Pont d'Iéna ("

Jena Jena () is a German city and the second largest city in Thuringia. Together with the nearby cities of Erfurt and Weimar, it forms the central metropolitan area of Thuringia with approximately 500,000 inhabitants, while the city itself has a po ...

Bridge") is a bridge spanning the River Seine in Paris. It links the

Eiffel Tower The Eiffel Tower ( ; french: links=yes, tour Eiffel ) is a wrought-iron lattice tower on the Champ de Mars in Paris, France. It is named after the engineer Gustave Eiffel, whose company designed and built the tower. Locally nicknamed "' ...

on the

Left Bank In geography, a bank is the land alongside a body of water. Different structures are referred to as ''banks'' in different fields of geography, as follows. In limnology (the study of inland waters), a stream bank or river bank is the terra ...

to the district of

Trocadéro The Trocadéro (), site of the Palais de Chaillot, is an area of Paris, France, in the 16th arrondissement, across the Seine from the Eiffel Tower. It is also the name of the 1878 palace which was demolished in 1937 to make way for the Palai ...

on the

Right Bank In geography, a bank is the land alongside a body of water. Different structures are referred to as ''banks'' in different fields of geography, as follows. In limnology (the study of inland waters), a stream bank or river bank is the terrai ...

History

In 1807, by an imperial decree issued in

Warsaw Warsaw ( pl, Warszawa, ), officially the Capital City of Warsaw,, abbreviation: ''m.st. Warszawa'' is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the River Vistula in east-central Poland, and its population is officia ...

Napoleon I Napoleon Bonaparte ; it, Napoleone Bonaparte, ; co, Napulione Buonaparte. (born Napoleone Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821), later known by his regnal name Napoleon I, was a French military commander and political leader who ...

ordered the construction of a bridge overlooking the Military School, and named the it after his victory in 1806 at the Battle of Jena, disregarding other names considered previously: ''pont du

Champ-de-Mars The Champ de Mars (; en, Field of Mars) is a large public greenspace in Paris, France, located in the seventh ''arrondissement'', between the Eiffel Tower to the northwest and the École Militaire to the southeast. The park is named after the ...

'' and ''pont de l'École militaire''. Talleyrand later had the bridge reverted to its original name under

Louis-Philippe Louis Philippe (6 October 1773 – 26 August 1850) was King of the French from 1830 to 1848, and the penultimate monarch of France. As Louis Philippe, Duke of Chartres, he distinguished himself commanding troops during the Revolutionary Wa ...

. The structure was designed with five arches, each with an arc length of 28 m, and four intermediate piers. The initial construction, the cost of which was enormous at the time, was fully financed by the State and spanned six years from 1808 to 1814. The tympana along the sides of the bridge had been originally decorated with imperial eagles conceptualized by

François-Frédéric Lemot François-Frédéric Lemot (4 November 1772 — 6 May 1827) was a French sculptor, working in the Neoclassical style. Biography Lemot was born at Lyon. Having briefly studied architecture at the Academy of Besançon, then having made his way to P ...

and sculpted by Jean-François Mouret. The eagles were replaced with the royal letter "L" soon after the fall of the First Empire in 1815 but in 1852, when Napoléon III ascended the throne of the

Second Empire Second Empire may refer to: * Second British Empire, used by some historians to describe the British Empire after 1783 * Second Bulgarian Empire (1185–1396) * Second French Empire (1852–1870) ** Second Empire architecture, an architectural styl ...

, new imperial eagles, this time by the chisel of

Antoine-Louis Barye Antoine-Louis Barye (24 September 179525 June 1875) was a Romantic French sculptor most famous for his work as an ''animalier'', a sculptor of animals. His son and student was the known sculptor Alfred Barye. Biography Born in Paris, France, Ba ...

, replaced the royal "L". Put in place in 1853, on the two ends of the bridge, are four sculptures sitting on top of four corresponding pylons: a Gallic warrior by Antoine-Augustin Préault and a

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *'' Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a lette ...

warrior by

Louis-Joseph Daumas Louis-Joseph Daumas (1801–1887) was a French sculptor and medallist. Born in Toulon, Daumas was admitted into the École nationale supérieure des Beaux-Arts in 1826, and entered the ''atelier'' of David d'Angers.American architect and archit ...

by the

; an

Arab The Arabs (singular: Arab; singular ar, عَرَبِيٌّ, DIN 31635: , , plural ar, عَرَب, DIN 31635: , Arabic pronunciation: ), also known as the Arab people, are an ethnic group mainly inhabiting the Arab world in Western Asia, ...

warrior by Jean-Jacques Feuchère and a

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

warrior by François-Théodore Devaulx by the

. Towards the second half of the 19th century, the inadequacy of the bridge's carrying capacity started to become a pronounced problem. With the increasing traffic resulting from the expansion of the districts of Trocadéro, Auteuil and Passy, the necessity to enlarge the structure (the width of which was no more than 14 m, including the pavements) in a durable fashion grew as time went on. Not until 1937, with the prospect of the upcoming

World Fair A world's fair, also known as a universal exhibition or an expo, is a large international exhibition designed to showcase the achievements of nations. These exhibitions vary in character and are held in different parts of the world at a specif ...

drawing closer, did the French government decide to execute the project, which was all the more necessary as the structure was starting to show sure signs of deterioration. As well as the widening operation, reduced to just 35 meters from the planned 40 meters, the project also transformed the bridge with two additional concrete elements placed at either end, joining to the existing bridge with metal girders. Stone

facings A facing colour is a common tailoring technique for European military uniforms where the visible inside lining of a standard military jacket, coat or tunic is of a different colour to that of the garment itself.René Chartrand, William Younghusb ...

were used to protect the concrete tympana, the imperial eagles put back in place and the four statues repositioned accordingly during the bridge expansion. This bridge has been part of the supplementary registry of historic monuments since 1975. The steps leading off the bridge are popularly known among film fans as the "Renault stairs", as they featured in a scene in ''

A View to a Kill ''A View to a Kill'' is a 1985 spy film and the fourteenth in the ''James Bond'' series produced by Eon Productions, and is the seventh and final appearance of Roger Moore as the fictional MI6 agent James Bond. Although the title is adapted ...

'' where

James Bond The ''James Bond'' series focuses on a fictional British Secret Service agent created in 1953 by writer Ian Fleming, who featured him in twelve novels and two short-story collections. Since Fleming's death in 1964, eight other authors have ...

(played by Roger Moore) drove a hijacked Renault 11 taxi down the steps in pursuit of an assassin later revealed to be May Day ( Grace Jones).

Gallery

File:Tour Eiffel autochrome collection Albert Kahn museum.jpg, Pont d'Iéna in Paris (1914) File:Paris_expo_1937.jpg, Pont d'Iéna in Paris (1937) File:Guerrier romain par Louis Daumas, October 12, 2012.jpg,

warrior by

File:Cavalier Gaulois Pont D'Iena RG am.jpg, Gallic warrior by Antoine-Augustin Préault File:Cavalier arabe pont d'Iena RD am.jpg,

warrior by Jean-Jacques Feuchère File:Cavalier Grec pont d'Iena RD av.jpg,

warrior by François-Théodore Devaulx

Access

References

External links

*
Bridge history

Technical Specifications
{{Authority control Bridges over the River Seine in Paris Bridges completed in 1814 Buildings and structures in the 7th arrondissement of Paris Buildings and structures in the 16th arrondissement of Paris