Curated category
Napoleon
- Malet coup of 1812Claude François de Malet was born in 1754. He distinguished himself in the French Revolutionary Wars and slowly became disenchanted with Napoleon Bonaparte.
- NapoleonNapoleon Bonaparte was born on the island of Corsica on the 15th of August 1769 to Carlo Maria Buonaparte and Maria Letizia Ramolino.
- Treaty of Campo FormioA small house in the main square of Campo Formio held the weight of European history on the 17th of October 1797. Napoleon Bonaparte and Count Philipp von…
- Legion of HonourOn the 19th of May 1802, Napoleon Bonaparte signed a decree creating the Legion of Honour. He wanted to replace old aristocratic orders with something based…
- Peace of Pressburg (1805)The Battle of Austerlitz ended on the 2nd of December 1805 with a decisive French victory. Napoleon Bonaparte defeated the combined forces of Russia and…
- Concordat of 1801The National Assembly seized church properties during the French Revolution. This action stripped the Catholic Church of its vast landholdings and income…
- Coup of 18 BrumaireOn the 12th of March 1799, Habsburg-controlled Austria declared war on France. This declaration triggered emergency measures that allowed the pro-war Jacobin…
- Protector of the Confederation of the RhineA lithograph by Charles Motte from the 1820s shows German princes rendering homage to Napoleon. This image captures a moment shortly after the ratification…
- Constitution of the Year VIIIOn the 18th of Brumaire, year VIII, which corresponds to the 9th of November 1799, Napoleon Bonaparte executed a coup d'état in Saint-Cloud.
- Frankfurt proposalsAustrian foreign minister Klemens von Metternich designed the peace proposal in November 1813. The document emerged after Napoleon suffered a decisive defeat…
- Treaty of Fontainebleau (1814)On the 11th of April 1814, Napoleon signed his abdication at the Palace of Fontainebleau. This moment ended years of conflict known as the War of the Sixth…
- Abdications of BayonneOn the 27th of October 1807, an unsuccessful attempt by the Prince of Asturias to end Manuel Godoy's government revealed deep instability within Spain.
- Acte de déchéance de l'EmpereurThe French Consulate emerged from the chaos of 18 Brumaire, a military coup executed by General Bonaparte. This event established an equilateral triumvirate…
- Congress of ErfurtNapoleon, Emperor of the French, met Alexander I, Emperor of All Russia, on Tuesday the 27th of September 1808. This meeting aimed to reaffirm an alliance…
- Continental SystemThe Continental System was Napoleon's grand attempt to strangle Britain without firing a single shot at sea. On the 21st of November 1806, he signed the…
- Italian campaign of 1796–1797On the 27th of March 1796, Napoleon Bonaparte summoned three senior generals to his headquarters in Nice. Louis Alexandre Berthier served as chief of staff…
- Military career of NapoleonIn the autumn of 1793, a young artillery officer named Napoleon Bonaparte stood before the fortified port city of Toulon.
- Coronation of NapoleonNapoleon was crowned Emperor of the French on the 2nd of December 1804. This event marked the instantiation of a modern empire in France.
- Napoleon and the JewsThe French Revolution of 1789 enacted the first laws to emancipate Jews in France. This legislation established French Jews as citizens equal to other…
- Clisson et EugénieClisson stands at the front of an armed charge toward the enemy. He deliberately engineers his own death to end a marriage that has turned against him.
- French expedition to SardiniaThe year 1793 marked the first offensive by the new French Republic in the Mediterranean during the War of the First Coalition.
- Napoleon's penisNapoleon died on the 5th of May 1821 on the island of Saint Helena. An autopsy followed his death, and some accounts claim François Carlo Antommarchi removed…
- Napoleon's theoremImagine a triangle drawn on paper with sides of any length. On each side, construct an equilateral triangle pointing outward.
- Napoleon's tombIn early 1840, the French government led by Adolphe Thiers made a bold political decision to return Napoleon's remains from Saint Helena.
- Quum memorandaThe Latin phrase Quum memoranda opens a papal brief issued by Pope Pius VII in 1809. This document arrived as a direct counter to an imperial decree from…
- Route NapoléonNapoleon I stepped onto the soil of France on the 1st of March 1815. He had escaped from his exile on the island of Elba just days before.
- Napoleonic CodeOn the 12th of August 1800, Napoleon Bonaparte appointed a commission of four jurists to draft a new civil code for France.
- French Imperial EagleOn the 5th of December 1804, three days after his coronation, Napoleon I distributed aigles based on the eagle standards of the Roman legions.
- HMS Undaunted (1807)The keel of HMS Undaunted was laid down in April 1806 under the supervision of naval constructor Edward Sison. This vessel belonged to a class of sixteen…
- Legacy of NapoleonIn 1805, Jacques-Louis David painted Napoleon Crossing the Alps, a work that would become central to centuries of historical argument.
- Napoleon complexAn 1803 political cartoon by James Gillray depicts Napoleon as short of stature. This image helped spread a myth about the French emperor's height that…
- Bank of FranceOn the 14th of April 1803, the new Bank received its first official charter granting it the exclusive right to issue paper money in Paris for fifteen years.
- Napoleonic tacticsIn 1792, the French Army began a radical transformation of its battlefield principles. Jean-Baptiste Vaquette de Gribeauval and Jean-Pierre du Teil developed…