Napoleon’s Legacy

* His rise (already covered in book)

- 1785 - graduate of artillery school

-> strong calculus skills give him a big boost

- During first part of the Revolution, he fought against invaders

- 1795 his unit fires of rioters in front of National Convention

-> Royalists shot down in the name of the Republic

-> Revolutionary credentials

- 1796 invasion of Italy begun to get Austrians out of the way

-> Napoleon's army wildly successful

=> N. becoming a French national hero

-> N. popular with Italians as a liberator

- Nov. 9 1799 N. stages coup against the directory

- 1800 plebiscite makes him First Consul

-> he really was popular with the French

- 1802 consul for life

- 1804 Emperor

-> crowns himself, not allowing the Pope to do it

=> believed himself a self-made man

* Acts and effects

- economic reforms

-> taxes, banking, etc. strengthen the economics of the government

-> state capitalism (government sponsored production)

=> using government to jump-start industry and create jobs

- conciliation and compromise with all classes

-> rich allowed breathing room and ability to gain again

-> poor are star-struck, even if he doesn't do much for them

- kills anti-religion of Revolution permanently

- creates the Code Napoleon - his own legal code

-> everyone has same law, equality under the law (officially)

-> the Code was exported to other countries as Napoleon conquered

-> Louisiana and Mississippi valley still have vestiges

-> women lose even right to own property

-> brings back slavery

=> in Haiti, a slave revolt becomes 1st Black led independence movement of modern era

- military campaigns

-> called the anti-Christ by his enemies

-> stunning death and destruction

=> 412,000 lost to Russian winter (Hitler faced similar fate later)

-> does export French culture, knowledge, and law

-> most important as an enemy upon which to build counter-nationalism

=> creates Poland for a short while

=> Prussians shifting towards being Germans

-> even after first defeat, still popular enough to return

=> faced final defeat at Waterloo

- Centralization

-> the absolutist state of Louis XIV redone

-> modern centralized autocracy

* The legend

- man on a white horse

-> remember the David picture from the slide show

=> forget popular Revolution and the Republic, a strong leader will deliver change

-> Beethoven’s 5th symphony written for him - the romanticism of war

-> military genius is not physical prowess

-> the triumph of the individual

=> a common hero

+> short, poor, has an accent, foreign, yet triumphant