Napoleon Bonaparte
Born on 15 August 1769 and
Died on 5 May 1821 was a French military and political leader who rose to
prominence during the latter stages of the French Revolution and its associated
wars in Europe.
As
Napoleon I, he was Emperor of the French from 1804 to 1815. His legal reform,
the Napoleonic Code, has been a major influence on many civil law jurisdictions
worldwide, but he is best remembered for his role in the wars led against
France by a series of coalitions, the so-called Napoleonic Wars. He established
hegemony over most of continental Europe and sought to spread the ideals of the
French Revolution, while consolidating an imperial monarchy which restored
aspects of the deposed Ancien
Régime. Due to his success in
these wars, often against numerically superior enemies, he is generally
regarded as one of the greatest military commanders of all time, and his
campaigns are studied at military academies worldwide. Napoleon was born
at Ajaccio in Corsica to parents of noble Italian ancestry. He trained as an
artillery officer in mainland France. He rose to prominence under the French
First Republic and led successful campaigns against the First and Second
Coalitions arrayed against France. He led a successful invasion of the Italian
peninsula.In 1799, he staged a coup
d'état and installed himself
as First Consul; five years later the French Senate proclaimed him emperor. In
the first decade of the 19th century, the French Empire under Napoleon engaged
in a series of conflicts—the Napoleonic Wars—that involved every major European
power. After a streak of
victories, France secured a dominant position in continental Europe, and
Napoleon maintained the French sphere of influence through the formation of
extensive alliances and the appointment of friends and family members to rule
other European countries as French client states.The Peninsular War and 1812
French invasion of Russia marked turning points in Napoleon's fortunes. His Grande Armée was badly damaged in the campaign and
never fully recovered. In 1813, the Sixth Coalition defeated his forces at
Leipzig; the following year the Coalition invaded France, forced Napoleon to
abdicate and exiled him to the island of Elba. Less than a year later, he
escaped Elba and returned to power, but was defeated at the Battle of Waterloo
in June 1815. Napoleon spent the last six years of his life in confinement by
the British on the island of Saint Helena. An autopsy concluded he died of
stomach cancer, but there has been some debate about the cause of his death, as
some scholars have speculated that he was a victim of arsenic poisoning.
