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Place Raymond Poincaré

Monument aux morts de 1914-18

War Memorial 1914-18

Saint Jeanne d'Arc (Joan of Arc), The Maid of Orléans (ca. 1412 - 1431)
national heroine of France, beatified in 1909 and canonized in 1920. She led the French army to several important victories during the Hundred Years' War
(Wikipedia)

Maxime Real del Sarte
1922

Description

Relief showing Joan of Arc with a halo, wearing a breastplate and a tunic fleurdelisee, and a sword on her belt. With her the right arm, in which she keeps a laurel wreath she supports a dying soldier wrapped in a flag and with her left arm she point into the sky. In the upper right corner of the relief is the cathedral of Strasbourg depicted.

Inscription(s)

la ville de briey
a ses enfants morts pour la france
1914 - 1918

With lists of names of the fallen, later those of the 1939-45 war were added.

Annotation

The relief is almost identical to a marble relief of the war monument in Sommières-du-Clain (Vienne). That monument was commissioned by a member of the Vareilles-Sommières family from the Catholic and royalist sculptor Maxime Real del Sarte. The sculptor made two copies, one in marble for Sommières-du-Clain and the other in bronze for Briey. There are only small differences.
For the record, the family of the Count de Briey possessed at that time the castle of Roche à Magné, a few kilometers from Sommières-du-Clain, and the commission of both reliefs to Maxime Real del Sarte may be related to two families of Briey and Vareilles-Sommieres.

The Briey monument is inaugurated 24 September 1922.

Jeanne d'Arc - Timeline

1412 - Approx date of birth
1425 - Visions of Saint Michael, Saint Catherine, and Saint Margaret, who told her to drive out the English and bring the Dauphin to Rheims for his coronation
1428, May - Went to Vaucouleurs to ask garrison commander, Count Robert de Baudricourt, to send her to the royal French court at Chinon, but is sent away.
1429, February - Baudricourt allows Jeanne to join the Dauphin at Chinon.
1429, May 8 - Lifting of the siege of Orleans
1429, July 17 - Coronation of Charles VII in Reims
1430, May 23 - Captured at Compiègne
1431, May 30 - Executed at Rouen
1871 - After the defeat of 1871, in many French towns and villages statues of Jeanne d'Arc are erected.

Sculptor

Maxime Real del Sarte (Paris 1888 - 1954), French sculptor (Wikipedia).

Sources & Information

Poitou-Charentes, Sommières-du-Clain (Vienne) Monument aux morts.
Bernard Mugnier, La statuaire johannique du XVIe au XXe siècle (Vesoul: l'auteur, 2008), p. 361.
Jean-Marc Bodson, Modèle français (Bruxelles: Husson, 2008), no. 72.

Locatie (N 49°14'55" - E 5°56'15") (Satellite view: Google Maps)

Item Code: frlo134; Photograph: 15 June 2011
Of each statue we made photos from various angles and also detail photos of the various texts.
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© Website and photos: René & Peter van der Krogt

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