Napoleon Bonaparte (/nəˈpoʊliən ˈboʊnəpɑːrt/[1]; French: Napoléon [napɔleɔ̃ bɔnapaʁt]; 15 August

1769 – 5 May 1821), born Napoleone di Buonaparte (Italian: [napoleˈoːne di ˌbwɔnaˈparte]), was a
French statesman and military leader who became famous as an artillery commander during the French
Revolution. He led many successful campaigns during the French Revolutionary Wars and was Emperor
of the French as Napoleon I from 1804 until 1814 and again briefly in 1815 during the Hundred Days.
Napoleon dominated European and global affairs for more than a decade while leading France against a
series of coalitions during the Napoleonic Wars. He won many of these wars and a vast majority of his
battles, building a large empire that ruled over much of continental Europe before its final collapse in
1815. He is considered one of the greatest commanders in history, and his wars and campaigns are
studied at military schools worldwide. Napoleon's political and cultural legacy has made him one of the
most celebrated and controversial leaders in human history.[2][3]

He was born Napoleone di Buonaparte in Corsica to a relatively modest Italian family from minor
nobility. He was serving as an artillery officer in the French army when the French Revolution erupted in
1789. He rapidly rose through the ranks of the military, seizing the new opportunities presented by the
Revolution and becoming a general at age 24. The French Directory eventually gave him command of
the Army of Italy after he suppressed the 13 Vendémiaire revolt against the government by royalist
insurgents. At age 26, he began his first military campaign against the Austrians and the Italian monarchs
aligned with the Habsburgs—winning virtually every battle, conquering the Italian Peninsula in a year
while establishing "sister republics" with local support, and becoming a war hero in France. In 1798, he
led a military expedition to Egypt that served as a springboard to political power. He orchestrated a coup
in November 1799 and became First Consul of the Republic. After the Peace of Amiens in 1802,
Napoleon turned his attention to France's colonies. He sold the Louisiana Territory to the United States,
and he attempted to restore slavery to the French Caribbean colonies. However, while he was successful
in restoring slavery in the eastern Caribbean, Napoleon failed in his attempts to subdue Saint-Domingue,
and the colony that France once proudly boasted of as the "Pearl of the Antilles" became independent
as Haiti in 1804. Napoleon's ambition and public approval inspired him to go further, and he became the
first Emperor of the French in 1804. Intractable differences with the British meant that the French were
facing a Third Coalition by 1805. Napoleon shattered this coalition with decisive victories in the Ulm
Campaign and a historic triumph over the Russian Empire and Austrian Empire at the Battle of Austerlitz
which led to the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire. Napoleon formed the Franco-Persian alliance
and wanted to re-establish the Franco-Indian alliances with the Muslim Indian emperor Tipu Sultan by
providing a French-trained army during the Anglo-Mysore Wars, with the continuous aim of having an
eventual open way to attack the British in India.[4][5] In 1806, the Fourth Coalition took up arms against
him because Prussia became worried about growing French influence on the continent. Napoleon
quickly defeated Prussia at the battles of Jena and Auerstedt, then marched his Grande Armée deep into
Eastern Europe and annihilated the Russians in June 1807 at the Battle of Friedland. France then forced
the defeated nations of the Fourth Coalition to sign the Treaties of Tilsit in July 1807, bringing an uneasy
peace to the continent. Tilsit signified the high-water mark of the French Empire. In 1809, the Austrians
and the British challenged the French again during the War of the Fifth Coalition, but Napoleon solidified
his grip over Europe after triumphing at the Battle of Wagram in July.
Napoleon then occupied the Iberian Peninsula, hoping to extend the Continental System and choke off
British trade with the European mainland, and declared his brother Joseph Bonaparte the King of Spain
in 1808. The Spanish and the Portuguese revolted with British support. The Peninsular War lasted six
years, featured extensive guerrilla warfare, and ended in victory for the Allies against Napoleon. The
Continental System caused recurring diplomatic conflicts between France and its client states, especially
Russia. The Russians were unwilling to bear the economic consequences of reduced trade and routinely
violated the Continental System, enticing Napoleon into another war. The French launched a major
invasion of Russia in the summer of 1812. The campaign destroyed Russian cities, but did not yield the
decisive victory Napoleon wanted. It resulted in the collapse of the Grande Armée and inspired a
renewed push against Napoleon by his enemies. In 1813, Prussia and Austria joined Russian forces in the
War of the Sixth Coalition against France. A lengthy military campaign culminated in a large Allied army
defeating Napoleon at the Battle of Leipzig in October 1813, but his tactical victory at the minor Battle of
Hanau allowed retreat onto French soil. The Allies then invaded France and captured Paris in the spring
of 1814, forcing Napoleon to abdicate in April. He was exiled to the island of Elba off the coast of
Tuscany, and the Bourbon dynasty was restored to power. Napoleon escaped from Elba in February
1815 and took control of France once again. The Allies responded by forming a Seventh Coalition which
defeated him at the Battle of Waterloo in June. The British exiled him to the remote island of Saint
Helena in the South Atlantic, where he died six years later at the age of 51.

Napoleon's influence on the modern world brought liberal reforms to the numerous territories that he
conquered and controlled, such as the Low Countries, Switzerland, and large parts of modern Italy and
Germany. He implemented fundamental liberal policies in France and throughout Western Europe. His
Napoleonic Code has influenced the legal systems of more than 70 nations around the world. British
historian Andrew Roberts states: "The ideas that underpin our modern world—meritocracy, equality
before the law, property rights, religious toleration, modern secular education, sound finances, and so
on—were championed, consolidated, codified and geographically extended by Napoleon. To them he
added a rational and efficient local administration, an end to rural banditry, the encouragement of
science and the arts, the abolition of feudalism and the greatest codification of laws since the fall of the
Roman Empire".[6]

Contents

1 Early life

2 Early career

2.1 Siege of Toulon

2.2 13 Vendémiaire

2.3 First Italian campaign

2.4 Egyptian expedition

3 Ruler of France

3.1 French Consulate

3.1.1 Temporary peace in Europe

3.2 French Empire

3.2.1 War of the Third Coalition

3.2.2 Middle-Eastern alliances

3.2.3 War of the Fourth Coalition and Tilsit

3.2.4 Peninsular War and Erfurt

3.2.5 War of the Fifth Coalition and Marie Louise

3.2.6 Invasion of Russia

3.2.7 War of the Sixth Coalition

3.2.8 Exile to Elba

3.2.9 Hundred Days

4 Exile on Saint Helena

4.1 Death

4.1.1 Cause of death

5 Religion

5.1 Concordat

5.2 Arrest of Pope Pius VII

5.3 Religious emancipation

5.4 Freemasonry

6 Personality

7 Image

8 Reforms

8.1 Napoleonic Code

8.2 Warfare

8.3 Metric system

8.4 Education

9 Memory and evaluation

9.1 Criticism

9.2 Propaganda and memory

9.3 Long-term influence outside France

10 Marriages and children

11 See also

12 Notes

13 Citations

14 References

14.1 Biographical studies

14.2 Primary sources

14.3 Specialty studies

14.4 Historiography and memory

15 External links