Napoleonic Wars

These are actually a set of individual wars that sometimes overlap, succeed, or run parallel to each other. Image: Jacques-Louis David, Napoleon Crossing the Alps (1800), Kunsthistorisches Museum. The work of art depicted in this image and the reproduction thereof are in the public domain worldwide. The reproduction is part of a collection of reproductions compiled by The Yorck Project (DVD-ROM, 2002). The compilation copyright is held by Zenodot Verlagsgesellschaft mbH and licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License.

Historians do not agree on the exact beginning or end of the wars. November 9, 1799 is an early candidate since that is when Napoleon seized power in France. Hoping to ease the difficulty, historians date by isolated wars. They disarticulate the Napoleonic Wars in a linear series:

• War of the Second Coalition 1798-1802
• War of the Third Coalition 1805
• War of the Fourth Coalition 1806-7
• War of the Fifth Coalition 1809
• War of the Sixth Coalition 1812-14
• War of the Seventh Coalition 1815

The successive numerical coordinates for the Coalitions offer regularity, but that regularity is undercut by the shifting make-up of that Coalition (sometimes Prussia was in, sometimes not; sometimes Russia, sometimes not) and by the discontinuity and ambiguity of the dates.

Articles

Mary Favret, "The Napoleonic Wars"

Napoleon made king of Italy

On 26 May 1805, Napoleon crowns himself King of Italy in Milan Cathedral, with the iron crown of Lombardy. Image: The Iron Crown of Lombardy, from Cesare Cantù Grande illustrazione del Lombardo-Veneto ossia storia delle città, dei borghi, comuni, castelli, ecc. fino ai tempi moderni Milano, Corona e Caimi Editori, 1858. This image is in the public domain in the United States because its copyright has expired.

In a flamboyant and highly theatrical gesture, Napoleon Bonaparte signifies his political and military dominance over the Italian peninsula with a ceremony in Milan Cathedral, where he crowned himself King of Italy with the ancient, iconic iron crown of Lombardy. This crowning of Napoleon as King is a result of the French conquest of Italy. His full title was "Emperor of the French and King of Italy."

Articles

Alison Chapman, "On Il Risorgimento"

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Erik Simpson, “On Corinne, Or Italy”

Battle of Toulouse

The Battle of Toulouse occurred on 10 April 1814. The Duke of Wellington and Allied troops defeated the French at Toulouse on this day, the final battle of the Peninsular War. The Allied victory forces Napoleon Bonaparte to abdicate and accept exile to Elba and restores the Bourbons to the French throne. Image: British infantry exchanging fire with the French during the battle of Toulouse in 1814. Print after Henri Dupray (c. 1890). This image is in the public domain in the United States because its copyright has expired.

Related Articles

Sean Grass, “On the Death of the Duke of Wellington, 14 September 1852″

Mary Favret, "The Napoleonic Wars"

Battle of Waterloo

On 18 June 1815, Wellington led Allied troops to a final victory over Napoleon at the Battle of Waterloo, ending Napoleon’s “Hundred Days” of rule after his escape from Elba on 26 February. The war is officially ended by the 1815 Treaty of Paris, and Napoleon is sentenced to permanent imprisonment at St. Helena, where he dies in 1821. Image: Richard Knötel, Print of English Life Guards (left) and Horse Guards (right) of 1815 charging (Band IV, Tafel 4, Uniformenkunde, Lose Blätter zur Geschichte der Entwicklung der militärischen Tracht, Berlin, 1890). This image is in the public domain in the United States because its copyright has expired.

Related Articles

Sean Grass, “On the Death of the Duke of Wellington, 14 September 1852″

Mary Favret, "The Napoleonic Wars"

Frederick Burwick, “18 June 1815: The Battle of Waterloo and the Literary Response”

Death of Napoleon

Horace Vernet, Napoleon on his Death Bed (1826)

Napoleon Bonaparte died on 5 May 1821 while in Exile on the island of Saint Helena. Image: Horace Vernet, Napoleon on his Death Bed (1826).

Benjamin Robert Haydon paints portrait of Napoleon at sunset

Benjamin Robert Haydon, Napoleon Musing at St Helena

in 1829, Benjamin Robert Haydon painted a first version of Napoleon Musing after Sunset, which was exhibited at the Western Exchange in 1830.  Haydon later painted 23 versions and replics of this work, including the one pictured here.  The later full-length version was titled Napoleon Musing at St. Helena.  In 1831, William Wordsworth wrote of this painting, "If I can command my thoughts I will write something about your Picture, in prose for the Muse has forsaken me - being scared away by the villainous aspect of the Times."  Image:  Benjamin Robert Haydon, Napoleon Musing at St Helena.  This work is in the public domain in its country of origin and other countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 100 years or less.

Wordsworth composes "To B.R. Haydon, on Seeing His Picture of Napoleon"

On 11 June 1831, William Wordsworth composed the sonnet, "To B.R. Haydon, on Seeing His Picture of Napoleon Buonaparte on the Island of St. Helena," in response to Benjamin Robert Haydon's portrait of Napoleon, pictured here. Image:  Benjamin Robert Haydon, Napoleon Musing at St Helena.  This work is in the public domain in its country of origin and other countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 100 years or less.  Here is the sonnet:

HAYDON! let worthier judges praise the skill
Here by thy pencil shown in truth of lines
And charm of colours; I applaud those signs
Of thought, that give the true poetic thrill;
That unencumbered whole of blank and still,
Sky without cloud—ocean without a wave;
And the one Man that laboured to enslave
The World, sole-standing high on the bare hill—
Back turned, arms folded, the unapparent face
Tinged, we may fancy, in this dreary place
With light reflected from the invisible sun
Set, like his fortunes; but not set for aye
Like them. The unguilty Power pursues his way,
And before him doth dawn perpetual run.

Elizabeth Barrett Browning dinner with Wordsworth

Portrait (engraving) of Elizabeth Barrett Browning

On 28 May 1836, Elizabeth Barrett Browning met William Wordsworth at a literary dinner in London; EBB's cousin, John Kenyon, was the host and the event most likely occurred at Kenyon's main residence at the time:  39 Devonshire Place, London, which is right around the corner from EBB's residence at the time:  50 Wimpole Street.  See the associated map.  

Wordsworth composes "On a Portrait of the Duke of Wellington"

On 31 August 1840, William Wordsworth composed the sonnet, "On a Portrait of the Duke of Wellington upon the Field of Waterloo, by Haydon."  The poem is a companion to his earlier 11 June 1831 sonnet, "To B.R. Haydon, on Seeing His Picture of Napoleon Buonaparte on the Island of St. Helena."  Wordsworth informed Isabella Fenwick in 1843 that he composed the sonnet while ascending Helvellyn with his daughter (on horseback) and her husband.  In response to this sonnet, Haydon began a portrait of Wordsworth, which he sent to Elizabeth Barrett Browning for her to view before he completed it. Elizabeth Barrett Browning wrote her own sonnet, "On a Portrait of Wordsworth," as a result.  Image:  Benjamin Robert Haydon, Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington (National Portrait Gallery).  This work is in the public domain in its country of origin and other countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 100 years or less.   Here is Wordsworth's sonnet:

By Art's bold privilege Warrior and War-horse stand
On ground yet strewn with their last battle's wreck;
Let the Steed glory while his Master's hand
Lies fixed for ages on his conscious neck;
But by the Chieftain's look, though at his side
Hangs that day's treasured sword, how firm a check
Is given to triumph and all human pride!
Yon trophied Mound shrinks to a shadowy speck
In his calm presence! Him the mighty deed
Elates not, brought far nearer the grave's rest,
As shows that time-worn face, for he such seed
Has sown as yields, we trust, the fruit of fame
In Heaven; hence no one blushes for thy name,
Conqueror, 'mid some sad thoughts, divinely blest!

Publication of EBB, "On a Portrait of Wordsworth"

Manuscript of EBB, "On a Portrait of Wordsworth" (Armstrong Browning Library, Baylor)

On 29 October 1842, Elizabeth Barrett Browning's “On a Portrait of Wordsworth, by R. B. Haydon” was published in The Athenaeum.  Image:  Manuscript of the poem, reproduced by permission of the Armstrong Browning Library, Baylor University (leaf 3 recto of EBB's autograph notebook).

Wellington's funeral

After a two-month delay, Wellington was buried at St. Paul’s Cathedral in London on 18 November 1852 after a procession watched by 1.5 million people and a funeral service attended by 10,000. At the time the funeral was almost certainly the most costly and spectacular in English history, and it was undoubtedly so for anyone not a member of the royal family. Image: Sir Thomas Lawrence, Portrait of Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington (1814). This image is in the public domain in the United States because its copyright has expired.

Articles

Sean Grass, “On the Death of the Duke of Wellington, 14 September 1852″

Aurora Leigh

On 15 November 1856, Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s Aurora Leigh was published by Chapman and Hall in Great Britain. Aurora Leigh—a verse-novel and modern epic—set off literary, social, and political reverberations in Britain, North America, and Europe up to the end of the century. Given its innovative, generically mixed form and its controversial contemporary subject matter, it figured in debates over poetry and poetics, the nature of the realist novel, class divisions and social reform, women’s rights, religion, and the politics of nations. Image: An 1871 engraving of an 1859 photograph of Elizabeth Barrett Browning (photograph by Macaire Havre, engraving by T. O. Barlow). This image is in the public domain in the United States because its copyright has expired.

Articles

Marjorie Stone, “The ‘Advent’ of Aurora Leigh: Critical Myths and Periodical Debates”