Place Concorde

PlaceConcorde,
originally uploaded by cvraman.

Between the Champs Elysees and the Tuileries Gardens, there lies the Place de la Concorde. With traffic roaring and careening about seemingly in all directions, it is easy to feel lost in its 84,000 square meters.
Built between 1755 and 1775, many important historical events took place here. Louis XVI, Marie-Antoinette and 1119 other people lost their lives here, among them Charlotte Corday (the murderess of Marat), Danton, Philippe and Robespierre.
In the center of the square is the Obelisk of Luxor, a pink granite monolith 23 m (73 tt) high and weighing 220 tons. It is 3300 years old and decorated with hieroglyphics exalting the reign of the pharaon Ramses II.
The obelisk was presented as a gift to Charles X by the Egyptian viceroy in 1829. The monument was installed here under Louis Philippe who, bearing in mind the death and destruction witnessed by Place de la Concorde, was pleased to have found a non-political monument to replace the unpopular Bourbon Louis the XVth statue. It took three years of travelling from the Nile riverbanks to get the Obelisk to Paris.
This is a nice corner in Paris. The giant wheel at the back ground is the one that inspired the great London eye. This is one of the important things which Paris takes pride of.