So what’s in a name? Quite a lot, if your name happens to be Bonapart or Hapsburg. The Bonaparts or Bonoparte were counts of some account on the island of Corsica. Corsica is north of Sardinia, west of Italy, south of France, and east of the Iberian peninsula in the Mediterranean Sea.

The most important event to ever take place on Corsica was the birth of a baby boy following a battle which the Corsicians fought with the French, and lost, in the year 1769. That little fellow was Napoleon, son of Count and Countess Carlo Bonaparte.

Napoleon grew up on the island for sixteen years. He hung around the French garrison near Ajaccio, and traded loaves of his mother’s homemade baked white bread for the black bread of French soldiers. This made him popular with the troops.

At age sixteen, he went off to the French Officer’s Academy and excelled in mathematics and artillery.

His military career is history with its ups and downs and “almost” beheading during Robespierre’s “Reign of Terror.”

Robespierre, as leader of the radical Jacobites, became de facto ruler of France. No coins exist with his image. He declared himself to be “The Incorruptible.” He declared that all enemies of the state were to be imprisoned. Tens of thousands were locked up in makeshift jails. Of all those beheaded, only 12 percent were of the aristocracy. The rest were middle class and common people. The Reign of Terror lasted from September 17, 1793 to when Robespierre was overthrown on July 27, 1794 and was beheaded in turn.

During the next ten years, Napoleon had his rank of general restored, conquered Italy, and put down an uprising against the Directory which was the government of France. It was the Directory which first minted the well known, “Hercules Group Coin” which has been in use, off and on, for more than 200 years.

Bonapart abandoned his army in Egypt, returned to France and his unfaithful wife, Josephine, contemplated suicide, but pulled off a coup d’etat instead. He made himself First Consul of France in 1799, then Emperor of the French in 1804, after taking the crown from the hands of Pope Pius VII, who had sold out, and was on hand to do the job of the actual crowning.

Napoleon then crowned his family, starting with Josephine, who had insisted that her civil marriage with Napoleon be blessed by Pius. Napoleon ruled with Josephine as his empress until he really felt pressed for an heir. He needed a son to succeed him as emperor.

Josephine was almost twelve years older than the forty-year old Emperor. This brings us to Marie Louise von Hapsburg, daughter of the Austrian Emperor, Francis II.

Francis II was an unlikely father-in-law for Napoleon. Napoleon had defeated him in war and taken vast lands away from him. In 1806, Napoleon had  ended the 1006 year old Holy Roman Empire which Francis II had ruled. Napoleon reduced him in rank to Emperor of Austria which still had a most respectable piece of European real estate. On this coin shown here, does Francis II look a bit crestfallen?

After Napoleon’s ultimate defeat in 1815, all of his brothers and sisters lost their various positions in the European scheme of things. Here you can see Joseph Bonapart as King of Spain, who had replaced Charles IV as King of Spain. Joseph was a better man, and you can contrast Charles IV, Joseph, and Ferdinand VII (Charles’ son and horrible heir) on their respective crowns or pieces-of-eight.

Ferdinand VII actually approached Joseph Bonapart, even though he was a deposed Spanish prince and offered his services to the French, after his father Charles IV was booted from power, along with his former stable keeper, whom he had elevated to the title of Duke of Gordy. Gordy was made first Minister. He also occupied the position of the queen’s lover.

Charles IV was a member of the House of Burbon, and his great, great, great, great grandson, Juan Carlos rules Spain today. That is a great accomplishment when one considers all of the Hapsburgs, Hoenzollerins, Bonaparts, Romanoffs, and the other royals are out of work today. Nevertheless, Napoleon divorced Josephine and married Maria Louise in 1809, got his heir, and in 1815 at last, lost his Empire.

Just look at this five soldi of Parma struck in 1815. There is the former Empress Marie Louise of France as Dutchess Marie Louisa of the sunny Italian Dutchy of Parma. Things worked out rather well for her, and she was only twenty-four! By the way, did I happen to mention that her aunt (Francis II’s sister) was Marie Antoinette who was rendered headless in the French Revolution’s “Reign of Terror?”

There are still Burbons around with pretentions to being rulers of France. Napoleon’s nephew and step-grandson (I’ll help you figure this one out later) did become president of France from 1848 to 1852, then Emperor of the French from 1852-1870 when he lost the Franco-Prussian War. This stupid war was fought because Isabella II of Spain was dethroned in 1868, because she disgusted her people with her hobby of collecting men. Napoleon III warned the King of Prussia not to allow any of his sons to take the Spanish throne, and this insult to Prussia’s William I at Ems caused the war in which France lost the provinces of Alsace and Lorraine and 800 million dollars in gold. This would be about 16 billion dollars in today’s money.

This war was an indirect cause of World War I, which led to the rise of Communism in Russia, and Hitler in Germany, World War II, the rise of Communism in China and Korea, the Korean War, and Viet Nam. Is this a reach? Think about it, and check out the coins that back up this thesis.

Now when one is called a “Royal Pain” you know why. Now about that Napoleonic, “I’m my own grand paw thing.” He was both step-grandfather and uncle to Napoleon III, because his wife Josephine Beauharnaise had a daughter, Hortense. He became Hortense’s stepfather when he married Josephine Beauharnaise. She was a woman to be understood and pitied because her ever loving husband, Alexander Beauharnaise, was a general who lost a battle and was beheaded during the “Reign of Terror.”

Now Napoleon’s stepdaughter, actually fell in love with Napoleon’s little brother Louie whom he made “Louis King of the Neitherlands.” This made Napoleon her brother-in-law as well as stepfather. When little Louis Napoleon was born in 1808, Napoleon I was both his uncle and step-grandfather. Is it not good to be a historian? I think that Talleyrand, my favorite cynic, was right when he said, “History is a lie agreed upon.” I say that history is also great gossip. By the way, look at Benedetto Pistrucci’s great medal celebrating the loss of Napoleon’s last imperial hopes at the 1815 Battle of Waterloo. One of the four victors over him is his father-in-law, Francis II. Look at him closely. I think that he’s smiling.

Benedetto Pistrucci’s Medal of the Victors over Napoleon I, which celebrated the Battle of Waterloo. Francis II, Napoleon’s father-in-law, is second from the left.	Coin of Maria Louise as Dutchess of Parma in 1815.	Piece of Eight, Charles IV, the Not-So-Smart King of Spain, who alternately was an ally then, was disposed by Napoleon.	Joseph Bonapart as King of Spain on a crown size coin.
The restored Ferdinand VII on a Spanish Colonial coin.	The “Hercules Groups” graced the coins of the First Republic. Coins of the Second and Third Republics also featured Hercules and his two female companions. in the Twentieth Century, the Depré design was also used from time to time.	Spanish Coin of Queen Isabella II whose outlandish sexual behavior cost her the Throne of Spain.	Napoleon III, who was president of the Second French Republic (1848-1852) and Emperor of the French (1852-1870).
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