Content note: Photograph of a 1937 Nationalist parade with mass arm-raised salutes and portraits of Franco. This object is shown as it was published. Why
Franco portraits carried through Salamanca's Plaza Mayor to celebrate the fall of Gijón, 1937
Photograph of a parade in the Plaza Mayor of Salamanca marking the Nationalist capture of Gijón: uniformed marchers carry five identical half-tone portraits of Franco on poles, flanked by banners, while crowds at the sides and in the foreground raise their arms in salute. The tell: identical portraits and massed arm-raising turn a military victory into a ritual of personal allegiance, with the size of the crowd displayed as part of the message.
- Date
- 1937
- Period
- Interwar
- Made by
- Nationalist (Francoist) side: military and party units parading in Salamanca; photographer not stated
- Country
- Spain
- Medium
- Photograph
- Issuer type
- Mixed
- Regime
- Nationalist Spain
- Leader
- Francisco Franco
- Audience
- Domestic public
- Themes
- War and the military, Home front
- Event
- Spanish Civil War
- Techniques
- Identity fusionBandwagon
- Source
- Identified Openly sourced: the speaker is who they say they are
- Source
- Wikimedia Commons (from Biblioteca Virtual de Defensa, Spanish Ministry of Defence, MUE-120692), retrieved October 2, 2026
- Rights
- CC0 1.0 (Biblioteca Virtual de Defensa 'Derechos de Autor' statement, as recorded on the Wikimedia Commons file page)
Author unknown. Biblioteca Virtual de Defensa (Spanish Ministry of Defence), via Wikimedia Commons.
Text on the object
No legible printed text; the photograph was checked and the portraits and banners carry no readable words.
Banners at the right and background are visible but carry no legible lettering at this resolution.
