Vintage pair Swiss Lucerne cast iron recumbent lions painted black. Great used as bookends, since they are quite heavy. Latin inscription reads: Helvetiorum Fidel Ac Virtuti. (“To the loyalty and bravery of the Swiss”). The Lion of Lucerne, is a rock relief in Lucerne, Switzerland, designed by Bertel Thorvaldsen and hewn in 1820–21 by Lukas Ahorn. It commemorates the Swiss Guards who were massacred in 1792 during the French Revolution, when revolutionaries stormed the Tuileries