Types of Monuments

（1） Intentional Monument
In 1903, Alois Riegl, a renowned Austrian art historian and one of the important figures in the history of architectural heritage preservation, referred to such monuments as "intentional monuments" in his famous "Modern Monument Worship: Its Origin and Development".
All kinds of statues, altars, manidui, temples, churches, temples, etc., which were originally built as specific worship objects and places, are also intended monuments, that is, Signedness monuments of "inner saints and outer bodies". Its original construction significance and the object people want to commemorate and worship are specific "inner saints", and the "outer body" and "outer body" composed of material materials are only Signedness tools, carriers and media of "inner saints", which are not important in themselves. Even if people renovate and reconstruct the body of this monument in completely different materials or forms for the original or changed commemoration and worship purposes, its Signedness meaning of inner sacredness remains unchanged, even more powerful. For example, the St. Peter's Cathedral in Rome was built primarily to showcase the burial place of St. Peter, to celebrate his achievements, the glory of the Heavenly Kingdom, and the authority of the Holy See. The cathedral itself is only an external structure, not a monument for commemoration. Therefore, when people in the Renaissance felt that the old St. Peter's Cathedral built in the fourth century could no longer strongly express this Signedness meaning of inner sainthood, they had no pity to demolish the old St. Peter's Cathedral that had existed for more than a thousand years, and rebuilt the present St. Peter's Cathedral in a completely different scale, form and style.
In fact, before the end of the 18th century, before the emergence of modern awareness of architectural heritage protection, people had always regarded intentionally designed monuments as symbols for something unrelated to their own body, and treated them according to specific symbolic meanings. And even today, this is still the case for many monuments that still have strong symbolic meanings, such as the continuous reshaping of the golden body of deities in temples. [4]
（2） An unintentional monument
Liger believes that in modern times, people mainly value and protect unintentional monuments, which were not originally built for specific commemorative purposes but later acquired a certain commemorative significance as heritage objects. For example, the Great Wall and various city walls, which used to be only practical Fortification, are now of strong commemorative significance, similar to historical villages, historical blocks, and historical towns. However, the unintentional monument is also a long-standing heritage concept. In late ancient Rome, people had already regarded the previously built aqueducts as symbols and monuments of the empire's former glory. The Yueyang Tower in Hunan was originally just a city tower in a general sense. Thanks to the presence of numerous literati and poets, such as Fan Zhongyan, and their poems, it had a commemorative significance for the generation of talent long ago. Until today, people still naturally consider the buildings where a famous person was born, lived, or visited, as well as the place where an important historical event occurred, as commemorative buildings or commemorative sites. Monumental buildings such as Nieer's Former Residence in Kunming are still mainly regarded as Signedness monuments of "inner sainthood and outer body". Their core meaning in people's minds is not the body of the building, but a kind of other Signedness signs that have nothing to do with it. Therefore, they will be drastically changed due to better worship and memorial reasons.
In 1790, French scholar Auban Louis Mirin introduced a new term: a monument of historical significance, now commonly referred to as a historical monument. This marks the shift of the core protected objects in the architectural heritage community since the end of the 18th century from the inner and outer monuments, which are intentionally or unintentionally unrelated to the material substance, to the inner and outer monuments that are fundamentally different from the past. The material noumenon of the latter, as evidence for the recognition of various historical facts in the past, has transformed all its meanings and values into a new inner saint, from an external entity unrelated to the inner saint to an inseparable entity, becoming the core meaning and value of the heritage. From then on, when the protection community talks about monuments, it usually only refers to the sacred historical monuments within the body, that is, architectural relics reflect various historical facts of the past due to their material form, material technology, and methods. Today's vast majority of Material culture heritage treatment principles are essentially based on this new understanding of historical monuments. The significance of this monument is not only formed by the day after tomorrow, but also is a monument of unintentional behavior as mentioned by Leger. Moreover, because its internal saintliness only comes from the material noumenon, the protection of the material noumenon, contrary to the past, has become the most important thing in heritage protection.
For this type of historical monument, The definition of Article 1 of the Venetian Charter is: "The concept of historical monuments includes not only individual architectural works, but also urban or rural environments from which people can discover a unique civilization, meaningful development, or witness to historical events. This concept applies not only to outstanding works of art, but also to works that were not important in the past but gained cultural significance over time Moreover, it is worth noting that this type of historical monument also includes certain heritage objects that have been extended by the World Heritage Convention, such as "monumental sculptures and paintings" with historical, artistic or scientific value, "elements or structures with archaeological properties, inscriptions, residential caves, etc.
Although people may think that monuments are just a single concept with limited spatial scale and scope, the concept of historical monuments, or historical monuments, essentially encompasses all immovable heritage with the significance of historical monuments. It not only includes individual buildings, including towns and villages, but also applies to gardens and cultural landscapes discussed later. All the concepts of immovable Material culture heritage described later, classified by specific types, regardless of the size of the objects involved, whether created at one time or accumulated in succession, regardless of how diverse and complex the constituent elements are, in essence, historical monuments, and therefore are protected accordingly. In order to conform to the understanding habits of the Chinese people, the term "historic site" is still used in the later text, but unless otherwise specified, it refers to monuments or monumental historical sites.