Place de la Concorde is without a doubt one of the most impressive squares in Paris (perhaps second only to Place de l’Étoile, at the far end of the Champs-Élysées). But how many of you, who have passed through it on your way to the Tuileries Garden and the Louvre Museum, to the Madeleine Church or to the Left Bank, actually know its story?
Today I want to tell you the story of this beautiful square. As you’ll see, there’s no shortage of blood, fire and smoke in this story. Don’t believe me? Read on.
Act One: Place Louis XV
Our story begins in 1748, when Edmé Bouchardon (1698-1762) received a commission to sculpt a monumental statue of Louis XV on horseback. The statue was commissioned to celebrate the king’s recovery from a serious illness, and as a side note, another result of that miraculous recovery is the Church of Sainte-Geneviève, which would later become the Panthéon. But that’s a story for another day.
A statue like that needed a worthy location, which was no small challenge, since Paris at the time had very little open space. In the end, the choice fell on a relatively empty plot of land west of the Tuileries Garden, which could serve as a royal square. The task was given to the famous architect Ange-Jacques Gabriel (1698-1782), who finished building the square in 1757.
To create a royal impression, Gabriel decided to build two palaces on the north side of the square, which would balance out the Palais Bourbon, located south of the square on the Left Bank of the Seine.
The eastern palace started out as the residence of the official in charge of the royal furniture, and eventually became the headquarters of the royal navy (Hôtel de la Marine). But don’t let the name confuse you: even though it was a military building, in terms of splendor it rivaled the finest palaces of Paris. After a major renovation, the palace opened to the public in 2021. Here’s a short video showing you what you can expect to see when you visit:
To get to know the fascinating history of this building and to plan a visit, I invite you to read Ronen Sas’s wonderful article, Hôtel de la Marine: The New Flagship of Paris’s Museums.
If the eastern palace served the navy, the western palace, the Hôtel de Crillon, named after the Duke de Crillon, became a residence where the duke’s descendants lived until 1907. What’s interesting is that unlike many buildings in France called “hôtel” (like the Hôtel de Ville in Paris), this hôtel eventually became an actual hotel (one of the most luxurious in Paris). If you’d like to stay there on your next visit, feel free to click this link. If the prices scare you off a bit, you can settle for watching this short video to see what you’re missing.
In 1763 the statue of Louis XV was placed in the square, and what a statue it was! Louis XV, dressed as a Roman emperor, rode proudly on his horse, radiating glory and majesty. This was meant to honor his victory at the Battle of Fontenoy, which had taken place about 15 years earlier. Too bad that in the Seven Years’ War (1756-1763), Louis XV was somewhat less successful, coming out of it without Canada, without France’s colony in India, and worst of all, without the popularity he had once enjoyed.
By this time, the French no longer called Louis XV “the Beloved” (a title he’d earned in the 1740s). He had become a rather hated king. And it seemed as if the bad luck that had clung to him during the Seven Years’ War and his final years on the throne had transferred itself to this very square.
On June 30, 1770 (my own birthday), the Dauphin Louis (the future Louis XVI) and his new wife Marie Antoinette decided to celebrate their wedding at Place de la Concorde. Everyone was invited to the celebration, including the common people, who showed up completely drunk (in honor of the festivities, all the fountains were filled with wine instead of water). All these people crowded into the square through Rue Royale, which at the time was the only entrance to the square (Rue de Rivoli and the Pont de la Concorde didn’t exist yet).
But then disaster struck. Because of some fireworks, one of the temporary structures in the square, called the “Temple of Marriage,” caught fire and began to burn. Panic broke out in the square, and everyone who could tried to flee north through Rue Royale. The result: 133 dead, killed either by the fire or trampled to death by the crowd.
There’s no question this was not a great way to start a royal career. If only the royal couple had known what awaited them in this very square 23 years later…
Act Two: Place de la Révolution
Despite the disaster at the start of the square’s history, things returned to normal fairly quickly. But in 1789 the French Revolution broke out, and the revolutionaries decided to destroy the statue of Louis XV and rename the square from “Place Louis XV” to “Place de la Révolution.” In place of the king’s statue, the revolutionaries put up a giant allegorical statue representing Liberty, wearing a Phrygian cap and holding a spear.
At the same time, the revolutionaries decided to take the stones left over from the Bastille, which they had demolished, and use them to build a bridge connecting the square to the Left Bank. That’s why, if one of your friends ever asks you where to find the Bastille, feel free to send them to the Pont de la Concorde…
In November 1792, another “attraction” was set up in the square: the guillotine. The first people it beheaded were criminals who had broken into one of the nearby palaces and stolen jewelry (the idea was to carry out the punishment close to the scene of the crime). But on January 21, 1793, a far more important “guest” arrived, and the square became forever associated with executions.
In 1791, Louis XVI and his family tried to flee but were caught in the town of Varennes, in the Lorraine region. From that moment on, the royal family’s standing only deteriorated, until it was decided to imprison them in the Temple fortress, in the Marais, and put Louis XVI on trial for treason. The verdict: death.
On January 21, 1793, Louis XVI was led from the Temple fortress to the square. The cart arrived around 10:00 in the morning. The (former) king of France stepped up onto the platform where the guillotine stood, and refused the offer of Charles-Henri Sanson (1739-1806), Paris’s chief executioner, to cover his eyes. The king tried to give one last speech, but the soldiers began to drum, so that none of the onlookers could hear his final words.
The executioner’s assistants grabbed the king and laid him down on the guillotine’s plank. Because he wasn’t positioned correctly, when the blade fell it didn’t cut through his neck but through his skull. Even so, the assistants managed to sever the head and held it up for the crowd to see. A new era had begun…
Liberty, What Crimes Are Committed in Your Name!
From that day on, Place de la Concorde became the revolutionaries’ preferred execution site, and at first it was the heads of nobles and opponents of the Revolution that rolled there. In October 1793, Marie Antoinette, Louis XVI’s widow, arrived here (you can read about her death in the article The End of Marie Antoinette), and in December 1793 the head of Madame du Barry (1743-1793), Louis XV’s mistress and the last royal mistress in French history, was severed here. They were joined in May 1794 by Madame Élisabeth (1764-1794), Louis XVI’s sister.
But the Revolution, like the god Saturn, soon began to devour its own children. First it was the Girondins, a relatively moderate revolutionary faction, who were executed. One of their greatest supporters was Madame Roland (1754-1793), who, standing by the guillotine, turned to the statue of Liberty and spoke the immortal line: “Liberty, what crimes are committed in your name.”
Another famous woman who belonged to the Girondin camp and was executed at Place de la Révolution was Olympe de Gouges (1748-1793), one of the first feminists in French history and the author of the Declaration of the Rights of Woman.
After the revolutionaries finished eliminating the Girondins, they began eliminating each other. And so famous revolutionaries such as Camille Desmoulins (1760-1794) and Georges Danton (1759-1794) met their deaths here. At some point, the people living around the square grew tired of all the blood and noise, and demanded that the revolutionary government move the guillotine elsewhere. The government agreed, and the guillotine moved to Place de la Bastille and later to Place de la Nation.
But the guillotine returned to the square for one final “encore.” On July 28, 1794, the head of Maximilien Robespierre (1758-1794), the man more responsible than anyone for the revolutionary Reign of Terror, fell at Place de la Révolution. His death marked the end of the Reign of Terror, which had claimed around 17,000 heads.
The era of bloody revolution in the square had come to an end. The time for reconciliation had begun.
Act Three: Place de la Concorde
There’s no doubt that by 1794, with the end of Robespierre’s Reign of Terror, the square suffered from especially bad public relations. Not only had the square become synonymous with bloodshed, it was also named after the French Revolution, which many people hated. As a result, the Directoire, which rose to power after Robespierre’s rule, decided in 1795 to rename the square “Place de l’Harmonie,” or in French, Place de la Concorde.
If you thought the name Place de la Concorde stuck from then until today, you’d be wrong. After the fall of Napoleon’s rule, the Bourbons returned to France and tried to restore the old order. One of the first things they did was restore the square’s original name, Place Louis XV. But a few years later, it was decided it would be more fitting to name the square after Louis XVI, since he had lost his life there.
But in 1830, the July Revolution took place, bringing Louis-Philippe I (1773-1850) to power, the son of Louis Philippe II, Duke of Orléans (1747-1793), who had voted in favor of the death penalty for Louis XVI, only to be executed himself in that very same square. So it’s no surprise that Louis-Philippe I wasn’t thrilled that a square not far from where he lived was named after a relative of his who had been killed there because of his father.
So Louis-Philippe I decided to rename the square once again, this time to “Place de la Concorde,” and along the way began to beautify it. The guillotine, long gone by then, was replaced by a giant obelisk, which the king received in 1831 from Muhammad Ali Pasha (1769-1849), the governor of Egypt (and no, despite what plenty of people seem to think, this obelisk wasn’t stolen from anyone).
Two beautiful fountains, designed by the architect Jacques Ignace Hittorff (1792-1867), joined the obelisk. The first, located on the south side of the square, represents France’s maritime trade, while the second, on the north side, represents France’s rivers. Originally, two more fountains were planned, but it turned out there wasn’t enough water to run them, so those plans were shelved.
In 1840 the fountains were unveiled, joining the obelisk, which had been placed there in 1836 after a long journey. If all that doesn’t sound impressive enough, the square also has 8 statues, each representing a different French city. Each statue is positioned relative to the location of the city it represents:
- Rouen and Lille, on the north side of the square.
- Strasbourg and Lyon, on the east side.
- Brest and Nantes, on the west side.
- Bordeaux and Marseille, on the south side.
And that’s how Place de la Concorde took its final shape, becoming the most impressive square in Paris (at least in my opinion). Nothing dramatic (certainly nothing like the beheading of Louis XVI) happened in the square again until the end of World War II, when crowds gathered there to cheer for Charles de Gaulle (1890-1970), who arrived from the Arc de Triomphe, the starting point of his victory march. What’s interesting is that these were the very same people who had cheered for Marshal Philippe Pétain (1856-1951) just about four months earlier.
Place de la Concorde: Visitor Information
Has reading about the history of Place de la Concorde made you want to visit, or maybe even stay nearby? To help you out, I put together the guide Place de la Concorde: Visitor Information, where you’ll find hotel and apartment recommendations, walking routes starting from Place de la Concorde, information about nearby attractions and more.
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