During the long dictatorship of Porfirio Díaz, from 1876 to 1911, Esposito asserts that Mexico gained both national pride and its international personality due to Diaz's reliance on memorialism, death and ceremony. Porfirian state constructed dozens of national monuments, performed countless commemorations, and held 110 state funerals. These magisterial displays of state power created an aura of legitimacy that helped the eight term dictator stay in power.