Column of the Grande Armée
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Column of the Grande Armée (French - Colonne de la grande Armée or Colonne Napoléone) is a 53 metre high triumphal column (modelled on Trajan's Column and other triumphal columns in Rome) at Wimille, near Boulogne-sur-Mer, France.
[edit] History
It was initially intended to commemorate the successful invasion of England, but it now commemorates the first distribution of the Imperial Légion d'honneur at the "camp de Boulogne", by Napoleon I to the soldiers of the Army of England (which would become the Grande Armée) on 16 August 1804. (This scene is shown in a relief on the column's base, which is surrounded by railings decorated with the golden French Imperial eagle.) It was begun by the architect Éloi Labarre, with the first stone put in place on 18 Brumaire, year 13 (9 October 1804). The stone was sourced from local marble. The descriptions by C.P. Brard (1808) of the marbles of the Departement of the Pas-de-Calais includes the following quotation:
- "What gave [me] the chance to discover this marble was this column that the troops of the camp de Saint-Omer voted to be erected to the glory of the Emperor[1] at Boulogne, on the sea edge, after a great victory; then they searched to find the right materials and after several searches, Monsieur Piron discovered this marble"
In the 1808 edition he adds that Monsieur Piron then
- "rushed to give the name of Napoleon to his career and to the marble which it had led him to"[2]
The column reached 20 metres in 1814, but work stopped on Napoleon's fall. It restarted in 1819, with the platform on the top put in place in 1821 and a royal globe placed on top of that in 1823 (this globe was replaced in 1962 by a statue of Napoleon by Stenne). A statue of Napeoleon was placed on the top instead of the globe on August 15, 1841 by Napoleon III[3], and the Column was declared complete on 31 March 1905. It was struck by lightening in 2002, causing some of the stone at the top to explode, and so a restoration project is still in progress, making it presently impossible to climb the Column. There is a free museum in a pavilion to the right of its base.
[edit] References
- ^ In the 1821 edition, this phrase was changed to "their chief", or "leur chef", which was politically correct at that time.
- ^ Articles sur la géologie, les minéraux, les fossiles, les volcans
- ^ The Tragedy of St Helena
[edit] Source
- This page is a translation of Colonne de la grande Armée on French Wikipedia.
