Karl Marx Original Grave

Marx moved to London as a political exile in June 1849. Living originally in Soho, he moved in 1875 to Maitland Park Road, in the north London area of Belsize Park, and this remained his home until his death in 1883. During this period, Marx wrote some of his most notable works, including The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Napoleon and Das Kapital. Throughout his time in London, Marx lived in financially straitened circumstances and was heavily reliant on the support of his friend and collaborator Friedrich Engels. Marx died on the afternoon of 14 March 1883 from a combination of bronchitis and pleurisy, exacerbated by an abscess on his lung. He was buried on the following Saturday, at…

for the tomb, displayed at the Henry Moore Institute in Leeds]] The tomb was designed by Laurence Bradshaw, an artist, sculptor and a member of the Communist Party since the 1930s. On obtaining the commission, Bradshaw wrote that the challenge was to create, "not a monument to a man only but to a great mind and a great philosopher". The tomb comprises a large bronze bust of Marx's head and shoulders, set on a marble plinth. Pevsner, which records the pedestal as being constructed "of granite", describes the head as "colossal". Bradshaw wrote that he wanted the bust to convey the "dynamic force of [Marx's] intellect" and for it to appear at eye-level rather than "towering over the people".…