Description of the attraction
Pont de la Tournelle appears in Dumas' novel The Three Musketeers in a funny episode. On this bridge, Porthos saw Planchet spitting into the water and watching the diverging circles. Porthos decided that this occupation speaks of a tendency to contemplation and prudence, and offered Planchet as a servant to d'Artagnan.
Well, there is something to behold from the Pont de la Tournelle, which connects the Ile Saint-Louis to the left bank of the Seine. Planchet could not only spit into the water, but also admire the beautiful view of the east arrow of the Isle of Cite and the Cathedral of Notre Dame de Paris.
Almost four centuries have passed since then, and the view is still beautiful. True, the bridge is not the same. Crossings at this place have changed more than once. The first, still wooden, was built here in the XIV century. It was washed away by the flood of 1651. Five years later, the bridge was rebuilt in stone. He stood for quite a long time, although he was often beaten by ice. In 1918, the bridge had to be demolished because the flood of 1910 damaged it too much.
In 1928, the current bridge was erected here. The architects brothers Pierre and Louis Guidetti had a difficult task: to fit the structure into a unique landscape, given that this section of the Seine is one of the most difficult to navigate in Paris. The brothers tried to emphasize the asymmetry of the river, for which they built a monumental pylon 14 meters high on the left pier. At the top of the pylon is a statue of St. Genevieve by the famous sculptor Paul Landowski (it was he who created the statue of Christ the Redeemer in Rio de Janeiro).
St. Genevieve is the patroness of Paris. In 451, when the city was threatened by the invading Attila, a young, impeccable Christian woman, Genevieve, predicted that Paris would be saved. Compatriots did not believe her and even wanted to kill her, but Attila really left Paris. Later, when the city was under the siege of Clovis for five years, Genevieve organized the delivery of food for the starving people - she brought a caravan of eleven ships with food supplies.
St. Genevieve looks into the distance from the Pont de la Tournelle, with a motherly gesture protecting the child standing at her feet. This child is Paris.
