The Body in Lenin’s Tomb

Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, known to history as Lenin, died on January 21, 1924, exactly 50 years ago, at the age of 54. But he has not yet been buried, except perhaps piecemeal. What is purported to be his body is on permanent display in a severely angular porphyry mausoleum on Moscow’s Red Square.

In the half-century, millions of Soviet citizens and foreign visitors have descended into the crypt and filed by the catafalque under its peaked glass cover for hasty glimpses in subdued indirect lighting. Every day there are still long queues waiting their turn to enter the shrine. Peasant women often cross themselves. How many pilgrims come to worship, to pay patriotic homage, or merely out of curiosity, is anyone’s guess. They see only the head and hands, taking for granted that there is a body under the velvet drape and the flag of the Paris Commune of 1871 now covering the presumptive torso and legs. At least twice a year, on November 7, birth of the Bolshevik regime, and on May 1, a handful of the Kremlin oligarchs and sometimes prestigious foreign guests review massive parades from a balustrade near the top of the tomb.

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Eugene Lyons

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Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov, known to history as Lenin, died on January 21, 1924, exactly 50 years ago, at the age of 54. But he has not yet been buried, except perhaps piecemeal. What is purported to be his body is on permanent display in a severely angular porphyry mausoleum on Moscow’s Red Square.

In the half-century, millions of Soviet citizens and foreign visitors have descended into the crypt and filed by the catafalque under its peaked glass cover for hasty glimpses in subdued indirect lighting. Every day there are still long queues waiting their turn to enter the shrine. Peasant women often cross themselves. How many pilgrims come to worship, to pay patriotic homage, or merely out of curiosity, is anyone’s guess. They see only the head and hands, taking for granted that there is a body under the velvet drape and the flag of the Paris Commune of 1871 now covering the presumptive torso and legs. At least twice a year, on November 7, birth of the Bolshevik regime, and on May 1, a handful of the Kremlin oligarchs and sometimes prestigious foreign guests review massive parades from a balustrade near the top of the tomb.