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EDITORIAL
Imperial Art
Whilst on the one hand, the Fondation Napoléon's exhibition, "Imperial Splendour", celebrating primarily the magnificent decorative arts of the First Empire, just opened this week at Malbrouck, earlier this week we celebrated another art at another of the Fondation Napoléon's Ateliers. This second atelier was dedicated to the music of the First Empire, and with its fascinating discussions of the role that music played in daily life, interspersed with charming, beautiful and at times amusing, instrumental and vocal musical performances, it really was a great success.
Irène Delage
In the letter today, you will find the opportunity to delve further into the art of the period: as well as Napoleon's sumptuous throne, our latest objet d'art of the month, you will also find information on a new exhibition on European depictions of war in art which is taking place in Houston (USA) plus an excerpt from Chateaubriand's Mémoires d'outre-tombe in 200 years ago. Elsewhere, we have a new article on Napoleon's Egyptian campaign in our Kids' Corner and more information on the fast-approaching Nuit des musées, the reopening of the modern history wing of the Musée de l'Armée and an upcoming talk on the death of Napoleon.
And to finish, we are delighted to announce that Emmanuelle Papot, web editor of the French side of napoleon.org, gave birth to a baby boy named Malo on 20 March (who thus shares his birthday with the son of Napoleon I!). Mother, baby and father are all doing well, and we should like to take this opportunity to offer our congratulations to all concerned.
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OBJET D'ART OF THE MONTH
Napoleon's throne
If Napoleon's personal tastes were simple and reserved - his sober and functional campaign equipment attest to this fact -, the pomp and splendour that surrounded his regime were anything but. His imperial residences and official buildings were luxuriously furnished to give an image of wealth, grandeur and majesty. The Emperor's throne, a symbol of power par excellence, played an important role in this image.
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EXHIBITION
The Plains of Mars: European War Prints, 1500—1825, from the Collection of the Sarah Campbell Blaffer Foundation
The "Plains of Mars: European War Prints, 1500—1825", from the Collection of the Sarah Campbell Blaffer Foundation and which takes place at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, is the first large-scale exhibition to survey the theme of war and peace in the early-modern period specifically through the graphic print. Among the artists represented are Albrecht Dürer, Annibale Carracci, Jacques Callot, Francisco de Goya, and Théodore Géricault.
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CONFERENCE
"The Death of Napoleon: myths, legends and mysteries"
With the publication of La Mort de Napoléon: mythes, légendes et mystères (published by Perrin) imminent, the authors Thierry Lentz and Jacques Macé will be giving a talk on 8 April 2009, at 5.30pm in the Auditorium Austerlitz at the Musée de l'Armée, in Paris.
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NUIT DES MUSEES 2009
Paris, 16 May 2009
The Musée de l'Armée's wing dedicated to the history of the Ancien Régime, the Revolution and the First Empire will reopen on 16 May for the annual Nuit des musées, the night when museums across Paris and indeed Europe remain open until midnight, with free-entry. The night of 16 May will be the first opportunity for the general public to visit the Musée de l'Armée's newly refurbished wing, and there will musicians, actors, guides and re-enactors to bring the history of the different rooms to life, the perfect opportunity for discussions, questions and answers.
Click here for the Nuit des Musées website, which contains details of all the events taking place in the different museums across Paris and Europe (external link in French).
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KIDS' CORNER
Napo' Fact files: Bonaparte in Egypt
We have another new addition to our Kids' Corner section of the website: for all our younger readers looking for an introduction to Napoleon's expedition to Egypt in 1798, this is the perfect place to start. The article, the first instalment in Napoleon's Egyptian adventure, is on the military campaign between 1798 and 1801. Keep an eye out in the coming weeks for our next part, which will be on the scientific expedition that accompanied Napoleon.
200 YEARS AGO
Armand de Chateaubriand du Plessis is executed
On 31 March, 1809, Armand de Chateaubriand du Plessis, cousin of the writer François-René de Chateaubriand, was executed by firing squad for his role in the Royalist plotting against the regime. Charged with delivering letters and information between London and Royalists based in Brittany, he was arrested carrying compromising letters on a beach on the Contentin peninsula. He was brought before a military council and sentenced to death. Despite letters from François-René to Napoleon pleading for clemency, the execution went ahead. The death profoundly affected Chateaubriand and intensified his resentment towards the imperial regime. The entry in his Mémoires d'outre-tombe is particularly touching:
"The day of the execution, I wanted to accompany my comrade onto the last battlefield that he would know; I was completely unable to find my carriage and thus had to run to the Plaine de Grenelle. I arrived, dripping in sweat, a second too late: Armand had been executed against the Paris walls [...] I followed the cart that carried the bodies of Armand and of his two companions, [...] Quintal and Goyon, to the cemetery at Vaugirard, where I had buried M. de Laharpe. There, I saw my cousin for the last time, although he was unrecognisable: the lead had disfigured him [...] The ravages of time were no longer visible; he remains young in my memories. [...] When I take a walk along the Boulevard de la plaine de Grenelle, I stop to look at the impressions still in the wall left by the bullets." [Mémoires d'outre tombe]
Sources:
François-René de Chateaubriand, Mémoires d'outre tombe
Dictionnaire Napoléon (ed. Jean Tulard), "François-René de Chateaubriand", entry by Pierre Riberette, pp. 425-430
150 YEARS AGO
A new addition to the Muséum d'Histoire Naturelle's menagerie
On 30 March, 1859, the Moniteur universel reported on the two newest additions to the menagerie at the Muséum d'Histoire Naturelle in Paris. "The menagerie at the Muséum d'Histoire Naturelle in Paris recently received two new, rather curious animals: two coatis, which belong to the plantigrade family, and which are only found in South America. They are about the same size as the domestic cat, but with different proportions and less graceful in their movements. Their head is elongated into a snout […] Coatis are forest-dwelling animals adept at climbing, and who spend their lives in the trees. When they come down, they do so head first, clinging on with their claws. Like the majority of carnivorous plantigrades, and depending on the circumstances, their diet is composed of insects, fruits, eggs and small animals. They are not too wild in temperament and are easily tamed. They are kept with the monkeys at the menagerie; their natural inclination to climb lends them a certain similarity with these animals." [Moniteur universel, 30 March, 1859]
The menagerie in question began life as the Ménagerie Royale at Versailles before being renamed the Ménagerie Nationale and moved to the Jardin des Plantes in 1794, joining the newly-created Muséum d'Histoire Naturelle which had been announced by the Convention one year previously. Animals from the private menagerie belonging to the Duc d'Orléans as well as those that had been seized following an order announced 15 Brumaire An II (5 November 1793) banning animal shows in the streets of Paris were also added around the same time. Amongst the first animals on show were two white bears, a leopard, a margay (spotted wildcat), monkeys, agoutis (a type of rodent), a vulture and two eagles. Throughout the 19th century, new buildings and enclosures were added, including a bear pit in 1805, the first big-cat pen in 1821, a semi-circular game-bird enclosure in 1827 and a reptile house in 1870. In December 1870 and January 1871, a large number of the animals were killed and eaten by Parisians who were starving during the last few days of the siege of Paris.
Wishing you an excellent "Napoleonic" week,
Peter Hicks and Hamish Davey Wright
Historians and web-editors
THE NAPOLEON.ORG BULLETIN, N° 491, 27 March - 2 April 2009
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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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THE BIBLIOTHEQUE FONDATION NAPOLEON LIBRARY
Winter opening times:
Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday: 1pm-6pm
Thursday: 10am-3pm
(Closed Friday)
THE MAGAZINE
Book of the month (English)
- Soldiers, Citizens and Civilians: Experiences and Perceptions of the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, 1790-1820
Book of the month (French)
- 1809, les Français à Vienne. Chronique d'une occupation
Just published
Flora Fraser, Pauline Bonaparte: Venus of Empire (with first chapter available to read online)
Press review
- The Daily Telegraph reports on the arrival in Paris of the musical Les Misérables
- "Did 'Tin Pest' cause Napoleon's wardrobe failure?"
Seen on the web (all links are external)
- Social history: personal correspondence from 1780-1859 on the L'Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales website (in French)
Fondation Napoléon History Prizes 2008
- Francis and Madeleine Ambrière, Talma, ou l'histoire du théâtre
- Alain Decaux, Coup d'état à l'Elysée
- Edgardo Donati, La Toscana nell'impero napoleonico
Fondation Napoléon news
- Fondation Napoléon Research Grants 2008
WHAT'S ON
Conferences
- "The Death of Napoleon: myths, legends and mysteries", Paris (France), 8 April, 2009
- "Breaking Boundaries: the 1790s in Germany, France and Britain. Revolution, Liberation and Excess", London (UK), 22-24 April, 2009
- Seventh annual conference of the Society of Dix-Neuviémistes, Bristol (UK), 27-29 March, 2009
- Napoléon, Montreal (Canada), 20 March - 3 April, 2009
- Australian Napoleonic Congress, Goulburn (Australia), 31 October - 1 November, 2009
Commemorations
- Annual May Ceremony in the British Cemetery
- Bicentennial commemoration of the death of Maréchal Lannes
- French presence in South Africa
Re-enactments
- The 1er Régiment des Chasseurs à pied de la Garde Impériale de Ligny in Malbrouck, Manderen (France), 29 March, 2009
- Znaim 1809 bicentenary re-enactment, Znojmo and Dobšice (Czech Republic), 11-12 July, 2009
- Bivouac and the Battle of Oostmalle, Oostmalle (Belgium), 5-6 September, 2009
Exhibitions
- "The Plains of Mars: European War Prints, 1500—1825, from the Collection of the Sarah Campbell Blaffer Foundation", Houston, USA [08/02/2009 - 10/05/2009]
Full details
- "Imperial Splendour", Manderen, France [15/03/2009 - 31/08/2009]
Full details
- "Napoleon, Commander, Emperor and Genius", Schallaburg, Germany [16/05/2009 - 01/11/2009]
Full details
- "Napoleon, genius and despot", Saarlouis, Germany [25/01/2009 - 10/05/2009]
Full details
- "Napoleon on the Nile: Soldiers, Artists, and the Rediscovery of Egypt", Syracuse, USA [29/01/2009 - 29/03/2009]
Full details
- "Nicolas-Toussaint Charlet and the origins of the Napoleonic legend", Boulogne-Billancourt, France [05/03/2009 - 27/06/2009]
Full details
- Imperial painter: Pietro Benvenuti at the court of Napoleon and the Lorenas, Florence, Italy [10/03/2009 - 21/06/2009]
Full details
- "Romania on the road to modernity: 150 years since the unification of the principalities under Prince Cuza", Bucharest, Romania [22/01/2009 - 24/05/2009]
Full details
- "Coinage at War. Catalonia in Napoleonic Europe", Barcelona, Spain [04/06/08 - 03/05/09]
Full details
- "The Crinoline Empire (1852-1870)", Paris, France [29/11/2008 - 26/04/2009]
Full details
- "Ben Weider Collection at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts", Montreal, Canada [Permanent]
Full details
- "Bonaparte and Egypt", Paris, France [14/10/2008 - 29/03/2009]
Full details
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