THE PLACES* CREATED TO ASSEMBLE TROOPS FOLLOW THE ROYAL MODEL
*As there is no translation for a design that is specific to France, I put it in italics or say "space" or "void."
Adapted from Mappy
Haussmann enlarges places of Bastille, République and Nation, builds straight, wide streets that converge on them and demands homogenous architecture. The republican government adds symbols in the center, replacing those of the equestrian king.
Drone shot / zoom
Place des Vosges, the first royal place and model for all others of importance.
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Place de la Bastille
- Louis XVI prepared to tear down the Bastille and substitute a royal place...
Paris City Hall / zoom (please scroll down)
Project of a royal place for Louis XVI on the site of the Bastille, conceived by the l’architecte Maillet in 1784
- ...but the prison was torn down immediately after its fall.
- Napoleon planned an elephant* for the void and 20 years later Louis-Philippe celebrated the insurrection that had brought him to power by the July Column.
*To associate his first victories, in Italy, with Hannibal crossing the Alpes.
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Place de la République
- Originally the space in front of a porte (gate) in the 14th-century rampart:
Adapted from the Turgot map, 1735
- Haussmann enlarged it, created long, straight streets that ran toward it and replaced the disparait houses with the similar buildings that characterize the torn-down areas generally.
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Watercolor by N. Pelocq / zoom |
In 1848
As Haussmann changed it, the statue excepted.
- He left the Fontaine des Lions. Symbols of force and majesty, lions suited the image of the Second Empire.
By Charles Fichot / zoom
Before 1880 when the fountain was transferred to the 12th district, where one can still admire it.
- The giant statue, Homage to the Republic, took the fountain's place (in 1883).
Ministry of Culture (cropped) / zoom
When the Second Empire imploded (in 1870) the Third Republic shakily appeared. The statue was made when an election showed it definitive (in 1879).
- The most important Parisian barracks is next to the place, to have soldiers on hand in case of another insurrection (as the preceding page explains).
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Place de la Nation's far eastern location is the reason why...
- Louis XIV's royal entry took shape there.
- It became the gate in a city wall built to tax goods coming into the city. Taverns sprang up just outside the wall, where wine was cheaper, and to the counter-culture where the cancan began.
The statues symbolized Justice and Prosperity. The street behind them leads to Paris and is a symbol of royalty, the new wall being built a few years before the Revolution. The tax it imposed added to the outbreaks that came just before taking the Bastille.
- It was the site of the first popular celebration of the Revolution, in avril 1792. Since the government was run by wealthy deputies who feared the street, such an event had to take place on an outskirt.
On April 15 1792, the first celebration of Liberty when 40 soldiers were torn away from they galleys of Brest. / zoom
- The guillotine was moved there from the center (in 1794), when Parisians stopped favoring the Terror.
Zoom
Exécution des Martyrs of Compiègne à la place du Trône-Renversé, le 17 juillet, 1794
Notice the columns.
The best-known execution is that of 14 Carmelite nuns, who sang as they mounted the scaffold one by one, the abbess last, still singing.
- Louis-Philippe (1830-1848) tried to reinforce the monarchy by placing the most celebrated medieval kings (Philippe le Bel and Louis IX / Saint Louis) on top of the columns. He was overthrown regardless, but the statues remain.
Detour: that space now
- The Republic — Marianne, its symbol, with one bared breast following Delacroix — stands on a chariot pulled by lions, which Liberty guides and Work, Justice and Abundance surround.
Sculpture Jules Dalou, photo Oanh Nguyen Thuy
Plaster statue for the centennial of the Revolution in 1889, final version in bronze, 1899
- Greening's transformation (since 2019):
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The immense spaces,
built to assemble troops in case of another revolt,
recall national grandeur and buttress current rule
by taking up the royal archetype,
particularly symbol at the center.
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