George III (The Copper Horse)

The statue was announced in January 1821 by George IV, to commemorate his late father George III, who had died one year before. George IV had visited Westmacott's studio in December 1820, where he saw a smaller equestrian statue of George III that had been commissioned by the Liverpool Corporation to celebrate the Golden Jubilee of George III, ten years earlier, delayed through very slow collection of public subscriptions. That smaller statue, now displayed in Monument Place, Liverpool, depicts George III in classical garb, mounted on a horse, with his right arm outstretched, in the manner of the second century Equestrian Statue of Marcus Aurelius in Rome. Westmacott had studied in Rome in…

The statue depicts George III on horseback, in the style of a Roman emperor, wearing a laurel wreath and toga, riding without stirrups. The statue is reminiscent of the Equestrian Statue of Marcus Aurelius in Rome. The high stone base also leads to comparisons with the Bronze Horseman, an equestrian statue of Peter the Great unveiled in Saint Petersburg in 1782. A c.1821 drawing attributed to John Nash shows a similar equestrian statue of George III, but the subject is much younger and the statue is mounted on a regular rectangular plinth oriented to the northwest. This may be a drawing of the proposal: Nash is not known to have been involved in the design of the statue, which is attributed…