Fountain on Place Saint-Michel, Paris, France - Fountains on Waymarking.com

[FR]
La fontaine Saint-Michel fait partie elle aussi du plan d'aération de la ville prévu par Haussmann sous Napoléon III. Le percement du boulevard Saint-Michel dans l'axe de la Sainte-Chapelle entraînait la création d'une place au débouché du pont Saint-Michel, Haussmann a ordonné la mise en place de cette fontaine afin de combler l'angle entre la boulevard Saint-Michel et la place Saint-André-des-Arts et donner un débouché visuel à la perspective du boulevard du Palais.
La première idée était d'ériger une énorme statue de Napoléon Ier mais elle fut abandonnée, et devant l'insistance de la commission municipale — qui voulait rappeler le souvenir de la vieille chapelle Saint-Michel en la Cité —, ce fut finalement la lutte du Bien contre le Mal qui fut retenue comme programme : l'archange Michel terrassant le Diable dans un arc de triomphe entouré de chimères ailées.
Elle a été conçue par l'architecte Gabriel Davioud, aidé de Flament, Simonet et Halo. Elle est haute de 26 mètres et large de 15 mètres. La statue de Saint Michel terrassant le Diable, dans la niche centrale, est de Francisque Duret. Les deux dragons crachant de l'eau en contrebas sont dus à Henri-Alfred Jacquemart. Le portique à colonnes est décoré de quatre statues de bronze représentant les vertus cardinales de La Prudence, de Jean-Auguste Barre, La Force, de Eugène Guillaume, La Justice, de Louis Valentin Robert et La Tempérance, de Charles Gumery.
Cette fontaine, dont le chantier a commencé en juin 1858 fut inaugurée le 15 août 1860. Elle est inscrite monument historique par arrêté du 16 mars 1926.

[EN]
The fontaine Saint-Michel was part of the great project for the reconstruction of Paris overseen by Baron Haussmann during the French Second Empire. In 1855 Haussmann completed an enormous new boulevard, originally called boulevard de Sébastopol-rive-gauche, now called Boulevard Saint-Michel, which opened up the small place Pont-Saint-Michel into a much larger space. Haussmann asked the architect of the service of promenades and plantations of the prefecture, Gabriel Davioud, to design a fountain which would be appropriate in scale to the new square. As the architect of the prefecture, he was able to design not only the fountain but also the facades of the new buildings around it, giving coherence to the square, but he also had to deal with the demands of the prefet and city administration, which was paying for the project.
Davioud's original project was for a fountain dedicated to peace, located in the center of the square. The prefect authorities rejected this idea and asked him instead to build a fountain to hide the end wall of the building at the corner of boulevard Saint-Michel and Saint-André des Arts. This forced Davioud to adapt his plan to the proportions of that building.
The next design made by Davioud in 1856 provided the architectural structure of the fountain; a facade divided into four horizontal levels, similar to a triumphal arch, with four Corinthian columns on high socles framing the central niche. The main cornice is surmounted by a French Renaissance design feature, an inscribed tablet in a grand architectural framing. As the revised site was just off the axis of the bridge, Davioud created a visual compromise in a series of shallow bowed basins through which the water issuing from the rock under the supine body of Saint Michael's adversary spills. The water ends in a basin sunk into street level, with a curving front edge that softens the line of the monuments architectural base.
In the 1856 plan, Davioud placed a feminine statue of Peace into the central niche. The 1858 plan called for replacing Peace with a statue of Napoleon Bonaparte. This provoked furious opposition from the opponents of Louis-Napoleon, so later in 1858 Davioud proposed that the central figure be the Archangel Michael wrestling with the devil. This was agreed, construction began in June 1858, and the statue was inaugurated on August 15, 1860.

The Decoration of the Fountain

Davioud was himself a trained neoclassical sculptor from the Ecole des Beaux-Arts, and the large scale (26 meters by 15 meters) and the elaborate iconography he created for the fountain required the work of nine different sculptors. It features:
- Two winged dragons on either side of the fountain by Henri Alfred Jacquemart.
- The figure of Saint Michael and the devil by Francisque-Joseph Duret
- The rock under Saint Michael by Félix Saupin
- Bas-reliefs and ornamental foliage by Noémie Constant
Four statues representing the cardinal virtues:
- Statue of Prudence, holding a serpent and a mirror, by Jean-Auguste Barre
- Statue of Power, with a lion skin and club, by Claude-Jean Guillaume
- Statue of Justice, with a scale and sword, by Louis-Valentin Robert
- Statue of Temperance, by Charles-Alphonse Guméry
- Statues of Power and Moderation, holding the coat of arms of Paris, by Auguste-Hyacinthe Debay

The fountain was different from most other Paris fountains because it used different colors of stone; columns of red marble from Languedoc; green marble; blue stone from Soignies; yellow stone from Saint-Yllie; and bronze statues.

Note: Content from Wikipedia

Web Link: Not listed

Visit Instructions:
Please post another photo of the fountain and tell us your opinion about the fountain.

Recent Visits/Logs:

Date Logged Log User Rating   01/21/2024 Blanko36 visited it 07/22/2023 LaTourSombre visited it 05/19/2023 fi67 visited it 09/10/2022 seal13 visited it 01/25/2022 jezevcik visited it 11/05/2019 Outspoken1 visited it 01/26/2019 Michaelfiles visited it 08/12/2018 Tromel visited it 03/22/2018 keillec visited it 03/03/2017 junkys visited it 01/23/2016 petendot visited it 10/06/2015 Luzifersangel visited it 06/07/2015 dschinny visited it 05/27/2015 xxxicedevilxxx visited it 05/26/2015 lorenz1980 visited it 02/11/2015 Tumbrel visited it 12/21/2014 celene37 visited it 08/14/2014 Nebola visited it 05/16/2014 Dragon Ball visited it 02/24/2014 nelsonlevita visited it 02/03/2014 dan.ser visited it 10/03/2013 Infra-Blue visited it 05/31/2013 Jyffe visited it 05/31/2013 thepauliina visited it 09/05/2012 mlafortu visited it

View all visits/logs