Place De La Concorde

It was originally called Louis XV, but after de la R�volution the royal equestrian statue sculpted by Bouchardon was toppled, and the 84.000 square meters (20 acre) place de la Concorde was the main execution site during the Reign of Terror when 1119 people were killed, including the King Louis XVI and his wife Marie-Antoinette, after, the leaders of the Revolution itself, were led here their deaths.

It was built between 1755 and 1775. The 3300-year-old, pink granite obelisk in the middle of the place was given to France in 1831 by Muhammad Ali, Viceroy of Egypt at the time. The monument, weighing 230 tons and towering 23 meters, used to be in the Temple of Ramses at Thebes (Luxor). It reached Paris four years later, in the reign of Louis-Philippe. The obelisk is covered in hieroglyphics. The bottom heiroglyphics talk about the travel and rising of the obelisk.