Equestrian Statue of Henri IV
by LEMOT, François-Frédéric, Bronze
The statues of monarchs which stood in the centre of Royal Squares in France in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries appeared as the symbol of their power. The Revolution was quick to pull them down, thus demonstrating that royal authority had passed into the hands of those who had so long been subject to it. Yet, one of Louis XVIII’s first acts was to order their replacement.
On 25 August 1818, the day of St Louis, a reconstruction of the popular effigy of Henri IV was erected on the Pont-Neuf. It was cast by Lemot from the debris of the Napoleons on the Colonne Vend�me. Meanwhile Dupaty was commissioned to restore the Louis XIII in the Place des Vosges, Bosio was allotted the Louis XIV in the Place des Victoires, and Cartellier the Louis XIV on the Invalides pediment and the Louis XV in the Place de la Concorde.