TOLSA, Manuel, Spanish engineer and sculptor, born in Enguera, Valencia, about 1750; died in Mexico about 1810. He studied architecture and sculpture in the Academy of San Carlos of Madrid, and became a member of the Academy of fine arts of San Fernando. In 1781 he went to Mexico as government architect, and as such he has left numerous marks of his genius in various public buildings, directing the erection of the towers of the cathedral in 1787-'91, and of the College of mines, for which he made the plans and began the building in 1797; but afterward he had to modify the plan, to add a second story, which was begun in 1799. In 1798 he became director of the Academy of San Carlos; but his chief fame rests on the equestrian statue of Charles IV., ordered in 1795 by the viceroy, Marquis de Branciforte, of which a temporary model in plaster was erected in 1796. After the working model was completed by Tolsa, the statue was cast, under his own direction, on 4 August, 1802, without an accident, notwithstanding that it contains thirty tons of bronze. The statue is 151/2 feet high, and was erected on a 201/2-foot stone pedestal, on the queen's birthday, 9 December, 1803, in the main square of Mexico. In 1822 it was removed to the university, and since 1852 it has stood oil the Paseo de Bucareli, at the crossing of the Calzada de la Re-forma. It is one of the finest in America, and, according to Humboldt, second only to the statue of Marcus Aurelius in Rome. When England declared war against France and Spain in 1803, Tolsa established a foundry in Mexico where many cannon for coast defence were successfully cast.