The Bavaria is a bronze statue on the Theresienhöhe in Munich. Ludwig I of Bavaria commissioned it, and Ludwig Michael Schwanthaler designed its final form. Leo von Klenze first proposed the idea in 1824 and built the Hall of Fame behind it. The figure wears Germanic dress, an oak-leaf wreath and a bearskin, and holds a drawn sword.
The statue is 60 feet 9 inches (18.52 meters) tall and weighs about 87 tons, on a stone base 28 feet (8.92 meters) high. It was sand-cast in several parts between 1844 and 1850 and unveiled on October 9, 1850. The head was cast from Turkish cannon salvaged from the 1827 Battle of Navarino.
An internal circular staircase leads to a platform in the head. Openings in the helmet look over the Theresienwiese. The statue closed in 2001, after experts found more than 30 flaws, and reopened in September 2002 after a renovation of about one million euros.
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