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62-627: Together with the two triumphal arches, the Porte Saint-Denis (1672) and Porte Saint-Martin (1674), and echoing the Hall of Mirrors in the Palace of Versailles (decorated 1680–1684), the Victory Monument marked the high point of public exaltation of Louis XIV's military glory and European dominance in the urban landscape of Paris, before the setbacks and exhaustion that would come later in his reign with

124-467: A capital, except for papal envoys who retained senior status. This convention remained in usage until 1961, when it was superseded by the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations . The latter still allows the host state to grant seniority of precedence to the nuncio over others of ambassadorial rank accredited to the same country, and may grant the deanship of that country's diplomatic corps to

186-526: A globe and holding a laurel wreath above his head. The statue was more than four meters high, and the entire monument's total height was about 12 meters. The monument included numerous celebratory inscriptions, including a main dedicace in Latin on the front which read Viro Immortali ("To the Immortal Man"), an unambiguous reference to Louis. Each of the four prisoners simultaneously evoked an age of life and

248-628: A matter of principle only emerged gradually, even though an early case was the mutual recognition of equal rank between France and England in the mid-16th century. The Kings of France, who reigned over Europe's most populous country, were continuously frustrated by the primacy of the Emperors, but were never able to question it, even though they did object to the fact that the King of the Romans would similarly outrank them. The quest for higher status partly explains why

310-635: A role, for example when France accepted Sweden's claim of status equality at the Peace of Westphalia . In addition, the emergence as European powers of the Ottoman Empire in the 15th and 16th centuries, and of the Tsardom of Russia in the 17th and 18th centuries, created additional conflicts of precedence. After the fall of Constantinople in 1453, the Ottoman Sultans viewed themselves as rightful successors of

372-468: A specific emotion, and was also widely understood to refer to a vanquished nation: youth / hope / Spain ; adulthood / rebellion / Holland ; middle age / grief / Brandenburg ; and old age / despondency / the Holy Roman Empire . The link with European states, however, was not made entirely explicit. Three of the figures were easy to identify as they represented France's main adversaries of the time, but

434-679: Is a Parisian monument located in the 10th arrondissement , at the site of one of the gates of the Wall of Charles V , one of Paris's former city walls . It is located at the crossing of the Rue Saint-Denis continued by the Rue du Faubourg Saint-Denis , with the Boulevard de Bonne-Nouvelle and the Boulevard Saint-Denis. The Porte Saint-Denis was originally a gateway through the Wall of Charles V that

496-582: The Place de Nos Conquêtes , was sharply toned down in 1699 to a more domestically-focused Place Louis-le-Grand . That year, Louis XIV's senior official Louis Phélypeaux, comte de Pontchartrain specifically referred in a letter to the Académie des Inscriptions to the "reliefs, slaves, and inscriptions of the statue of the Place des Victoires" as the example not to follow while aiming at something "wise and reasonable" for

558-645: The Battle of Augusta ); 12. Battle of Palermo , 1676; 13. Storming of Valenciennes , 1677; 14. Battle of Cassel , 1677; 15. Takeover of Cambrai , 1677; 16. Dutch fleet burnt at Tobago in America, 1676 (actually 1677); 17. Ghent taken in 1676; 18. Swedes reestablished in Germany, 1679 (by the Treaty of Fontainebleau ); 19. [?] and Strasbourg returned on the same day, 1681 (during the War of

620-502: The Consulate . Napoleon then commissioned a bronze heroic statue of General Louis Desaix which was produced by Claude Dejoux and inaugurated in 1810. The nude sculpture was widely disliked and removed in 1814 before Napoleon's fall. Its metal was used for the new Equestrian statue of Henry IV by François-Frédéric Lemot , inaugurated on the Pont Neuf in 1818. A more permanent replacement

682-503: The Edict of Fontainebleau of 1685 that revoked the Edict of Nantes of 1598 and led to the expulsion of France's Protestants or Huguenots ; and The Abolition of Duels , referring to Louis's various initiatives starting in 1662 and especially his ordinance of 1679 by which he attempted to put an end to duels as a form of private justice in the French nobility. Desjardins's other two medallions, on

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744-655: The Franco-Dutch War . Work began in 1672 and was paid for by the city of Paris . A monument defining the official art of its epoque, the Porte Saint-Denis provided the subject of the engraved frontispiece to Blondel's influential Cours d'architecture , 1698. It was restored in 1988. The Porte Saint-Denis was the first of four triumphal arches to be built in Paris. The three others are the Arc de Triomphe du Carrousel (1806–1808),

806-613: The Great Northern War transformed it into a fully-fledged European power. The Tsar's imperial dignity was recognized in 1721 by the Kingdom of Prussia and the Dutch Republic ; 1723 by Sweden and Saxony ; 1741 by the Ottoman Empire ; 1742 by Great Britain ; 1745 by the Holy Roman Empire , France and Spain ; and 1764 by Poland . In 1760, Sebastião José de Carvalho e Melo, 1st Marquis of Pombal , attempted to definitely resolve

868-712: The Investiture Controversy . For Catholic rulers, the Pope and his court in Rome were the ultimate arbiters of precedence and rank. The legacy survives to this day with the senior rank of the Nuncio in the diplomatic corps of many countries. By contrast, the pope's primacy was contested by non-Catholic powers, including the Byzantine emperor especially at the Council of Ferrara in 1438, where

930-483: The Kingdom of Allada ), of Morocco and Fez in 1682 ( Mohammad Temim , on behalf of Ismail Ibn Sharif ), of Siam in 1684 (led by Bénigne Vachet  [ fr ] , preceding the grander embassy of 1686 ), and of Algiers in 1683 (Djiafar-Aga-Effendi, during the French-Algerian War ). The monument was generally well received on esthetic grounds and was widely considered Desjardins's major masterpiece. In

992-472: The Louvre Palace . On 10 August 1792, during that day's insurrection , the monument's main statue was toppled to be melted into cannons. Parts of the decoration, including the four bronze reliefs, were salvaged by Alexandre Lenoir for his Musée des Monuments français . A temporary woodwork monument was erected to celebrate the insurrectionist victims of 10 August 1792, which in turn was removed during

1054-563: The Nine Years' War and War of the Spanish Succession . Prominent courtier François III d'Aubusson, Duke of La Feuillade planned the Place des Victoires as both a property development project and a celebration of Louis XIV following the Treaties of Nijmegen , which in the late 1670s had put an end to his previous career as a military leader. He formed the plan in 1681 and purchased part of

1116-556: The Paris Foreign Missions Society , the Couvent de la Madeleine de Traisnel  [ fr ] , and Sens Cathedral . The latter reemployed four of the columns for its altar baldachin , erected in 1742 under Archbishop Jean-Joseph Languet de Gergy on a design by Giovanni Niccolò Servandoni . In 1790, the statues of the captives, deemed an offense to the new spirit of freedom, were "liberated" and initially relocated at

1178-623: The Peace of Zsitvatorok (1606), the Ottomans for the first time acknowledged equal rank for the Holy Roman Emperor, in a manner reminiscent of the Carolingian and Holy Roman Empire's prior parity of status with the Byzantine Empire . As for Russia, its monarch's title of Tsar was not viewed (outside of Russia itself) as denoting Imperial rank until the 18th century, after its victories in

1240-570: The Porte Saint-Martin (1674), and the Arc de Triomphe (1836). The Porte Saint-Denis is a triumphal arch inspired by the Arch of Titus in Rome . The monument is 24.65 m (80.9 ft) high, 25 m (82 ft) wide, and 5 m (16 ft) deep. The arch itself is 15.35 m (50.4 ft) high in the center and 8 m (26 ft) across. The main arch is flanked by obelisks applied to

1302-465: The 1670s, the remaining walls of Charles V were entirely demolished when Paris spread beyond the confines of its medieval boundaries. To replace the old gateway of the Porte Saint-Denis, Louis XIV commanded architect François Blondel and the sculptor Michel Anguier to build him a monumental archway that would honor the capture of Franche-Comté in 1668 and the victories on the Meuse and Rhine during

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1364-592: The 1692 portrait of Desjardins submitted by Hyacinthe Rigaud for entry into the Académie royale de peinture et de sculpture , the sitter was represented with his hand on the captive statue of Holland. At the same time, the entire project was criticized for the unrestrained adulation of Louis XIV and humiliation of fellow European nations that were inherent in the program. The March 1686 inauguration ceremony, complete with artillery salvos, military march, incense and genuflections,

1426-649: The Carolingian Empire which started in the 9th century. The disputes about rank were initially concentrated between the two most immediate heirs of the Empire, namely the Holy Roman Emperor and King of France . In the 10th century, Carolingian kings of France sought Ottonian help against their Robertian rivals, thus placing themselves in an unequal relationship, as when Louis IV of France spent Easter in Aachen at

1488-500: The Doge of Genoa and the Swedes in Germany, were reused in the side lanterns. Around the monument, on four points of the near-circular square, were monumental lanterns ( French : fanaux ), each of them made of three columns of colored marble holding a naval lamp and decorated with two garlands of three circular medallions each, thus six by lantern. These lanterns provided for the illumination of

1550-618: The Emperor and Patriarch of Constantinople were unwilling to cede the place of honor to the Pope. Similarly, Protestant sovereigns from the 16th century onwards only viewed the pope as an ecclesiastical authority and secular ruler (of the Papal States ). The demise of the Pope's role was visible after Frederick I of Prussia 's assumption of royal dignity in 1701, which was recognized by most European powers, including Catholic ones, even as Pope Clement XI refused to do so. A formal order of precedence

1612-476: The French kings sought the Imperial crown at the 1519 imperial election and again at the 1658 imperial election . As it happened, both attempts were unsuccessful. Similarly, the monarchs of Spain were malcontent with the seniority of those of France, following the end of the reign of Charles V who had outranked his French counterpart as Holy Roman Emperor. The Council of Trent , which had started under Charles V,

1674-537: The Holy Roman Empire in 1806 and the humbling of France following the Battle of Leipzig in 1813. A "Regulation concerning the precedence of Diplomatic Agents", inspired by Talleyrand , was signed on 19 March 1815 and included as the last (17th) annex in the Congress's Final Act. The rank of an ambassador was based on length of tenure, and specifically determined by the date of official notification of their arrival in

1736-740: The Louvre. The two that decorated the monument's basis became part of the museum's collections in 1836 after having been kept at the Musée des Monuments français : Five medallions from the lanterns were purchased during the Revolution by King George III of Great Britain and donated by the UK to France in 1914: The remaining four, all by Arnould, were acquired by the Louvre between 1980 and 2006: Porte Saint-Denis The Porte Saint-Denis ( French pronunciation: [pɔʁtə sɛ̃ dəni] ; English: St. Denis Gate )

1798-609: The Reunions ); 20. Capture of Luxembourg , 1684; 21. The Junction of the Two Seas (by the Canal du Midi in 1681); 22. Submission of Genoa, 1685 (Doge Francesco Maria Imperiale Lercari 's visit to Versailles); 23. The seas freed from the pirates, 1685; 24. Ambassadors from Muscovy in 1668 ( Pyotr Potemkin ), 1681 (Pyotr Potemkin and Stefan Volkov) and 1685 (Semyon Erofeevich Almazov and Semyon Ippolitov), of Guinea in 1670 (Matteo Lopes, on behalf of

1860-474: The Revolution and subsequently restored by Jean-François Lorta  [ fr ] in 1815–1816. That statue served as an inspiration for that on the Victory Monument, even though the king's attire differs: ancient Roman in Versailles, versus coronation garb in Paris. La Feuillade commissioned Desjardins to create the victory monument in 1682. The monument was completed and inaugurated on 26 March 1686, even as

1922-599: The Roman Empire and would not concede superiority of rank to any European monarch. The European powers grudgingly accepted the Sultan's imperial rank above European kings, but were unwilling to countenance a higher position for the Sultan than that of the Holy Roman Emperor. In the Treaty of Constantinople (1533) , at the height of Ottoman power, the European accepted the subterfuge of referring to Charles V only as King of Spain . At

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1984-554: The base of the Lotharingian Counts of Chiny , in 1043, 1048 and 1056. In the early 14th century, the French monarchy's legal officials formalized this equality by claiming that the king has in his kingdom the same prerogatives as the emperor in the Empire ( Rex est imperator in regno suo ). In 1377–1378, the visit to Paris of Emperor Charles IV and his son Wenceslaus , as recounted in the Grandes Chroniques de France ,

2046-489: The ceiling of the Hall of Mirrors in Versailles and includes several of the same episodes, even though the depictions on the Victory Monument make less systematic use of allegory. La Feuillade had previously ordered a marble statue of Louis XIV from Desjardins in 1679. He offered it to the king in 1683 and it was placed in the Versailles Orangerie in 1684, where it remains to this day after having been altered during

2108-680: The court of Otto I in 947, or when Lothair of France made peace with Emperor Otto II at Margut in 980. In the 11th century, by contrast, occasional meetings between the French king and the Emperor took place on a basis of equality of status, on or near the river Meuse that symbolized the border between the two realms: between Robert II of France and Emperor Henry II in 1006 and again (in Mouzon ) in 1023; between Henry I of France and Emperor Conrad II in nearby Deville in 1033; and between Henry I of France and King then Emperor Henry III in Ivois ,

2170-501: The diary of his master of ceremonies , Paris de Grassis , below with added titles (in parentheses) that were granted over time by the Papacy, as well as the holders of the titles or the situation of the same in 1505: When one monarch held several crowns in personal union , he or she would hold the higher rank among them. For example in 1504, Ferdinand II of Aragon had recently become King of Sicily (in 1501), and Vladislaus II of Hungary

2232-415: The early modern era, notably between England and Spain; England and Portugal; Denmark and Sweden; Sweden and Poland; Poland and Hungary; Poland and Portugal. The generally held view that older monarchies deserved higher rank led to pseudo-historical claims of ancient origins, such as, for Sweden, Johannes Magnus 's Historia de omnibus Gothorum Sueonumque regibus . The power politics of the day also played

2294-1060: The following list for the themes of the 24 medallions: 1. Battle of Rocroi in 1643; 2. Restoration of military discipline (reform of 1665); 3. Dutch rescued in Münster , 1664 (actually 1665 during the Second Anglo-Dutch War ); 4. Fight of Saint-Gotthard in Hungary, 1665 (actually 1664); 5. Tournai, Lille and C. taken in 1667 (during the War of Devolution ; "C." may be either Courtrai or Charleroi ); 6. Justice reform in 1667 (the Code Louis  [ fr ] ); 7. Pyramid erected in Rome in 1664 and torn down in 1668 (the Corsican Guard Affair ); 8. Takeover of Maastricht in 1673; 9. Battle of Seneffe in 1674; 10. Victorious fights in Germany in 1674 and 1675; 11. Naval fight in Sicily, 1676 (presumably

2356-497: The fourth one, now understood as representing Brandenburg, has been misinterpreted variously in the past as the Duchy of Savoy or the Ottoman Empire . Between them were scattered broken weapons and military emblems, including an imperial ensign that anachronistically combines the SPQR motto of Ancient Rome with the double-headed eagle of the Holy Roman Empire . Desjardins's relief plates on

2418-480: The grounds in 1684, the rest being acquired for the same purpose by the City of Paris. While not much is known about the details of the planning process, it is probable that Louis XIV's entourage, if not the king itself, was involved in the definition of its program of monarchical glorification, so that the monument eventually appears as a hybrid of private initiative and official project. The iconographic program echoes that of

2480-517: The issue of diplomatic precedence by denying any permanent seniority to envoys others than those of the Pope and Holy Roman Emperor. This was predictably rejected by the French minister in Lisbon. The formula eventually adopted at the Congress of Vienna would be similar. The issue of precedence among ambassadors was settled at the Congress of Vienna , an outcome that was arguably enabled by the dissolution of

2542-411: The monarch's mortality, put into question his responsibility before God. The offensive depiction of France's neighbors as vanquished captives did nothing to help French diplomacy, and was viewed several decades later as having possibly contributed to the kingdom's isolation. A follow-up bombastic urban design project on a larger scale than the Place des Victoires, started in 1685 and intended to be named

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2604-467: The new polities acknowledged the lingering primacy of the (Eastern) Roman Empire , or were too isolated for matters of international relations to have much salience. In the late 8th century, the Frankish kingdom , which on Christmas Day 800 became the Carolingian Empire , unified all Christendom west of the Byzantine Empire , with few exceptions that were all geographically remote and could not contest its primacy (the Kingdom of Asturias , Brittany and

2666-425: The new square, now known as the Place Vendôme . The lanterns were permanently turned off in 1699, decommissioned by royal order in 1717, and dismantled in 1718. La Feuillade's son donated their twelve precious marble columns to the Theatines congregation of Paris, then established on what is now Quai Voltaire , for their unfinished church. After his death in 1725 the Theatines, who were short of money, sold them to

2728-400: The obelisk pedestals but they have now been closed. The arch is decorated with a variety of sculptures and friezes Precedence among European monarchies The order of precedence among European monarchies was a much-contested theme of European history, until it lost its salience following the Congress of Vienna in 1815. Following the fall of the Western Roman Empire , many of

2790-446: The pedestal commemorated four events viewed as particularly representative of Louis XIV's glory: on the front, an allegory of the Peace of Nijmegen of 1678–1679, with Louis XIV bringing Peace to Europe, the latter two represented as female allegories; on the rear, an idealized depiction of Louis XIV accepting the excuses of Spain's ambassador on 24 March 1662, a noted episode in the history of precedence among European monarchies ; and on

2852-414: The respective ambassadors of the two countries often had to make sure they would not find themselves in the same place at the same time. In 1661, a contest for position between the French and Spanish ambassadors in a ceremonial procession in London led to a number of deaths. The Count of Fuentes  [ es ] , Spanish ambassador in Paris, had to apologize to Louis XIV the next year, an event that

2914-533: The same status as Portugal. This was also refused, especially as a result of the English reformation. Julius's ceremonial list may have temporarily resolved some squabbles, but did not satisfy those monarchs who felt entitled to a higher position than it granted them. The disputes were made visible by proceedings of the Papal court in Rome, where all the significant monarchies had ambassadors, and of occasional councils, as well as in third locations on occasion. The solution of acknowledging equality of all royal crowns as

2976-409: The sides, two military actions in which La Feuillade had participated, the crossing of the Rhine of June 1672 and the Siege of Besançon of 1674. Desjardins was also commissioned to produce four circular medallions ( tondi ) in bronze for the base of the monument, but only two were eventually installed there while the other two were replaced by inscriptions: The Destruction of Heresy , referring to

3038-491: The square and monument at night. In practice, however, they were not all completed. Some of the medallions were only temporary ones made in stucco, and possibly no more than half of the total (i.e. a dozen) were produced in bronze. Aside from the two initially created by Desjardins for the central monument, the others medallions were created by Flemish sculptor Jean Regnault (or Arnould) and caster Pierre Le Nègre, based on drawings by Pierre Mignard . A contemporary engraving gives

3100-446: The surrounding buildings were unfinished or not started yet. At the center of the square, the monument itself stood and consisted of three sections: a base with larger-than-life bronze statues of prisoners and military spoils; a square pedestal with four bronze reliefs commemorating specific events; and a colossal gilded statue of Louis XIV in coronation robe, trampling on Cerberus , with an allegory of Victory standing behind him on

3162-413: The various kingdoms of the British Isles ). The initial tension between the Carolingians and Byzantines over succession of the Roman Empire , dubbed by historians the problem of two emperors , largely faded away in the near-absence of a land border between the two entities. By contrast, the issue of precedence among Western European monarchies became a contentious matter following the disintegration of

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3224-427: The wall face bearing sculptural groups of trophies of arms . Above the main arch, the southern face carries a sculptural group by Michel Anguier of "The Passage of the Rhine" in a sunk panel, while the north face carries allegorical figures of the Rhine and the Netherlands . The entablature bears the gilded bronze inscription LUDOVICO MAGNO , "To Louis the Great". Two smaller pedestrian walkways were built through

3286-455: Was also King of Bohemia. Despite being listed as having greater precedence than certain duchies, Genoa, Venice and Florence were in reality republics . Attempts to change the Papal order of precedence took place in numerous occasions. Spain, which had been favoured by Pope Alexander VI , aspired to have the same status as France during the Council of Trent (1545–1563). However, Pope Pius IV rejected Spanish demands. England also aspired to have

3348-448: Was built between 1356 and 1383 to protect the Right Bank of Paris. The medieval fortification had two gates and was surmounted with four towers. Additional portcullises defended the outer gate along with a drawbridge and rock-cut ditch. However, with the advent of gunpowder and the development of cannons and bombards , the walls were eventually partly torn down in the 1640s to make way for the larger and more fortified Louis XIII Wall. In

3410-418: Was clothed with French colors . Conflicts of precedence were intermittent and flared up especially at international meetings such as the Council of Constance in 1415 and Council of Basel in 1431. Before the Reformation , all western European powers acknowledged the supreme status of the Papacy and of its envoys , notwithstanding the longstanding conflict between popes and emperors that culminated in

3472-431: Was considered way over the top by the Duke of Saint-Simon who attended it while a child and found it verging on cult. François-Timoléon de Choisy similarly mocked the elevation of Louis to godlike status as a hubristic echo of pagan Roman emperor-worship. Anonymous poems, pamphlets and caricatures were circulated both in France and abroad, lambasting the monument and not least the "immortal man" dedicace, which, by denying

3534-444: Was deemed significant enough to be memorialized a generation later in a bronze relief by sculptor Martin Desjardins on the Louis XIV Victory Monument on Place des Victoires in Paris together with major military victories. The issue was alleviated after the House of Bourbon secured the Spanish crown in the 18th century, and eventually settled with the Pacte de Famille of 1761. Other conflicts of precedence lasted for most of

3596-399: Was enunciated around 1504 by Pope Julius II , based on a combination of historical considerations (the older the realm, the higher the rank) and power positions. It built on earlier practices, particularly the senior status granted to the Holy Roman Emperor and the next-highest rank granted to the Kingdom of France as " eldest daughter of the Church ". The list was first recorded in 1505 in

3658-457: Was erected in 1822, namely an equestrian statue of Louis XIV by François Joseph Bosio . This monument bears no visual relationship with Desjardin's original, even though its program overlaps especially as the 1672 crossing of the Rhine is represented on one of Bosio's two bronze reliefs on the pedestal. Meanwhile, the statues of the four captives were placed in 1804 in front of Les Invalides , where they remained until 1939. In 1960 their ownership

3720-403: Was strictly choreographed to highlight the emperor's equality of rank with his nephew King Charles V of France . The Grandes Chroniques specifically comment on the color of the horses used for the procession into Paris: since riding a white horse denoted sovereignty over the land, that attribute was reserved to the French king, while the Emperor rode a dark horse. Furthermore, the Emperor's horse

3782-444: Was the inevitable theater of the rivalry. In 1560, Philip II of Spain suggested a joint representation there of himself and his uncle Ferdinand I, Holy Roman Emperor , so that his envoy would outrank that of France. In 1562–1564 and again in 1583, Philip appears to have contemplated an imperial title over the Indies for similar reasons, but eventually gave up. Spain contested French seniority for many generations: to avoid incidents,

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3844-470: Was transferred to the Louvre , which in 1961 had them deposited in the Parc de Sceaux  [ fr ] where they remained until 1992. In 1993, in the context of the museum's expansion known as the Grand Louvre project, they were transferred, together with other preserved parts of the monument, to their current location in the newly created Cour Puget , where they dominate the courtyard's lower section. Eleven bronze medallions are also preserved at

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