Classic bestselling people's history of the Napoleonic Empire now available in paperback Highly-acclaimed work of on Napoleonic Europe *Broers is the leading scholar of Napoleon and the Napoleonic Empire
The first volume of a majestic new biography of the great ruler told with energy, style and brand new research.
An accomplished Oxford scholar delivers a dynamic new history covering the last chapter of the emperor's life-from his defeat in Russia and the drama of Waterloo to his final exile-as the world Napoleon has created begins to crumble around him.
The Mediterranean was one of Napoleon's greatest spheres of influence. With territory in Spain, Italy and, of course, France, Napoleon's regime dominated the Great Sea for much of the early nineteenth century. The 'Napoleonic Mediterranean' was composed of almost the entirety of the western, European lands bordering its northern shores, however tenuously many of those shores were held. The disastrous attempt to conquer Egypt in 1798-99, and the rapid loss of Malta to the British, sealed its eastward and southern limits. None of Napoleon's Mediterranean possessions were easily held; they were volatile societies which showed determined resistance to the new state forged by the French Revolution. In this book, acclaimed historian and biographer of Napoleon, Michael Broers looks at the similarities and differences between Napoleon's Mediterranean imperial possessions. He considers the process of political, military and legal administration as well as the challenges faced by Napoleon's Prefects in overcoming hostility in the local population. With chapters covering a range of imperial territories, this book is a unique and valuable addition to the historical literature on Napoleonic Europe and the process and practice of imperialism.
Explores the intense cultural conflict created by French rule in Italy at the start of the nineteenth century. This book reveals how the alliance between Church and people grew in the face of alien, imperial rule. It exposes the vital role this union played in preventing Italy from being totally assimilated into the French empire.
In the years that followed, this struggle with Britain came to dominate Napoleon's actions, leading him into the bloodbath of the Spanish Peninsular war, and his attempt to blockade Europe against British commerce.
"The wars of Napoleon are among the best-known and most exciting episodes in world history. Less well known is the uproar the armies stirred up in their path, and even more, the chaos they left in their wake. The 'knock-on effect' of Napoleon's sweep across Europe went further than is often remembered: his invasion of Spain triggered the collapse of the Spanish Empire in Latin America, and his meddling in the Balkans destabilized the Ottomans. Many places had been riven with banditry and popular tumult from time immemorial, characteristics which worsened in the havoc wrought by the wars. Other areas had known relative calm before the arrival of the French in 1792, but even the most pacific societies were disrupted by these conflagrations. Behind the battle fronts raged other conflicts, 'little wars' -- the guerrilla ... Bandits often stood at the centre of these 'dirty wars' of ambushes, night raids, living hard in tough terrain, of plunder, rapine and early, violent death, which spread across the whole western world from Constantinople to Chile"--Page 4 of cover