Place de la Bastille, a place closely linked to the history of Paris, now a bustling crossroads liven up the year by its narrow streets full of bar and its modern opera.
But at the center it remains an unknown monument, dedicated to the memory of the 1830 revolution : the July Column.
Landmark of the Eastern Paris with its 52 meters high, the July Column was erected on the Place de la Bastille between 1835 and 1840, replacing various monuments commemorating the 1789 revolution, such as the Fountain of Regeneration.
Proposed in 1792, it will be raised in 1833, after a decree of Louis Philippe. The project was to raise a column in honor of the revolutionaries dead during the Three Glorious, also called the July Revolution.
The July Column
Inaugurated in 1840, the July Column is the work of Alavoine and Ducs architects. Remembering the dead fighters during the days of 27, 28 and 29 July 1830 – revolution that replaced the Second Restoration by the July Monarchy – the remains of the martyrs who fell during the fighting were placed inside a burial, above which rises that column. The names of men buried are engraved around the monument.
But in the rush, mummies brought back during Napoleon’s Egyptian campaign, and which were buried with some victims of the 1830 revolution, had been taken and also placed in the crypt. So are buried there revolutionaries, but also Egyptian mummies!
