Propaganda Poster Napoleon Bonapart Vendome Column Paris France

Original antique engraving poster with a view of The Vendome Column and text detailing victories and achievements of Napoleon I. The original column was started in 1806 at Napoleon's direction and completed in 1810. It was modelled after Trajan's Column, to celebrate the victory of Austerlitz; its veneer of 425 spiralling bas-relief bronze plates was made out of cannon taken from the combined armies of Europe, according to his propaganda (the usual figure given is hugely exaggerated: 180 cannon were actually captured at Austerlitz.) These plates were designed by the sculptor Pierre-Nolasque Bergeret and executed by a team of sculptors including Jean-Joseph Foucou, Louis-Simon Boizot, Francois Joseph Bosio, Lorenzo Bartolini, Claude Ramey, Francois Rude, Corbet, Clodion, Julie Charpentier, and Henri-Joseph Ruxthiel.A statue of Napoleon, bare-headed, crowned with laurels and holding a sword in his right hand and a globe surmounted with a statue of Victory (as in Napoleon as Mars the Peacemaker) in his left hand, was placed atop the column. In 1816, taking advantage of the Allied occupying force, a mob of men and horses had attached a cable to the neck of the statue of Napoleon atop the column, but it had refused to budge – one woman quipped: "If the Emperor is as solid on his throne as this statue is on its column, he's nowhere near descending the throne".After the Bourbon Restoration the statue, though not the column, was pulled down and melted down to provide the bronze for the recast equestrian statue of Henry IV on the Pont Neuf (as was bronze from sculptures on the Column of the Grande Armée at Boulogne-sur-Mer), though the statuette of Victory is still to be seen in the salon Napoleon of the Hotel des Monnaies (which also contains a model of the column and a likeness of Napoleon's face copied from his death mask). A replacement statue of Napoléon in modern dress (a bicorn hat, boots and a redingote), however, was erected by Louis-Philippe, and a better, more augustly classicizing one by Louis-Napoleon (later Napoeon III). Poor condition, tears, creasing, paper losses, staining, backed on paper Country of issue: France, designer: Unknown, size (cm): 95.5x67, year of printing: 1800s