The monument "Flame of the Revolution“ was dedicated on October 23, 1996 at Lajos Kossuth Square in the centre of Budapest, during the official ceremonies commemorating the 40th anniversary of the rebellion. It was financed with governmental support and public donations. The four-metre tall, obliskoid prism is covered with black granite plates. At its sides, the Kossuth coat-of-arms can be seen. In the upper region, a gas-powered eternal flame is located, situated precisely at the mid-centre of the surface specially designed with irregular and fractured lines. The monument designer is the renowned Hungarian sculptress Mária Lugossy. The Square located in front of the Parliament Building in Budapest was named after the Hungarian freedom fighter from 1848, Lajos Kossuth, and it was also one of the central scenes of the 1956 Revolution. Here, during the evening of October 23, 1956, several hundred-thousand people had assembled, after large-scale demonstrations had already been taking place throughout the city since the afternoon of the same day. The assembled masses awaited a speech from, above all, Imre Nagy. However, Nagy was at first hesitant to address the crowd. Instead, a speech from the Interior Minister, Ernő Gerő was presented, who condemned the rallies of the day. As Nagy finally appeared in a window near the main entrance of the Parliament Building at around 9 p.m., he generally spoke out for a continuation of the reforms he had begun in 1953, without directly addressing the demands raised by the demonstrators during the course of the day. In spite of this fact, his speech possessed great symbolic power. On the morning of October 24, 1956, Soviet troops advanced into Budapest and also occupied Lajos Kossuth Square. In order to protect the surrounding governmental and party buildings, units from the Red Army and the Hungarian Secret Service were brought into position. The presence of these forces caused a fateful occurrence the morning of the following day, which would go down in the history of the Revolution as „Bloody Thursday“. After hundreds of thousands of demonstrators had gathered before the Parliament Building once again, and for reasons still not entirely clarified to the present day, indiscriminate shooting ensued between insurgents, Hungarian and Soviet security forces, during which hundreds of people were killed.