This sculpture of the famous Sun King, sitting in the courtyard of the Carnavelet Museum since 1890, is one of the rare royal statues that went through the French Revolution (1789) without damage. As mentioned before (1/3/07 blog), the museum tells the story of French history and is housed in a beautiful 16th century grand private residence (hotel). 
The artist, Antoine Coysevox, sculpted this in 1689. He also created some of the statues on the Versailles façade and the magnificent Fame and Mercury horses for the Marly hunting lodge (the originals are in the Louvre; copies stand at the place de la Concorde). (Refer to 3/17/07 blog.) Coysevox also did a bust of Jacques Gabriel, one of Louis XIV’s architects after he’d been dead for 25 years. That artwork sits in the Musee Jacquemart-Andre (2/28/07 blog).
It seems silly but it was a custom—Louis wore Roman attire and then crowned it with his curly French wig. This is even more interesting because French history consistently describes banishment of the Romans from ancient Paris! Oh, the French…
