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THIS WEEK IN THE BULLETIN
This week read about the Colossus, a painting whose attribution to Goya has recently been put in doubt. Then we bring you news of the Consortium on the Revolutionary Era's 2009 conference in Savannah Georgia. There then follow two reminders (Napoleonica La Revue and the site's biographies). In ‘200 years ago', we see Napoleon lending money to kick-start his brother's new kingdom and the preparations for the Austerlitz (Vendôme) Column. In ‘150 years ago', you can read about Napoleon III creating military hospitals and his actions to create greenspace in Paris. In the Magazine, you can download a fundamental text on the history of the Pensinsular War, you can peruse one reader's review (Thomas Zacharis on Philip Haythornthwaite's latest book on Waterloo) and discover three recently published Napoleonic books, namely, David Markham on the passage from the Hundred Days to the departure for St Helena, Theodore Ayrault Dodge (republication) on the Russian campaign and Christopher Herold (republication) on Bonaparte in Egypt. Finally there's one new date for diary, the Napoleonic Association's annual conference in London in October.
Enjoy.
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THIS MONTH'S PAINTING
The Colossus, Madrid, Prado Museum
The occupation of Spain by Napoleon's troops beginning in 1808 and the patriotic reaction which ensued inspired Goya to one of his most dramatically forceful works. The Colossus (shown here) was begun 1808 and is to seen in the light of his more famous works, the Dos de Mayo and Tres de Mayo. Whilst the meaning of the painting however remains unclear, here we are presented with a vision of world falling apart.
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CALL FOR PAPERS: SAVANNAH 2009
The Consortium on the Revolutionary Era, 1750-1850 (CRE) is an organization which provides a venue for the presentation of original research on not only the revolutionary history of Europe in this era, but also the Atlantic World and beyond. It welcomes proposals from the allied disciplines and comparative studies; in short, it offers a platform for research into the revolutionary era broadly defined. The 2009 conference will be held February 19-21 at the Savannah DeSoto Hilton located in the heart of the historic district of Georgia's First City.
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NAPOLEONICA.LA REVUE
The first issue of Napoleonica.La Revue, the Fondatino Napoléon's e-journal has a fifty-page article (in French) on the role of the Grand-maréchal du Palais during the First Empire. The article was written by Pierre Branda, winner of the Fondation Napoléon Grand Prix for 2007. You can read either pay 7 euros to read this detailed article or you can sign up for the year for 60 euros.
BIOGRAPHIES
Why not have a wander through our biographies this weekend. There's plenty for you to (re-)discover.
200 YEARS AGO
Affairs in Spain
On 3 June, 1808, Napoleon approached the Banque de France for a loan of 25 million francs for Spain. The bank bowed to the demands of foreign policy.
«The bank will loan to the Spanish treasury twenty-five million francs or about one hundred million reals. This money will be transported by land to Bayonne, for a commission, which you will calculate. The payment should be made starting in the current month of June, at a rate of five million per month, for June, July, August, September, ending with five million in October. Interest should be paid at between 5 and 6 percent. It is to be paid to the Banque de France, and the guarantee for the loan will be crown jewels of an equal value (…) This loan is to be reimbursed in ten years». (Correspondence n° 14052, Napoleon's letter to Mollien, Minister of the Public Treasury, Bayonne, 3 June, 1808)
Work on the Austerlitz Column
«A great number of workmen are currently finishing the moulded bas-reliefs. The work on all those destined for the pedestal of the column is almost over, and they are soon to be mounted. These bas-reliefs represent groups and trophies of all sorts, like those on the Column of Trajan. Some of the bas reliefs which are to go around the column have also been moulded and they currently being chased» (Moniteur, 5 June, 1808).
In 1805, the day after Austerlitz, Vivant Denon, the Director of Museums, proposed that a commemorative column be erected dedicated to the Grande Armée, using the cannons taken from the Austrians. A decree of 1806 confirmed this proposal. Construction work began on 25 August, 1806 to finish on the symbolic date of 15 August, 1810.
See our file on the Vendôme column.
150 YEARS AGO
The military hospital in Vincennes was inaugurated on 1 June, 1858 (Almanach Napoléon, 1859)
The hospital was to be specifically for the garrison at Vincennes and the forts to East of Paris. It had been planned at the end of the Crimean War, and the Emperor, Napoleon III, had ceded 12 hectares of crown land to allow for the construction. In 1900, the hospital was renamed, this time after the surgeon L. J. Bégin.
On 6 June, 1858, the Moniteur universel noted the Sénatus-consulte, discussed and passed in the Senate on 15 May, 1858, which sanctioned the creation of a public promenade in the Bois de Boulogne park: «The Bois de Vincennes, included in the Crown donation, is to become a public promenade.» (1st and only article).
See our itinerary around the parks and gardens of the Second Empire.
Wishing you an excellent, Napoleonic, week.
Peter Hicks
Historian and Web editor
THE NAPOLEON.ORG BULLETIN, No 460, 30 May - 5 June, 2008
Interested in the work of the Fondation Napoléon? Why not participate, either generally or in a specific project, by making a donation.
© 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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Got a problem with a link in the Bulletin? Go to the homepage: http://www.napoleon.org
REMINDER
The new Bibliothèque Fondation Napoléon library times are: Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, from 1 to 6pm, Thursday from 10am to 3pm.
During the French school holidays the library openings times are Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, from 1-30 to 6pm.
THIS WEEK in the MAGAZINE
Seen on the web
- Important Spanish book on the Peninsula War online
Just published
- HAYTHORNTHWAITE Philip J., Waterloo Armies: The Men, Organization and Tactics - A reader's review
- MARKHAM J. David, The Road to St Helena: Napoleon After Waterloo
- DODGE Theodore Ayrault, Napoleon's Invasion of Russia
- HEROLD Christopher J., Bonaparte in Egypt
What's on
Re-enactments
- Medina de Rioseco, Spain
- Waterloo 1815 - 10th Napoleonic Bivouacs, Waterloo, Belgium
- Valencia: International Battle Re-enactment, Spain
Conferences
- Napoleonic Association 2008, London, UK
Exhibitions
- Coinage at War. Catalonia in Napoleonic Europe, National Art Museum of Catalonia, Barcelona
- Treasures of Napoleon, New Orleans, USA
- Napoleon III, der Kaiser vom Bodensee (The Emperor from Lake Constance), Arenenberg, Switzerland
- Napoleon – genius and tyrant, Namur, Belgium
- Royal weddings 1840-1947: from Queen Victoria to Queen Elizabeth II, Windsor, England
- Napoléon. Symboles des pouvoirs sous l'Empire (Symbols of Power: Napoleon and the Art of the Empire Style, 1800–1815), Paris, France
- Napoleone Fasto imperiale. I Tesori della Fondation Napoléon, Rome, Italy
- Gustave Courbet, Metropolitan Museum, New York, USA
- König Lustik!? Jérôme Bonaparte and the Model State: the Kingdom of Westphalia, Kassel, Germany
- The Eye of Josephine, High Museum of Art, Atlanta, GA, United States
- "The trace of the eagle ", the Invalides dome, Paris, France
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