, to El Campello."

Altamira's great-grandchildren have celebrated "with joy" his transfer to El Campello. "He always wanted to return to his land, but said that as long as the dictatorship regime was in place, he would not return," and so it happened, as he died in 1951 in Mexico. In an interview with the newspaper 'El Día' on May 2, 1935, Rafael Altamira stated: "When I am removed from official life, I will retire to the corner of my most cherished loves, to El Campello."

The repatriation of Rafael Altamira and Pilar Redondo's remains to El Campello will also serve to "raise awareness of him," as many institutions have contacted the family to "hold tributes when he arrives"—one of them already underway with the construction of the Rafael Altamira City of Justice in Alicante—and to highlight the figure of the great jurist, humanist, historian, educator, and writer who worked in favor of dialogue, education, and democracy.