National Anthem of Chile

Music piece by:
Eusebio Lillo and Ramón Carnicer
Testimony by:
anonymous
Experience in:
Cárcel de Valdivia / Cárcel de Isla Teja, September 1973

I was detained in Panguipulli on 24 September 1973, along with 17 other young people. I was a high school student. I was also working at the forestry and logging company of Huilo Huilo, which had been taken over by the working class.

We were tortured for two or three days at the police station of Panguipulli. They left me unconscious.

Then they took us to a police station in Valdivia. In the stables they took our names and addresses, and then sent us to the prison on Teja Island.

In the prison, one of the prisoners spent night and day in a dungeon. Despite being in solitary confinement, he would open his window and sing the National Anthem at full blast.

We all went outside to have a look, even the guards. The prisoner didn’t sing the verse about the brave soldiers, out of protest I imagine. He sang for about four days. After that, we heard nothing more about him.


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Published on: 13 January 2018


Pure, Chile, is your blue sky
pure breezes cross over you too
and your field of embroidered flowers
is the happy copy of Eden.

Majestic is the white mountain
that the Lord gave you for bulwark
and that sea that serenely bathes you
promises the splendour to come.

[Your names, courageous soldiers
who have been the pillar of Chile
are engraved on our breasts
our children will know it too.]The Pinochet regime reinstated this stanza, which had previously been in disuse for a long time. It was removed again when democracy was restored in 1990.

Sweet Fatherland, receive the vows
which Chileans swore on your altar.
May you be the tomb of the free
or their refuge against oppression.




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