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First French Empire

  • Sénat conservateurThe Sénat conservateur was born in the wreckage of revolution. On the 13th of December 1799, just weeks after Napoleon Bonaparte toppled the Directory in the…
  • TribunatThe Tribunat was born on the 1st of January 1800, the same day as the Constitution of Year VIII took effect and reshaped the French state.
  • French ConsulateThe French Consulate was the government of France from the 9th of November 1799 to the 18th of May 1804, a span of less than five years that changed the…
  • Antoine Christophe SalicetiAntoine Christophe Saliceti died in Naples on the 23rd of December 1809, in circumstances that no one has ever fully explained.
  • Corps législatifThe Constitution of the Year VIII took effect in 1799 and established a new Corps législatif. This body replaced the Council of Five Hundred from the…
  • Berlin DecreeThe Berlin Decree arrived on the 21st of November 1806, issued by Napoleon from a city he had just conquered. Prussia had fallen at the Battle of Jena, and…
  • Jacques-Louis DavidJacques-Louis David was born in Paris on the 30th of August 1748, into a world of powdered wigs, gilded ceilings, and a painting style built on prettiness.
  • First French EmpireThe First French Empire was proclaimed on the 18th of May 1804, when the French Senate granted Napoleon Bonaparte the title Emperor of the French.
  • Roger DucosRoger Ducos cast his vote for the execution of King Louis XVI without appeal and without delay. That single act, recorded in the National Convention in the…
  • Coronation of NapoleonThe Coronation of Napoleon unfolded on the 2nd of December, 1804, inside Notre-Dame de Paris, and it left witnesses with a ceremony unlike anything France…
  • Napoleon and the JewsNapoleon and the Jews stands as one of the most debated chapters in modern Jewish history. On the 22nd of May 1799, a French newspaper reported that Napoleon…
  • Napoleon IINapoleon II was Emperor of the French for exactly two days. He never sat on the throne. He never held a scepter. He never gave an order that anyone was bound…
  • French Imperial EagleThe French Imperial Eagle stood just 310 mm tall and weighed under two kilograms. Yet Napoleon told his troops on the 5th of December 1804 that they must…