Yes Yes! The same Parisian Bastille. Have you seen her in Paris? Well preserved?
Remember from "Yeralash" -
- Little Johnny, who took the Bastille !?
- Yes, I did not take it, Olga Petrovna!
I once told you that, in general, the Bastille was "never taken" by a small number of disabled defenders themselves opened the gates. So the heroic page of the French Revolution is somewhat exaggerated.
I’ll show you where the Bastille is in Paris. This is the place …
This is how it looked initially:
Promotional video:
How it was:
At about five in the evening, the Bastille passed into the hands of the rebels, who were disappointed. In the chambers of the Bastille, only seven were found, none of whom could be called “victims of the regime” - four counterfeiters, two mentally ill and one criminal murderer. Even the legendary Marquis de Sade was transferred from the Bastille to a psychiatric clinic by that time.
Nevertheless, all the Bastille prisoners found in the cells were released by the revolutionaries.
After that, the castle was plundered. Historians to this day regret the richest archive of documents of the Bastille, which for the most part was destroyed during the capture of the fortress.
Then what happened to the Bastille was what exactly two centuries later happened to the Berlin Wall. The Paris municipality decided to immediately destroy it on a voluntary basis, and the very next day Parisians with improvised tools and joy on their faces came out to smash the architectural monument of the XIV century. Since there was no Arkhnadzor movement in Paris at that time, there was no one to prevent vandalism.
The process of destruction lasted for two years, but the deed was done - not a trace remained of the Bastille. Broken bricks from the walls of the castle went to souvenirs, which were sold to everyone for a long time.
For a long time there was a vacant lot on the site of the Bastille, the color of which was added only by the inscription "They dance here". However, France, shaken by revolutionary upheavals, had no time for dancing for a long time.
In 1841 it looked like this:
In 1878, it looked like this:
And now like this:
Moreover, the monument on the square has nothing to do with the Bastille. The idea to build a column on a new square, formed after the destruction of the Bastille, arose back in 1792. Bonaparte, then a general, proposed to build on this site a fountain in the form of a colossal elephant with a tower, and for some time there really was a wooden model of this monument, immortalized by Victor Hugo in the novel Les Miserables.
Here is the seat of the Bastille.
But only in 1833, Louis-Philippe ordered the erection of a memorial column. The project was carried out by the architect Jean-Antoine Alavuan, and Louis Duc was responsible for construction and decoration. The round pedestal of the column is an unrealized fountain with an elephant. The grand opening of the July Column took place in 1840.
At the top of the bronze column is a gilded "Genius of Freedom" by Auguste Dumont, and at the base there are Bari bas-reliefs.
A memorial plaque is attached at the bottom of the column:
To the glory of the French citizens who fought with arms in their hands in defense of civil liberties on the memorable days of July 27, 28, 29, 1830.
Here is the place where the famous Bastille was.