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SPECIAL DOSSIER: THE CREATION OF THE CONFEDERATION OF THE RHINE, 12 July, 1806
It is perhaps hard to get enthusiastic about bicentenaries of treaties and territorial alterations which do not involve heroism, suffering and huge geopolitical clashes. But such ‘softer' changes are equally as shattering as the confrontations of great armies. The creation of the Confederation of the Rhine was in a way a natural development. These western German states which found themselves weak, subject to the meddling of the greater powers in the region, but having seen the possibilities offered by the French Revolution, were eager for autonomy and rational administration. France, the great super power in the region (and what is more on the rise) was obsessed with its concept of “natural frontiers”, those frontiers which would make France safe from invasion, namely the Alps to the south and east and the Rhine to the east. So with the power of Austria and Prussia on the wane, and the Holy Roman Empire an irrelevance, this marriage of Franco-German minds in the first decade of the 19th century was clear. Enjoy!
Peter Hicks
Legend: Portrait of Dalberg, Prince primat of the Confederation of the Rhine (de.wikipedia.org)
Document
- Treaty creating the Confederation of the Rhine (Paris, 12 July, 1806)
Article
- The Confederation of the Rhine, by Peter Hicks
Map
- Map of Europe in 1806
Timeline
- From the Holy Roman Empire to the Germanic Confederation
Biographies of the key players
- Karl Friedrich von Baden-Durlach (1728-1811), Grand Duke of Baden
- Jerome Bonaparte (1784–1860), king of Westphalia
- Princess Catherine of Wurtemberg, (1783-1835), second wife of Jerome
- C. Th. von Dalberg (1744-1817), Prince primat of the Confederation of the Rhine
- Francis II (1768-1835), emperor of the Holy Roman Empire
- Graf von Haugwitz (1752–1832), Prussian minister of foreign affairs
- King Maximilian I of Bavaria (1756 –1825)
- Count von Montgelas (1759-1838), Bavarian minister
- Frederick I of Württemberg (1754 - 1816), Elector
In pictures
- Meeting between Napoleon and Baron Karl von Dalberg at Aschaffenburg, 2 October, 1806
- Page of the treaty, on the site of the French ministry of Foreign Affairs
Bibliography
- The Confederation of the Rhine (1806-1815)
What's on
- Adel im Wandel (Changing nobility) Exhibition in the Prinzenbau and Landeshaus Sigmaringen, Germany
- Bayerns Krone 1806 (Bavaria's crown, 1806) Exhibition in what used to be the king's residence in Munich, Germany
- Napoleon and Nassau Exhibition in the Wiesbaden Casino-Gesellschaft, Germany
- Das Königreich Württemberg 1806–1918. Monarchie und Moderne (The kingdom of Württemberg 1806–1918. Monarchy and modernity) In the old castle, Stuttgart, Germany
- 200 Jahre Großherzogtum Baden (200 years of the Grand Duchy of Baden) Badisches Landesmuseum Karlsruhe, Germany
- The price of the new crown: Baden and Wurttemberg as Napoleon's vassal – the Confederation of the Rhine 1806 Wehrgeschichtliches Museum Rastatt, Germany
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THIS MONTH'S BOOK
ROWE, Michael, From Reich to State: The Rhineland in the Revolutionary Age, 1780-1830 (New Studies in European History)
From the publishers:
Napoleon's contribution to Germany's development was immense. Under his hegemony, the millennium-old Holy Roman Empire dissolved, paving the way for a new order. Nowhere was the transformation more profound than in the Rhineland. Based upon an extensive range of German and French archival sources, this book locates the Napoleonic episode in this region within a broader chronological framework, encompassing the Old Regime and Restoration.
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200 YEARS AGO
On 24 June, 1806, a decree was passed prohibiting gamaing houses throughout the empire (article 1). However, article 4 allowed the Police minister to adopt specific regulations for «the places where there are mineral waters [in other words, spa towns] and for the city of Paris.
(Le Moniteur universel, 30 June, 1806)
Gaming was hardly controlled at all when the legislation was passed. The legislation operating at the time (the penal code of 1791) was felt to be too soft in comparison to the rigour imposed by the Ancien régime and crime and violence were on the increase. The lure of the gaming tables was felt in all social classes and there were gaming houses everywhere, even in cafés… Roulette was introduced in 1802, and passion led to addiction and occasionally suicide.
The decree of 24 June was an attempt to limit these phenomena and the concomitant disorder. In 1810, with introduction of the Napoleonic Penal code, the running of a gaming house became a crime (art.410).
150 YEARS AGO
On 23 June, 1856, the ruling prince of Monaco, Florestan I (1785 - 1856), died in his seventy-first year. When he acceded to the monegascan throne, the principality was still a protectorate of the Kingdom of Sardinia, and Florestan was himself an actor working in Paris and completely unprepared to rule. As a result, he left the reins of power in the hands of his wife, Princess Caroline. Despite the efforts of the latter to improve her principality's finances, Monaco suffered a slump in 1856. And the situation was not to change until 1861 with the accession of Charles III. His way out of the crisis in 1861 was to offer the towns of Menton and Roquebrune to Napoleon III in return for financial benefits and also the laying of an imperial road and the prolongation of the railway from Nice to Monaco.
On 28 June, 1856, the first part of de Tocqueville's great work, l'Ancien Régime et la Révolution was to be published.
De Tocqueville had begun writing his conceptual work on the history of the French Revolution in 1854. His aim was to show that the Revolution was the result of an evolution.
Wishing you an excellent, Napoleonic, week.
Peter Hicks
Historian and Web editor
THE NAPOLEON.ORG BULLETIN, No 377, 23-29 June, 2006
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© this Napoleon.org weekly bulletin is published by the Fondation Napoléon. Reproduction or all or part of this bulletin is forbidden, without prior agreement of the Fondation Napoléon.
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FONDATION NAPOLEON LIBRARY
During the summer, from 17 July to 18 August, the Bibliothèque M. Lapeyre-Fondation Napoléon library will have the following opening hours:
Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday from 1-30 to 6pm. Normal opening times will resume on 21 August.
THIS WEEK in the MAGAZINE
Television:
The century that made us, BBC, UK
Conferences
Workshop: Luigi Emanuele Corvetto (1756-1821), financier, lawyer and politician, Genoa–Imperia, Italy
Commemorations:
- Pultusk 2006, Pultusk, Poland
- Jena 1806-2006 - Rendezvous in Thuringia The "Journées de Thuringe 2006" and the bicentenary of the Battle of Jena/Auerstädt
Exhibitions:
- NAPOLÉON An Intimate Portrait, South Carolina State Museum, Columbia, South Carolina, USA
- Napoleon on the Nile: Soldiers, Artists, and the Rediscovery of Egypt, New York, USA
- Géricault, a world of madness, Lyons, France
- Il tempo dell'Imperatore: gli orologi restaurati delle residenze di Napoleoni all'Elba, Elba, Italy
- "Battle in a sittingroom." The Austerlitz wallpaper, Museo Napoleonico, Rome, Italy
- Louis Napoleon: at the court of the first King of Holland, 1806-1810, Apeldoorn, Netherlands
Got a problem with the letter? Try the home page: http://www.napoleon.org
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