Champ de Mars: Parade Ground of the Revolution
Why is it significant?
Find a spot on the long lawns, turn round, and take in the whole tower from top to toe. Picnic blankets, a football, a couple taking a hundred selfies... this is the living room of western Paris. But the field itself is older than the tower by more than a century.
Key Facts
| Place | Champ de Mars: Parade Ground of the Revolution |
|---|---|
| Address | Champ de Mars, Allée Adrienne Lecouvreur, 75007 Paris, France |
| Geo Coordinates | 48.85610, 2.29780 |
| Part of Walk | Iron, Glory and Gold: The Eiffel Tower, Trocadéro & Les Invalides in Paris |
| Generated | Generated |
Find a spot on the long lawns, turn round, and take in the whole tower from top to toe. Picnic blankets, a football, a couple taking a hundred selfies... this is the living room of western Paris. But the field itself is older than the tower by more than a century.
The Champ de Mars, the Field of Mars, was laid out in the 1760s as a drill ground for the cadets of the military school at the far end. In August 1783 it saw something no one had seen before: the physicist Jacques Charles launched the first balloon filled with hydrogen from here. It drifted away for some forty-five minutes and came down in a village north of Paris, where, the story goes, terrified peasants attacked the strange hissing monster with pitchforks.
Then came the Revolution. On the 14th of July 1790, the first anniversary of the fall of the Bastille, Paris held the Festival of the Federation right here. Thousands of volunteers, aristocrats and laundresses side by side, had dug the earth banks around the field by hand in a few days. Hundreds of thousands watched as King Louis XVI swore to uphold the new constitution. It was the last day France felt truly united around him.
A year later, in July 1791, a crowd gathered here to demand the king's removal, and the National Guard opened fire. Dozens died in what became known as the Champ de Mars massacre. The same lawn has hosted five Universal Exhibitions since then, and in the summer of 2024 it became an Olympic site, with beach volleyball played in a stadium at the tower's foot.
And the tower itself was only ever meant to be temporary. Eiffel had permission for twenty years, until 1909, after which it could be dismantled. He saved it by making it useful: weather experiments, a wind tunnel, and above all a giant radio antenna. In the First World War its station listened in on enemy messages, and science, not beauty, kept it standing. Now walk the length of the lawns towards the grand building at the far end.