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IN THE LETTER...
...this week, we have some sad news to announce: earlier this week Robert Chénier, President of the ACMN, passed away after a heart attack. Our thoughts go out to his family, friends and colleagues.
Also in the letter this week is our new objet d'art of the month, which features the "Napoleon scarf", produced by Hermès, the French fashion house. An intriguing combination of haute couture and Napoleonic legend, the scarf is part of the Mito e Bellezza exhibition currently on display in Lucca (Italy). Further down we also have news of a new exhibition of the works of Delacroix, which is unusual in that it is the first time that a private collection (in this case, belonging to the American collector Karen B. Cohen) has been exhibited at the Eugène Delacroix Museum in Paris. You will also find a little reminder of the Ben Weider day of talks and film, mentioned last week, which takes place next week at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts. Finally, we have a short article on how to get the best out of the zoom function in our new Digital Library, as well as our usual bicentenary (Franco-Russian relations on the slide) and sesquicentenary (l'Univers banned and "the music of the future" criticised) sections.
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OBJET D'ART OF THE MONTH
The Napoleon scarf by Hermès
The famous Hermès "carré" (scarf), practically the Hermès symbol de rigueur, was invented in 1937 to mark the saddlery house's hundredth year in business. Founded in 1837 by Thierry Hermès (1801-1878), it was his son, Charles-Emile, who moved the company's offices in 1878 to 24 rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré and began to diversify their product range. Inspired by the 19th-century male fashion for neckerchiefs, the Hermès scarf introduced this very male accessory into the female fashion world.
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NAPOLEONIC NEWS
Obituary: Robert Chénier
On Monday 25 January, 2010, M. Robert Chénier, President of the ACMN (Association for the Conservation of Napoleonic Monuments), passed away as a result of a heart attack. He was Knight of the Légion d'honneur, officer of the Ordre national du Mérite and Honorary Colonel in the French Air Force.
Born in 1931, Robert Chénier was the son of an officer, and served in the Air Force as a member of the flight personnel before becoming a senior executive at IBM. A specialist in the Imperial Guard, he published in 2004 Les Officiers d'Ordonnance de l'Empereur. He was a member of the ACMN from its inception in 1982 and collaborated on its journal from 1987. He became president of the association on 9 October, 1993, succeeding the founder Robert Lecreux. Robert Chénier was also Vice-President of the Amis de Ligny and of the Association Franco-Européenne de Waterloo, as well as a member of numerous other Napoleonic associations.
The Fondation Napoléon extends its sincere condolences to his wife, his family and his friends. The funeral will be held today, 29 January, at 2.30pm at the church in Essarts-le-Roi (Yvelines, département 78, Île-de-France region).
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WHAT'S ON
"A Passion for Delacroix: the Karen B. Cohen collection"
Even though the Eugène Delacroix Museum was created on the initiative of artists and collectors, this is the first time it has exhibited a private collection. From religious compositions to scenes illustrating Shakespeare or George Sand, from combats of wild animals to flamboyant Moroccan scenes, this very complete panorama of the artist's career constitutes a kind of imaginary museum.
Ben Weider Day
As mentioned last week, taking place on Friday 5 February, 2010, at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (Canada), is a Napoleonic day of events in memory of Ben Weider, which includes talks from Serge Joyal, Sylvain Pagé and Nathalie Bondil.
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NAPOLEON.ORG
The Digital Library: zoom function
The recently announced Digital Library, available through napoleon.org, has an exceptionally powerful zoom function built into its programming. Users who fancy a leaf through some beautiful Napoleonic books can use the function to really explore in detail the images, text and maps on display. Our article takes a look at the Livre du Sacre, which commemorates Napoleon's coronation, and gives you an example of just how powerful the Digital Library really is.
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200 YEARS AGO
Franco-Russian relations on the slide
The creation of the Duchy of Warsaw, out of formerly Prussian land, after the Treaty of Tilsit saw tensions between Alexander I and Napoleon mount even higher. The vassal state, in union with the King of Saxony but in reality governed by the French ambassador in Warsaw, came into being as an effort to introduce yet more of Europe into the Napoleonic system, Napoleon's vision of a quasi-federated continent. Its creation also had the added advantages of 1) creating a barrier to Russian interests in Eastern Europe, and 2) punishing Prussia for her role in the fourth coalition (1806-1807). Alexander, worried about Napoleon's intentions for the former Polish lands and for Polish autonomy, pushed the French Emperor to explicitly declare himself against a Polish state in any form; taking the initiative, Caulaincourt, French ambassador in Moscow, proceeded to slip this stipulation into a treaty project between the two countries that the Emperor requested on 29 January, 1810. Napoleon, clearly unprepared to make such grand and system-imperilling announcements, chastised his ambassador for taking such liberties and explained to his Minister for Exterior Relations, Champagny, what he expected of the treaty:
"I cannot say that 'the kingdom of Poland will never be re-established' (art. 1) for that would be to say that, if one day the Lithuanians, or in any other circumstances, were to re-establish it, I would be obliged to send troops to oppose it. That goes against my dignity. The goal is to calm Russia, and to do so, such an article needs to be expressed in the following terms: 'The Emperor Napoleon agrees to give no assistance whatsoever to any power or domestic uprising that may occur which seek to re-establish the kingdom of Poland.'" The French Emperor continued:
"Article 2 is utterly wrong: it is in no way up to me to 'ensure that the words Poland and Polish are never seen again.' Such a commitment would be ridiculous and absurd. The article should instead be: 'The Emperor Napoleon agrees to never employ, in any public situation, the words Poland and Polish to refer to the land and inhabitants of these lands which once formed the old kingdom of Poland.'" [Letter from Napoleon to Champagny dated 6 February, 1810, Correspondance de Napoléon Ier, Second Empire edition; n° 16178]
The modified treaty, ratified by Napoleon, was sent back to Caulaincourt to be signed by Alexander. These concessions were not, however, to appease the Russians who continued to return to the matter with the insistence that Napoleon come out against a Polish state. Franco-Russian relations were deteriorating.
150 YEARS AGO
L'Univers banned
On 30 January, 1860, Louis Veuillot's daily newspaper L'Univers (part of the Catholic press) was banned from publication. Founded in 1833 by the Abbé Jacques Paul Migne and purchased by the Comte de Montalembert in 1838, from 1840 it became, under the fierce and talented polemist Louis Veuillot, the mouthpiece for the "Catholic Party". The paper, with its emphasis on Papal spiritual and temporal authority, was Ultramontan in outlook, and had already been issued two warnings, on 11 July and 26 December, 1859, regarding its behaviour following its vigorous criticism of Napoleon III's Italian policies. Despite this cautionary "advice", Louis Veuillot continued to pursue the paper's critical agenda and published the encyclique Nullis, in which Pope Pious IX condemned French imperial policy. As justification for this banning order, the Interior cabinet claimed that the newspaper "continuously pushed the limits of violence". It was only on 16 April, 1867, that L'Univers was allowed back into circulation. The social commentator Viel Castel noted in his memoirs for 30 January: "Veuillot has been suppressed [...], but this coarse pamphleteer will return in another form; a certain section of the clergy will be decidedly displeased." [Mémoires du Comte Horace de Viel Castel, Monday 30 January, 1860]
The "Music of the Future" judged
Richard Wagner, the German composer, performed for the first time in Paris, at the Théâtre Italien (salle Ventadour), during the month of January, 1860. His music, however, was poorly received by critics, and notably Léon Escudier, the editor of the French weekly paper La France musicale:
"Finally, our curiosity has been satisfied," he noted. "M. Wagner chose his best compositions [extracts from his operas The Flying Dutchman, Tannhaûser, Tristan and Isolde and Lohengrin, ed.] and he offered them to the Parisian public, performed with the greatest degree of prestige imaginable. [...] [But] M. Wagner impassioned and will impassion no-one in France, no more so than he has the English public [...]. M. Wagner is an eccentric musician, without taste, grace or melodic invention.
The effect produced in M. Wagner's first concert was that of a soporific mixed with the grinding of teeth. [...] Much hope was placed in the public's sense of curiosity, but the public did not respond to the call of the German trumpets. [...] Paris has passed down judgment, and righteous judgment at that, upon the "Music of the Future." [La France musicale, 29 January, 1860]
"The second concert from M. Richard Wagner attracted even fewer paying spectators than the first, and it came to a close to widespread indifference and yawns. The press was, in any case, almost unanimous in its condemnation of the work and musical system of the "musician of the future". At the second concert, one of our most illustrious composers, astounded by the public's patience, cried out: "At the rate we are going, I would not be surprised if, in sixty years, we were dancing to this music." [La France musicale, 5 February, 1860]
Wagner was one of the members of the group which Franz Liszt described as the "Music of the Future", contemporary music of which he was an ardent defender.
Wagner was a member of the group known as "Music of the Future", a term used to describe the sort of contemporary, progressive music of which Franz Liszt was an ardent defender. Liszt fought long and hard to introduce and establish musicians such as Wagner, Hector Berlioz and Peter Cornelius in the public eye but opposition to their music was strong and came to a head with the demonstrations against the comic opera Der Barbier von Bagdad by Cornelius. The publication in 1860 of "The Manifesto" - headed by traditionalists Joseph Joachim and Johannes Brahms - criticising the "Neudeutsche Schule", marked a high point in opposition to the new directions pursued by Wagner and his colleagues.
Wishing you an excellent "Napoleonic" week,
Peter Hicks & Hamish Davey Wright
Historians and web-editors
THE NAPOLEON.ORG BULLETIN, N° 527, 29 January – 4 February, 2010
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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THE BIBLIOTHEQUE FONDATION NAPOLEON LIBRARY
Winter opening times:
Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday: 1pm-6pm
Thursday: 10am-3pm
(Closed Friday)
FONDATION NAPOLEON ON THE WEB
Each week we offer you a "mystery" link to somewhere on napoleon.org. Click on the link to discover a part of the website you might not have visited before...
Statistic of the week:
Napoleon I attended 682 plays and operas during his reign.
Source: Thierry Lentz (ed.) Quand Napoléon inventait la France, Tallandier, 2008, p. 605
The Fondation Napoléon's triumvirate of Napoleonic websites:
- Napoleon.org
- Napoleonica. La Revue
- Napoleonica. Archives Online
The best of the month:
- Book of the month
- Painting of the month
- Objet d'Art of the month
- Article of the month
Press review
- History Today: "The View from Albion: Bagehot and the American Constitution"
- The Daily Mail online: arsenic in 19th century society
- Worthplaying.com: further screenshots of Napoleon: Total War
EVENTS
On now
A selection of events taking place now or in the coming weeks, taken from our What's on listings.
Napoleonic days
- Ben Weider Day at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, Montreal (Canada), 5 February, 2010
Film
- Yves Simoneau's Napoléon at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, Montreal (Canada), 7 February, 2010, 10am - 6pm
Talks
"Napoleonic museum policy" at the Museo Napoleonico, Rome (Italy), 5 February, 2010, 3.30pm
Exhibitions
- "Mathilde Bonaparte: a princess on the shores of Lac d'Enghien", Enghien-les-Bains, France [15/01/2010 - 15/04/2010]
Full details
- "Napoléon III et les Alpes-Maritimes", Nice, France [30/11/2009 - 30/06/2010]
Full details
- Mito e Bellezzo, Lucca, Italy [06/12/2009 - 07/03/2010]
Full details
- "Coup de crayon à l'Empire", Waterloo, Belgium [23/09/2009 - 17/05/2010]
Full details
Ending soon...
Exhibitions
- At the Russian Court: Palace and Protocol in the 19th Century, Amsterdam, Netherlands [20/06/2009 - 31/01/2010]
Full details<<
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