Joan of Arc dungeon stone, Rouen, France, ca. 1200
date: label: date made
content: 1915
label: associated date
content: 1915-12-06
name: label: associated person
content: Joan of Arc
notes: label: Description
content: On the eve of the First World War a statue of Joan of Arc was raised in New York City. The cast-bronze figure was placed atop a pedestal fitted with stones recently excavated from the castle in which Joan had been imprisoned and led to the stake in 1431. The statue and its symbolic pedestal were the inspiration of the American Scenic and Historic Preservation Society, led by George Frederick Kunz, a gemologist with Tiffany and Company.
label: Description
content: In 1909, Kunz chartered a statue committee to commemorate the upcoming 500th anniversary of Joan’s birth in 1412. The committee chose the young sculptor Anna Vaughn Hyatt to create the figure of an armor-clad Joan astride a horse.
label: Description
content: In 1912, learning that the dungeon was being excavated to make way for a modern building in Rouen, France, Kunz and the statue committee purchased the lot of 229 blocks, some 36,000 pounds of stone. The stones left Rouen for New York in June 1914. Today they form the decorative elements of the pedestal of the statue at Riverside Drive and 93rd Street.
label: Description
content: Gift of the Joan of Arc Statue Committee through George F. Kunz, 1915
place: label: associated place
content: France: Normandie, Rouen
setName: label: See more items in
content: Political History: Political History, General History Collection
label: See more items in
content: Government, Politics, and Reform
label: See more items in
content: Souvenir Nation
creditLine: label: Credit Line
content: Joan of Arc Statue Committee
dataSource: label: Data Source
content: National Museum of American History
identifier: label: ID Number
content: PL.015842
label: catalog number
content: 15842
label: accession number
content: 59181
objectType: label: Object Name
content: stone, dungeon
physicalDescription: label: Physical Description
content: limestone (overall material)