Statue of Charles II

Soho Square was laid out in the 1670s, during the reign of Charles II, and was originally called King Square in his honour. Its layout was influenced by European baroque ideas and specifically by the French tradition of a formal place royale. At its centre was a formal garden, in the middle of which stood a fountain in a basin that was installed in 1681. The fountain was a modest imitation of Bernini's famous Fontana dei Quattro Fiumi in Rome, which Caius Cibber probably saw during his visit to the city to study sculpture in the 1660s. Each corner had statues of river gods representing the Thames, Severn, Humber and Tyne, The fountain's water, which was pumped by a windmill in nearby…

in 2008]] The statue portrays Charles in a standing pose, left hand on hip, with his head turned to the right and wearing a long wig. He is shown wearing some body and thigh armour and a heavy long cloak at the back, and formerly held a baton in his right hand. The low pedestal once had an inscription on it, but this became illegible as long ago as 1815, leading to some dispute at that time about whom the statue was meant to represent. As the square was once called Monmouth Square, some people erroneously supposed the statue to represent Charles' favoured out-of-wedlock son, the Duke of Monmouth. By the 1920s it was described as "black with age". The pedestal's decorative carvings comprise…