The second funeral ceremony performed by Khrushchev during the 20th Congress of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union was even more pregnant with far-reaching political implications than the first one organized by him as a Chairman of the Funeral Arrangements Committee after the death of Stalin. The three speakers on the first occasion have in the meantime been relegated, one to the ground and two to the background. Iconolatry has been replaced by Stalinoclasm. Certain crimes of the Stalinist era, defined as the period between 1934 and 1953, have been admitted. However fascinating the personal aspects of the drama, the wider characteristics of the stage on which it is taking place are no less important.