Bonaparte, Napoleon (Napoleon I) (1769–1821)

Napoleon Bonaparte remains one of the most adored and infamous figures in the history of the modern world. He was an officer in the French army who, in his early career, distinguished himself in victories in the French Revolutionary Wars between 1793 and 1799. Following a coup d'etat on November 9, 1799, he became first consul under the new regime of the consulate and later established a dictatorship. In 1802 he was declared consul for life, and, in May 1804, he was declared Emperor of the French, titled Napoleon I, and proclaimed a hereditary monarch. He introduced a sweeping series of new codes, laws, and decrees, including a civil code, the Code Napoleon. Between 1803 and 1815, he brutally prosecuted the Napoleonic Wars and occupied most of continental Europe. France became a racial state as “whiteness” became a prerequisite for French identity and ethnic populations were stripped of citizenship and civil rights.