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Concept
Place de la Concorde
Summary
The Place de la Concorde (plas də la kɔ̃kɔʁd; Concord Square) is one of the major public squares in Paris, France. Measuring in area, it is the largest square in the French capital. It is located in the city's eighth arrondissement, at the eastern end of the Champs-Élysées.
It was the site of many notable public executions, including those of King Louis XVI, Marie Antoinette and Maximilien Robespierre in the course of the French Revolution, during which the square was temporarily renamed Place de la Révolution. It received its current name in 1795 as a gesture of reconciliation in the later years of the revolution.
The square was originally designed to be the site of an equestrian statue of King Louis XV, commissioned in 1748 by the merchants of Paris, to celebrate the recovery of King Louis XV from a serious illness. The site chosen for the statue was the large esplanade, or space between the revolving gate the Tuileries Gardens and the Cour-la-Reine, a popular lane for horseback riding at the edge of the city. At the time, the Concorde bridge and the Rue de Rivoli did not exist, and the Rue Royale was a muddy lane that descended down to a marsh beside the Seine.
The architect Ange-Jacques Gabriel made a plan for the site and the square was finished by 1772. It was in the form of an octagon, bordered by a sort of moat twenty meters wide, crossed by stone bridges, and surrounded by a stone balustrade. At the eight corners Gabriel placed stone stairways to descend into the place, which was divided into flowerbeds. In the center of the gardens was the pedestal on which the statue stood. The statue, by Bouchardon, depicted the King on horseback as the victor of the Battle of Fontenoy, dressed as a Roman general, with a laurel wreath on his head. On the four corners of the pedestal, designed by Jean Chalgrin, are bronze statues by Jean-Baptiste Pigalle, depicting the virtues of great monarchs; Force, Justice, Prudence, and Peace.
The statue was dedicated on 20 June 1763, but by this time the King had lost much of his popularity.
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