page_title: Iconoclasm
section_title: In the United States
hierarchical_section_title: Iconoclasm / Political iconoclasm / In the United States
caption_attribution_description: English: Pulling Down the Statue of King George III, N.Y.C. Working decades after the event, the artist depicts an imagined, romanticized image of the scene. The painting shows the Sons of Liberty destroying the statue after the Declaration was read by George Washington to citizens and his troops in New York City on July 9, 1776. In fact the statue was pulled down by slaves acting on the orders of their owners. Despite the presence of Native Americans, women and children, eyewitness accounts place only soldiers, sailors and more of the rougher sorts of civilians at the event. Additionally, historical records indicate the statue depicted King George III of England in ancient Roman garb based on the Renaissance sculpture of a Roman emperor, Marcus Aurelius, and not the contemporary 18th clothing depicted in this painting.
context_page_description: Iconoclasm is the social belief in the importance of the destruction of icons and other images or monuments, most frequently for religious or political reasons. People who engage in or support iconoclasm are called iconoclasts, a term that has come to be figuratively applied to any individual who challenges "cherished beliefs or venerated institutions on the grounds that they are erroneous or pernicious."
  Conversely, one who reveres or venerates religious images is called an iconolater; in a Byzantine context, such a person is called an iconodule or iconophile. Iconoclasm does not generally encompass the destruction of the images of a specific ruler after his or her death or overthrow, a practice better known as damnatio memoriae.
  While iconoclasm may be carried out by adherents of a different religion, it is more commonly the result of sectarian disputes between factions of the same religion. The term originates from the Byzantine Iconoclasm, the struggles between proponents and opponents of religious icons in the Byzantine Empire from 726 to 842 AD.
context_section_description: During the American Revolution, the Sons of Liberty pulled down and destroyed the gilded lead statue of George III of the United Kingdom on Bowling Green (New York City), melting it down to be recast as ammunition. Similar acts have accompanied the independence of most ex-colonial territories. Sometimes relatively intact monuments are moved to a collected display in a less prominent place, as in India and also post-Communist countries.
  In August 2017, a statue of a Confederate soldier dedicated to "the boys who wore the gray" was pulled down from its pedestal in front of Durham County Courthouse in North Carolina by protesters. This followed the events at the 2017 Unite the Right rally in response to growing calls to remove Confederate monuments and memorials across the U.S.
caption: The Sons of Liberty pulling down the statue of George III of the United Kingdom on Bowling Green (New York City), 1776
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