A salvo is a loud shot of gunpowder.
Just like a chime is a metallic sound.
But the context and the social convention is everything - the monarchy knows a lot about that - and when this Friday the first dry and resounding sound of the cannon sounded, Gibraltar stopped in awe.
The same noise that, a few months ago, tasted like a holiday for the 70th anniversary of Elizabeth II's jubilee, this noon had a gloomy, mourning aftertaste.
By the time those 96 salvos —one for each year of life, one of the longest remembered around here— had marked the daily life of the Rock, in its streets there was no longer a trace of the white and red banners that festooned the eve of the Gibraltarian National Day that was celebrated on Saturday and whose party has been suspended.
Quite a paradox
“He was the greatest thing in Gibraltar, a very loved person here.
He was our
legend
”, manages to say Nabila Charif, 34 years old, stationed in the queue of the book of condolences that the Government of Gibraltar has placed in the lobby of the Convent, the headquarters building of the governor.
Like her, dozens of people have fulfilled one of the few visible rituals with which the Rock shows its mourning and which has been initiated by the territory's chief minister, Fabian Picardo, with a heartfelt signature: "We were your Rock and you were the our".
The procession goes inside a city with flags at half-staff and in which the name of Isabel II was intertwined in every street conversation.
“Her loss of her I have felt as if she were part of my family.
The queen symbolizes England for us ”, explains Samuel Benzaquen, a 70-year-old Sephardic Jew, behind the glass of his antiquarian and money exchange house,
More information
Last hour of the death of Elizabeth II
Bezaquen was just 12 years old when Isabel II traveled to Gibraltar in 1954, the only time she did so.
"I don't remember anything about that day," confesses the Gibraltarian, but he does know well the consequences that, in the long run, that ended up having for him: "Thanks to his visit I learned Russian because, with everything that came after, here only Russian whalers came and the business was only with them”.
The money changer refers to the traumatic closure of the border decreed by the Spanish Francoist government in 1969, in an escalation of hostilities that began with the withdrawal of the consul in Gibraltar shortly before that trip in 1954. The crisis would not culminate until 1982, the year in which the one that the passage reopened.
That slam, the calamities that Gibraltar suffered at the beginning of that period and the development of its national autonomy as a British territory dependent on the English crown -there are its four Constitutions- coincides with the reign of Elizabeth II.
“She has been a central focus in Gibraltar.
Her visit was important geopolitically, but because of the consequences it had, ”says Jennifer Ballantine Perera, historian and director of the Garrison Library.
The “loyalty” that Gibraltar already felt for her royal family grew, according to Ballantine, in this context, increased by her longevity —three generations of llanitos contemplate her— and her image as a reference regardless of political ups and downs.
“She is family, but we are not part of the Spanish family,
Despite the fact that they are determined to reaffirm their identity as a unique people —or perhaps, thanks to it—, Gibraltar has never stopped proudly exhibiting that of being a multicultural city.
Elizabeth II herself praised him in this way when, at her platinum jubilee, she defined her as "proud of her rich history as well as dynamic and with a vision of the future", according to a written message released today by the Government of the Crag.
It is a hodgepodge of 33,690 inhabitants with English, Spanish or Italian surnames.
The “multiconfessionalism” that the monarch also spoke about in that message has been felt this Friday at her farewell.
She, head of the Anglican Church, has been dismissed today by Catholics, Jews or Muslims from the Rock.
In the Catholic Cathedral —the majority religion in the city— a small catafalque with a black rain cape, a cross and four candles shines on the main altar.
“There are more people than usual today.
I come every day, but today I have come to pray for her.
It was an example of stability for her entire town, ”explains Vivian Montegrifo, shortly after leaving the first mass celebrated in her honor.
The bells of the temple have tolled all morning, until that sound has mixed with the distant echo of the first of the 96 cannon salvos.
Impossible to ignore that the Rock is in mourning.
Although Gibraltarians, tourists and cross-border workers continue to come and go through the bustling Main Street (Main Street), today just as busy but much less cheerful than usual.
There are still more than nine days of mourning, with the bittersweet feeling of having to say goodbye to his beloved Elizabeth II and, at the same time, celebrate the arrival of Carlos III, who is also supposed to have a visit after his coronation, just as he did his mother in 1954. "All the kings throughout history have done it, so I think Charles will too," summarizes Ballantine.
What happens after that - if it happens at all -
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