Prix de Rome

in full Grand Prix de Rome

Art scholarship awarded by the French government from 1663 to 1968. Established by Louis XIV and Charles Le Brun, it enabled young French painters, sculptors, architects, engravers, and musicians to study in Rome. Grand-prize winners in each artistic category studied at the Académie de France in Rome for four years. Many of the greatest French artists and musicians of past centuries were prizewinners, including Jean-Honor, Jacques-Louis David, Hector Berlioz, and Claude Debussy. The competitions were discontinued in 1968 following the student riots in Paris, but the prize name was subsequently adopted by various groups for their own competitions.

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