Come off the high horse and let's meet under the tail!

In front of the central station in Hanover, there is a statue of Ernst August on a horse. One of these left overs of the authoritarian times that self evidently decorate European cities but lost their meaning to the citizens long time ago. They do not even cause emotions.

Back then however, when the statue was supposed to be raised, there had been controversies.

Ernst August is the most popular name of the dukes and kings of Hanover. This particular Ernst August started his rule in Hanover in 1837, he died in 1851. Maybe the most exciting moment in the genealogy of the Welfen family is when the line splits and Victoria, Ernst August's niece becomes the queen of Great Britain and Ernst August takes over the throne of Hanover. This moment ends up the personal union of Great Britain and Hanover due to the fact that there were no women on Hanover's throne allowed, so they had sent a man.

To get a detailed overview over the entire dynasty, you can check the following site:
http://www.welfen.de/stammtafel.html

Zimmermänner at construction work around Ernst August

Never mind.

So there is this new guy in Hanover and he just seems not to know how to make friends. Hanoverians are rather not used to the presence of the monarch anyway, as the previous king would rather stay in London till now. 

Apparently, during his time in England Ernst August got used to be in the center of scandals and for many people a persona non grata. In Hanover he simply followed a well known path: a strong authoritarian style, weakening constitution, citizen rights, the role of the parliament and cutting the political independence of the University professors. 

The monument of Göttinger Seven in Hanover

The king's intervention in the University affairs led to a famous protest of the Göttinger Seven. Seven professors, including the brothers Grimm signed an open protest letter. Because of their rebellion, all of them lost their professorships, three of them have been expelled.

The story of his life was much more complex of course but to sum up: Ernst August I was not Hanover's favorite guy. After his death, somebody started an initiative to build a statue of the king. The monument was to be situated in the so called Ernst-August-Stadt being back then a brand new representative center of the city raised in place of the old city walls by the monarch himself. People would not donate money for the statue so just few privileged families saved the reputation of Hanover and participated in covering the costs. Despite this fact, the signature on the monument says "To the father of the nation from his royal people"...

However now the statue plays a central role in Hanover: among the two most popular meeting points in the city there is Ernst August I on his horse. And yet, nobody talks about the king. People say "let's meet under the tail", in German "Unter dem Schwanz" which is even more misleading and double meaning for outsiders.

Smoke and mirrors

The equestrian statue  to the right stands in front of the Cathedral of Porto. It has also some controversial history. Despite of its medieval look, the statue was built in 1968. According to some sources, the monument's only purpose was to give the aged dictator Salazar an opportunity to unveil something in an ostentatious ceremony. The knight on the horse is supposed to be Vimara Peres. According to the legend, he had reconquered the city from the Moors.

Restless life of a statue

A literally moving story hides behind the statue of duke Jozef Poniatowski in front of the presidential palace in Warsaw.

Statue of Duke Jozef Poniatowski in Warsaw - apparently the archetype
for this portrayal was a Roman statue of Marcus AureliusFor the first 90 years of its existence, the monument travelled from place to place within Poland as the Russian occupants would not allow to situate it in Warsaw. Then 1922, the rider and the horse were given a break and made a stop in Warsaw till Nazis destroyed the sculpture in 1944 during the Warsaw Upraising. After the World War II the Danes presented to Poland a copy of the statue as the author of the original was a Danish sculptor. 

 Nonetheless, the duke has still a bad karma: in the years past the airplane crash of Smolensk all manifests of sorrow and solidarity with the Smolensk families concentrated in the foot of the statue. And the manifests got more and more bizarre and extreme as time passed. The army of the Mohair Caps, as we Polish call the catholic fundamentalists, occupied the square in front of the presidential palace making the military watch speechless.
                    

    People in front of the Presidential Palace in Warsaw, July 2010

Well, I could go on and on about these vainglorious equestrian monuments. But I will stop now with a short conclusion. 

Two simple points in my story: First of all, as soon as there is a guy on a horse in a very exposed place, you can be sure it has been an act of communication in the past and might have caused fierce emotions. Secondly, we have these statues in the most cities in Europe. They are relicts of such different era however that we just oversee them day after day on our way to work. But probably we would lose our sense of orientation when dating or demonstrating if we wouldn't have a guy on a horse in the middle of our town.

              Polish national heroes Jan III Sobieski in Warsaw and Tadeusz Kosciuszko in Cracow:

The royals: Wilhelmina, queen of the Netherlands in Amsterdam, and Daniel, king of Galicia in Lviv:

The capitols of equestrian statues - Habsburg cities Vienna and Madrid:

Good climate for powerful horsemen: Berlin, the capitol of Prussia:

The Prussian Kaisers in Köln and Kiel:

Friedrich III on the Hohenzollern Bridge in Cologne

Wilhelm I in a park in Kiel

Getting off the horse...

Barcelona

Wolfenbüttel

By the way: the duke's name is August II and he comes from the very same Welfen family as Ernst August, he ruled two centuries before Ernst August I on the territory of Wolfenbüttel.