DEMOLISHING THE PROTECTIVE WALL ANNOUNCES HEGEMONY

 

YOUNG LOUIS XIV'S VICTORIES LED HIM TO DEMOLISH THE RAMPART AND BUILD AN ARC OF TRIUMPH ON THE SITE OFTHE SAINT-DENIS GATE

(VICTORIES 1672, DESTRUCTION OF RAMPART AND BUILDING OF ARC, 1674)

It hovered over the trade and pilgrimage route that led to the royal graves: 

Carolyn Ristau

Its model, the Arc of Constantine in Rome...  

Its heir, the Manhattan Bridge Walkway in New York.

Zoom

# # #

The protective walls were universal:  

The Second Fall of Constantinople, by Tintoretto, towards 1600 / zoom

Constantinople 

Rome

  By Apollinary Vasnetsov, 1922 / zoom

Moscow toward 1350

From the Niger to the Gulf of Guinée by Louis Gustave Binger, 1892 / zoom

Sikasso (Mali), end 19th century

Zoom

Vienna toward 1690

   Getty Images/Vernon Lewis Gallery/Stocktrek Images

New Orleans in 1812

 Anonymous engraving / zoom

Marrakech toward 1840

 Destroying the ramparts meant that 

attacking Paris was unthinkable,

trumpeting French domination.

*    *    *

Next,

Urban effects of tearing down the rampart