July Column

The July Column stands at the center of the Place de la Bastille as a monument to the three days of intense street fighting in July eighteen-thirty that toppled the monarchy of Charles the Tenth. You are looking at a structure composed of twenty-one massive cast bronze drums that together weigh more than seventy-four tons. While many associate this square with the older French Revolution of seventeen-eighty-nine, this column specifically honors the later insurrection that installed King Louis-Philippe.