carries her cap of liberty on a pole, and it is not of the Phrygian form. 1660
From Phrygian to liberty cap In late
Republican Rome, a soft felt cap called the
pileus served as a symbol of freemen (i.e. non-slaves) and was symbolically given to slaves upon
manumission, thereby granting them not only their personal liberty, but also
libertas – freedom as citizens, with the right to vote (if male). Following the
assassination of Julius Caesar in 44 BCE,
Brutus and his co-conspirators instrumentalized this symbolism of the
pileus to signify the end of Caesar's
dictatorship and a return to the (Roman) republican system. These Roman associations of the
pileus with liberty and
republicanism were carried forward to the 18th century, until when the pileus was confused with the Phrygian cap, then becoming a symbol of those values in the wake of Medieval Italian uses of the Phrygian cap, most notably in
Venice. In Venice, the Phrygian cap was used by the
Doge instead of a crown as a symbol of Republican liberty, from the Middle Ages until 1797. The symbol of Libertas as a female figure holding the Phrygian cap upon a spear appeared in the 1500s in the Apotheosis of Venice, a major painting by Paolo Veronese in the Ducal palace, iconography that would later be reused in French and American art and coinage.
France's bonnet rouge s , who was deeply hostile to the French Revolution, a Phrygian cap substitutes for
Scylla atop the dangerous "Rock of Democracy", as
Britannia's boat (the
Constitution) navigates
between Scylla's rock and Charybdis, the "Whirlpool of Arbitrary-Power", pursued by Scylla's "dogs":
Sheridan,
Fox, and
Priestley, depicted as
sharks.
In revolutionary France In 1675, the anti-tax and anti-nobility
Stamp-Paper revolt erupted in
Brittany and north-western France, where it became known as the
bonnets rouges uprising after the blue or red caps worn by the insurgents. Although the insurgents are not known to have preferred any particular style of cap, the name and color stuck as a symbol of revolt against the nobility and establishment.
Robespierre would later object to the color but was ignored. The use of a Phrygian-style cap as a symbol of
revolutionary France is first documented in May 1790, at a festival in
Troyes, adorning a statue representing the nation, and at
Lyon, on a lance carried by the goddess
Libertas. To this day the national allegory of France,
Marianne, is shown wearing a red Phrygian cap. By wearing the
bonnet rouge and
sans-culottes ("without silk breeches"), the Parisian working class made their revolutionary ardor and plebeian solidarity immediately recognizable. By mid-1791 these mocking fashion statements included the
bonnet rouge as Parisian hairstyle, proclaimed by the Marquis de Villette (12 July 1791) as "the civic crown of the free man and French regeneration”. On 15 July 1792, seeking to suppress the frivolity,
François Christophe Kellermann, 1st Duc de Valmy, published an essay in which the Duke sought to establish the
bonnet rouge as a sacred symbol that could be worn only by those with merit. The symbolic hairstyle became a rallying point and a way to mock the elaborate wigs of the aristocrats and the red caps of the bishops. On 6 November 1793 the
Paris city council declared it the official hairstyle of all its members. The
bonnet rouge on a spear was proposed as a component of the national seal on 22 September 1792 during the third session of the
National Convention. Following a suggestion by Gaan Coulon, the Convention decreed that convicts would not be permitted to wear the red cap, as it was consecrated as the badge of citizenship and freedom. In 1792, when
Louis XVI was induced to sign a constitution, popular prints of the king were doctored to show him wearing the
bonnet rouge. The bust of
Voltaire was crowned with the red bonnet of liberty after a performance of his
Brutus at the
Comédie-Française in March 1792. During the period of the
Reign of Terror (September 1793 – July 1794), the cap was adopted defensively even by those who might be denounced as moderates or aristocrats and were especially keen to advertise their adherence to the new regime. The caps were often knitted by women known as
tricoteuses, who sat beside the
guillotine during public executions in Paris and supposedly continued knitting in between executions. The spire of
Strasbourg Cathedral was crowned with a
bonnet rouge in order to prevent it from being torn down in 1794.
During the Restoration In 1814, the ''
Acte de déchéance de l'Empereur decision formally deposed the Bonapartes and restored the Bourbon regime, who in turn proscribed the bonnet rouge
, La Marseillaise'' and
Bastille Day celebrations. The symbols reappeared briefly in March–July 1815 during "
Napoleon's Hundred Days", but were immediately suppressed again following the second restoration of
Louis XVIII on 8 July 1815. The symbols resurfaced again during the
July Revolution of 1830, after which they were reinstated by the liberal
July Monarchy of
Louis Philippe I, and the revolutionary symbolsanthem, holiday, and
bonnet rougebecame "constituent parts of a national heritage consecrated by the state and embraced by the public."
In modern France The republican associations with the
bonnet rouge were adopted as the
name and emblem of a French satirical republican and anarchist periodical published between 1913 and 1922 by
Miguel Almereyda that targeted the
Action française, a royalist, counter-revolutionary movement on the extreme right. The anti-tax associations with the
bonnet rouge were revived in October 2013, when a French tax-protest movement called the
Bonnets Rouges used the red revolution-era Phrygian cap as a protest symbol. By means of large demonstrations and direct action, which included the destruction of many highway trucking tax portals, the movement successfully forced the French government to rescind the tax.
In the United Kingdom In the 18th century, the cap was often used in English political prints as an attribute of
Liberty.
In Revolutionary America medal, initiated and designed by
Benjamin Franklin, honors the
American Revolution and depicts the goddess of Liberty carrying a Phrygian cap In the years just prior to the
Revolutionary War, Americans copied or emulated some of those prints in an attempt to visually defend their "
rights as Englishmen". Later, the symbol of republicanism and anti-monarchical sentiment appeared in the United States as the headgear of
Columbia, who in turn was visualized as a goddess-like female national personification of the United States and of
Liberty herself. The cap reappears in association with Columbia in the early years of the republic, for example, on the obverse of the 1785
Immune Columbia pattern coin, which shows the goddess with a helmet seated on a globe holding in a right hand a furled U.S. flag topped by the liberty cap. (as part of their official seals),
New Jersey, and
New York, as well as the official seal of the
United States Senate, the state of
Iowa, the state of
North Carolina (as well as the arms of its
Senate,
In Latin America and Haiti Many of the
anti-colonial revolutions in Latin America were heavily inspired by the imagery and slogans of the
American and
French Revolutions. As a result, the cap has appeared on the
coats of arms of many Latin American nations. The
coat of arms of Haiti includes a Phrygian cap to commemorate that country's
foundation by rebellious slaves. The cap had also been displayed on certain Mexican coins (most notably the old 8-
reales coin) through the late 19th century into the mid-20th century. Today, it is featured on the
coats of arms or
national flags of Argentina, Bolivia, Colombia, Republica Dominicana, Cuba, El Salvador, Haiti, Nicaragua and Paraguay.
The Phrygian cap in Latin American and Haitian coats of arms and flags •
Coat of arms of Argentina •
Coat of arms of Bolivia, featured on the
state flag of Bolivia •
Coat of arms of Colombia, featured on the
naval ensign of Colombia •
Coat of arms of Cuba •
Coat of arms of El Salvador, featured on the
flag of El Salvador •
Coat of arms of Haiti, featured on the
flag of Haiti •
Coat of arms of Nicaragua, featured on the
flag of Nicaragua • Reverse side of the
coat of arms of Paraguay, featured on the
reverse of the
flag of Paraguay == Gallery ==