Le Départ des volontaires de 1792

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L'Arc De Triomphe

Le Départ des volontaires de 1792

The sculpted groups | Arc de Triomphe

Created by François Rude between 1833 and 1836, this sculpted group illustrates an essential event in revolutionary history: the conscription of 1792, when nearly 200,000 men ordered by the Legislative Assembly organized the defense of France in the face of foreign armies aligned against the revolutionaries.

The sculptor chose a totally allegorical vision of this national union. He does not use period costumes or weapons contemporary with the Revolution. The use of the romantic style seeks to reach an universal dimension and to symbolise the struggle of a people, whichever it is, to defend what belongs to them.

The high relief represents the Génie de la Liberté in the form of a winged woman crying out in the face of enemy invasion. She invites the people to fight by brandishing her sword.

Underneath this figure, a bearded warrior with a cuirass is dragging a naked young man by the shoulder, while waving his helmet as a sign of departure and rallying. He seems to remain deaf to the advice that an old bearded man, placed in the background, seems to give him.

The Departure of the Volunteers in 1792 ("La Marseillaise") (Le Départ des volontaires de 1792 ["La Marseillaise"]), maquette Title: The Departure of the Volunteers in 1792 ("La Marseillaise") (Le Départ des volontaires de 1792 ["La Marseillaise"]), maque · Brooklyn Museum

The subject commemorates a crucial moment in 1792

(the year the French national anthem known as “La Marseillaise” was composed) when citizens volunteered to defend the young republic against Prussia and Austria, which sought to restore France’s recently toppled monarchy.

Emperor Napoleon commissioned the Arc de Triomphe in 1806 to celebrate his military victories. Unfinished when his empire collapsed in 1815, the monument was only completed in 1836 during the reign of King Louis-Philippe, who had proudly fought among the 1792 volunteers depicted in François Rude’s allegory.

Although the personification of Liberty wears the symbolic Phrygian cap of people freed from slavery in ancient Rome, France did not outlaw slavery in its colonies until 1794. Napoleon reinstated it in 1802, and it was not until 1848 that the legal structures of slavery were constitutionally dismantled in France.

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