Original subtitles

In the opening years of the 19th century,

across the battlefields and capital cities of Europe,

the Government of France and her leader, Napoleon Bonaparte,

reigned supreme.

In 1804, at the age of just 35,

Napoleon had been crowned Emperor of the French.

And within a year, astride a white stallion,

he entered the city of Milan in Italy in triumph

to add yet another title to his name.

On 26th May 1805,

Napoleon was crowned King of Italy here at Milan Cathedral.

He wore no fewer than four crowns on that occasion,

including the Iron Crown of the Emperor Charlemagne,

said to be made from nails from the Crucifixion.

Raising it up, Napoleon declared,

"God has given me this.

"Beware, any man who touches it."

GUNFIRE

To the sovereign nations of Europe,

such a powerful defender of revolution as Napoleon

posed a very grave threat.

They had turned hostile

and engulfed France in little short of a world war.

A decade of epic, relentless warfare

would challenge all of the Emperor's skills.

For all the majesty and power of the coronation in Italy,

the security of France

and French Revolutionary ideas remained fragile.

The great European monarchies

remained committed to turning the clock back,

so, for the next five years,

France was subjected to a series of debilitating attacks

from European coalitions.

Five years which, to my mind, mark the genius of Napoleon

as one of the greatest generals of all time.

It was in the rebuilding of Paris

that all of the idealism of a new, Napoleonic France was expressed.

The commissioning of an Arc de Triomphe...

..the construction of a Roman column at the Place Vendome...

splendid new bridges across the River Seine...

These projects heralded France

as home to a new Napoleonic civilisation,

led by a man of astonishing ambition.

Napoleon's decision to become

an emperor rather than a king

underlined the fact

that he intended to extend the ideas of the French Revolution

far beyond the borders of France.

It also underlined the fact that he had made, through his victories,

France into an empire the equal of Austria and Russia.

But above all,

it referenced the last great French Emperor,

Charlemagne.

Viewed through the prism of the 20th century,

historians have chosen to take that ambition

and turn Napoleon into a vain, despotic madman -

a Hitler or Stalin.

In his own age, he was attacked with cheap abuse,

denigrated as "the Corsican Ogre",

"the great despoiler",

"the Antichrist personified".

Napoleon's achievements as leader

of one of the most progressive nations on earth

have been marginalised.

I believe this to be little more than slander.

People think of Napoleon as an egocentric megalomaniac -

yet it was he who said

that "A throne is nothing more than a piece of wood covered in velvet."

He believed in rights - in property rights,

in equality before the law,

in religious toleration.

"Every trace of serfdom must be done away with," he ordered.

Hardly the remark of a megalomaniac.

In support of his new regime,

Napoleon exploited one of the most powerful

and commendable qualities of the human psyche -

the aspiration to better oneself.

In the Emperor's time,

this beautiful chateau just outside Paris

was home to Marshal Jean Lannes.

Lannes, the son of a commoner,

had served France with distinction

in military campaigns in Italy and Egypt.

When Napoleon became Emperor in 1804,

he named Lannes and a larger group of army officers

"Marshals of the Empire", who came to be known as

"Les Gros Bonnets", or "The Big Hats"

Berthier, Murat, Soult, Ney, Davout,

Oudinot, Augereau, Bernadotte,

Massena and Lannes.

These were just some of the soldiers who became marshals,

appointed through their talent,

utterly regardless of who their fathers were.

Granted titles and cash by Napoleon,

they were able to live a life of luxury.

Under the old regime,

the French Army was commanded by a small group of generals

who came almost exclusively from the aristocracy and the gentry.

When Napoleon became Emperor, he created 26 marshals,

some of whom came from very different social backgrounds.

There was the son of an innkeeper,

a bailiff, a tanner, a miller,

a barber and a barrel-cooper.

It was the first genuine meritocracy for 1,000 years.

Of those 26 marshals, 18 became dukes,

six became princes, and two even became kings.

Imagine the dynamism unleashed in Napoleonic France

when the son of an innkeeper can become a king.

Here was an ethos utterly at odds with the days of monarchy,

when the vast majority of people in France

were promoted either by parentage or patronage by the nobility.

Through the power of meritocracy,

Napoleon sought to unify the nation

and transform the effectiveness of his government.

His honouring of civilians for their service to the nation,

the Order of the Legion d'honneur,

remains the country's principal civil award.

Lannes and his fellow marshals

weren't part of some kind of a military dictatorship -

the civil administration of France ran the country -

but rather, they were the elite

of a much larger programme for a new nobility,

one that was based on merit and service to the State,

rather than on birth.

The new order in France

was galvanised by the driving ambition of her leader.

It had taken 18 years

for a commissioned artilleryman in the French Army,

born a Corsican, an outsider,

to become Consul for Life in France -

in effect, the nation's dictator.

Napoleon had risen fast through the ranks of the military,

due to his brilliant leadership in the first Italian campaign,

against the most aggressive antirevolutionary nation in Europe,

and his careful cultivation of a personal mythology.

Supported by his wife Josephine,

Napoleon had been part of a successful military coup in 1799,

bringing order to a country

that for a decade had only known political chaos.

Napoleon had banished the mob and the guillotine from French politics.

His conviction was stunning -

a feature of the man that I find inspirational.

In a world where leadership is so circumscribed today

by opinion polls and interest groups

and focus groups,

there is something liberating in seeing the example of a man

who followed his own beliefs, his own destiny,

who explained to his people what he wanted to do -

not what they wanted him to say,

but what he truly believed himself.

And that, it seems to me,

is something that is worthwhile and liberating and admirable.

A key to that conviction can be found in images of the Emperor.

In a painting that he commissioned of himself in his coronation costume

by the celebrated painter Gerard,

Napoleon is pictured adorned with a golden laurel crown...

..a symbol of victory similar to that worn

by the great Roman General and Consul, Julius Caesar.

Napoleon was near-obsessed with antiquity.

He drew on it for political precedent

and idolised the exploits of its heroes.

Throughout his life,

Napoleon took his inspiration from ancient history.

He called himself "Consul",

the title given in Ancient Rome to the Heads of State.

He chose the eagle as the symbol of Imperial France.

The Code Napoleon was strongly influenced by Roman Law.

This influence and this inspiration became so profound

that it became behavioural.

He actually put his hand inside his waistcoat,

in conscious imitation of the statues of the Caesars.

At school, Napoleon had read many books

about Alexander the Great and Julius Caesar,

and his palaces were decorated with busts of them both.

Their narrative was so compelling

that by the early 1800s,

he even referred to himself, without irony,

as "the new Caesar".

It's only when one gets really close to ancient artefacts

that one can appreciate

the tremendous power they had over Napoleon.

This is a glass token that was given by Germanicus to his soldiers,

and this was given out to connect the Emperor with the army,

something which was tremendously important also to Napoleon.

Both in Napoleon's case and the Roman case,

the soldier actually gave his oath of allegiance to the Emperor,

rather than to the Empire.

And here, a beautiful cameo of the Emperor Claudius.

Now, this would only go to the top people in the Empire,

and this would be the kind of thing

that Napoleon would have given to his top marshals,

like he gave land and cash.

In the Roman times,

you got this stunning representation of the Emperor.

Here is discharge papers, effectively,

of a member of the Praetorian Guard, the Emperor's close bodyguard.

After 25 years, this man would have got citizenship

and a land donation.

These artefacts remind me very powerfully of the interaction

that Napoleon wanted to encourage between him and his army.

He's demanding from them loyalty and, to an extent, obedience,

but certainly a sense of willingness to fight and die for him.

In the minds of the old monarchist nations of Europe,

and Britain in particular, such ancient allusions triggered fear.

For over 100 years, France had harboured plans to invade Britain -

and in the Revolutionary era, those plans had progressed with intent.

France feared the threat that Britain's naval mastery of the world

posed to her trade and colonies.

Britain was committed to defending her interests

against the bravura of the new Napoleonic regime,

come what may.

She distrusted Napoleon intensely,

blaming him for the collapse of a peace treaty between the two nations

that lasted for just over one year.

Britain was implacably opposed to the French Revolution,

and here in Downing Street,

William Pitt the Younger fought tirelessly to defeat it.

Tens of millions of pounds were spent on new warships, weapons

and subsidies for any country willing to fight against France.

"Never fear. Depend upon it,"

Pitt told the political philosopher Edmund Burke,

"we shall carry on as we are, even until the Day of Judgment."

In 1797, the French Government had appointed General Bonaparte

Commander in Chief of the Army of England.

When he became First Consul two years later,

he worked actively on plans

for the largest possible invasion of Britain.

His commitment to the cause was resolute,

later telling a general

who doubted the possibility of a speedy invasion...

"'Impossible', sir?

"I am not acquainted with the word.

"It is not in the French language.

"Erase it from your dictionary."

As ever with Napoleon,

ancient history granted him instructive precedent.

As he wrote later of his hero Julius Caesar's attempt

to invade Britain in 55 and 54 BC...

"Caesar failed in his foray into England.

"Two legions were not enough. He needed at least four

"and he did not have any cavalry -

"an indispensable weapon in a country like England.

"He did not make enough preparations for an expedition of this importance.

"It turned to confusion and it was considered good fortune

"that he was able to withdraw without loss."

By July 1804,

a huge armada of boats had been mustered

and a massive invasion force was in training along the Channel coast.

Napoleon was palpably excited by the prospect of invasion.

As he wrote to Second Consul Cambaceres...

"I have seen the English coast

"as clearly as one can see the wayside cross from the Tuileries.

"One could pick out the houses."

In response,

Britain fortified her coastal defences as much as possible.

In time, she would build a chain of Martello towers,

even a Grand Shaft in Dover

to allow soldiers to descend the cliffs under cover.

Together, they might have stopped Napoleon's armies

for about half an hour.

For eight years, Napoleon had dreamt of invading Britain.

"The death knell of England has sounded", he said.

"We must avenge the defeats of Poitiers, Crecy and Agincourt."

It was no idle threat,

for Napoleon was now in possession

of a highly-trained army of 350,000 men,

one of the great military phenomena in history.

In 1805, he named it "La Grande Armee".

As with every other institution of French life,

the Revolution had radically altered the organisation of the French Army.

Historically, the tactics of the old, aristocrat-led French Army

were rigid, with troops arrayed in two or sometimes three lines,

shoulder-to-shoulder,

exchanging volleys of fire with the enemy at close range.

However, with the introduction of universal conscription,

a much larger Revolutionary Army had to change its strategy.

Napoleon instituted the corps system,

turning the army into mini-armies with their own infantry,

cavalry, artillery and staff sections.

It was a masterstroke.

The army could now separate when marching,

but also concentrate for fighting.

The corps could move within a day's march, or 15 miles of each other,

each capable of becoming rearguard,

vanguard or reserve at a moment's notice.

What's more, once one corps "fixed" the enemy into battle position,

Napoleon could summon the others to reinforce,

outflank and occasionally completely envelop the enemy.

Here was a powerful new operational level of warfare

that would be adopted by every European army by 1812

and would last until 1945.

The dexterity of manoeuvre of the Grande Armee

was matched by the suavity of its appearance.

Decked out in scarlet, purple, yellow, blue, gold and silver,

with fringes, buttons, epaulettes, braids and leather,

the exotic look was all part of the strategy.

ALL: Vive la France!

Vive la France!

ALL: Vive la France!

Vive la France!

ALL: Vive la France!

The uniform of the Grand Armee was absolutely splendid.

This leopard skin-trimmed helmet belonged to a Captain of Dragoons.

Here was a pageantry that was intended to create esprit de corps,

a pride that would light what was called "the sacred fire"

under the men in battle.

It was a magnificence that would draw the attention of posterity.

It was also thought to pull the girls.

With the Grande Armee threatening to invade Britain,

the antirevolutionary monarchies of Europe

now mobilised for war against France, sweetened by British cash.

Austria formed an alliance with Britain and Russia,

and despatched a large force of troops westwards,

led by three archdukes.

Tsar Alexander I of Russia had expanded his army

and sent them to support Austria.

Sweden, Naples and several German principalities

joined the anti-French coalition.

The Allied strategy - advance towards France,

and destroy the French Imperial Army in Italy.

By 1805, simmering tensions had turned to direct threat.

No fewer than half a million Allied troops

were being mobilised against Napoleon in yet another coalition.

So Napoleon had to postpone the invasion of Britain,

and instead marched 600 miles to the east,

to confront the Austrian and Russian empires on the Danube.

The movement by the Grande Armee to meet the enemy

was one of the most brilliant,

speedily executed mass military manoeuvres of all time,

as well as the finest expression of the military power

of Imperial France.

Over 170,000 infantry

and 29,000 cavalry

raced eastwards across the continent of Europe.

They marched in support of a commander set upon a swift victory.

Napoleon's plan -

gain two weeks on the enemy and crush Austria

before the Russians could arrive in support.

"Soldiers! Your Emperor is in the midst of you.

"You are only the advance guard of a great people.

"No matter what obstacles are thrown in our way,

"we shall overcome them, and we shall only rest

"after having planted our flags on the territory of the enemy."

They advanced beneath regimental banners

that represented not just an army,

but a civilisation on the march.

Easily the most prized possession in the ranks of the Grand Armee

was the regimental eagle, the regimental rallying point.

Here are three of these magnificent creatures

that were captured in battle.

They are made up of six pieces of bronze

that were welded together and then gilded -

and there's the number of the demi-brigade

that this one belonged to -

and they were attached to eight-foot-long staffs,

which had the regimental silken colour hanging from them.

And, in essence,

they represented the honour of the regiment.

In one battle, a man actually had his hand chopped off

sooner than release it.

Napoleon said that

"The loss of an eagle was an affront to national honour,"

that "Neither victory nor the glory of 100 battles could make amends."

Napoleon's army was drawn from forces from the Atlantic coast

and across the continent of Europe.

The strategy was that they would converge on the River Rhine

and defeat the Austrian Army in Bavaria.

Troops stationed in Italy

would attack and frustrate the Austrians there, too,

under the leadership of Marshal Massena -

yet another soldier of humble birth

who'd been orphaned at an early age.

Napoleon wrote to Massena on the 18th of September, 1805 -

as ever, using the imperative case.

"You have nearly 60,000 men under your orders -

"that is one third more than ever I had.

"I have full confidence in your courage and ability.

"Win me some victories."

Minute planning, highly efficient marching,

secret manoeuvres

and an ingenious campaign of disinformation

enabled the French Army to cross the Rhine unopposed

and reach the River Danube by early October 1805.

After Marshal Ney routed an Austrian Army in the town of Elchingen,

the Grande Armee reached the city of Ulm,

an Austrian stronghold in Bavaria.

Utterly surprised by the speed of the French advance

and many miles from any relief force,

over 30,000 Austrians were forced to surrender.

Napoleon was delighted -

and, in a proclamation, made his troops a promise.

"Your progeny, 500 years hence,

"who may place themselves under those eagles which you rally,

"will know in detail everything

"that your respective corps shall achieve tomorrow.

"Your courage shall confer on them eternal celebrity."

However, the Grande Armee was now in an exceedingly perilous situation.

Over 500 miles from France,

it was at the very extremity of extended lines of communication

and open to encirclement.

After Napoleon had captured Vienna,

the main Russian Army now joined forces with the Austrians.

Napoleon knew that a decisive battle now had to be fought,

and he found an appropriate site - north of Vienna, in Moravia,

in today's Czech Republic.

Napoleon hadn't fought a battle for five and a half years.

He'd brought the Grande Armee, in that time,

up to a pitch of training and professionalism

that made it the most formidable fighting force in Europe.

He had a sixth sense, both for what his army was capable of,

but also for what his enemy's intentions were going to be.

He also had a lust for the decisive battle.

He had not started this war himself, but he meant to end it.

And he was going to do it here, on the battlefield of Austerlitz.

Napoleon's battle plan hinged upon the power of manoeuvre

that the corps system afforded him.

To feign weakness on one flank, lure the enemy, pin him down

and then follow up with a massive central counterattack.

It was clear in advance of the battle that the Allied forces,

spearheaded by the Russians,

would attack from a hill in the centre of the battlefield -

the Pratzen Heights.

So, to draw them into his trap,

Napoleon simply did nothing to discourage them.

He appeared to concentrate his troops to the north,

under Marshals Lannes and Bernadotte,

and leave his forces to the south relatively light,

under Marshal Davout.

The hope was that the enemy would underestimate the chances

of a frontal attack from the centre

and an enveloping attack from the south.

Battle was set to take place

on the first anniversary of Napoleon's coronation.

The night before, in a famous moment in military history,

the Emperor reviewed his troops in a torchlight procession

and issued a celebrated proclamation.

"Soldiers!

"The Russian Army is before you.

"I shall myself direct all your battalions.

"If victory be for a moment doubtful,

"you shall see your Emperor expose himself the first blows.

"We must conquer these hirelings of England,

"who are animated with so great a hatred against our nation.

"This victory will finish our campaign

"and the peace that I will make will be worthy of my people -

"of you and of me.

"Before tomorrow night, that army will be destroyed."

On the morning of the Battle of Austerlitz,

something extraordinary happened.

When the sun came up,

it burnt off the mists on the upper ground

where the Russians and Austrians were,

but not on the lower ground, where the French were.

So when, at nine o'clock, Napoleon organised his attack,

it was a surprise attack.

It came straight out of the mist.

Forever thereafter, the sun of Austerlitz

occupied a central role in the Napoleonic myth.

And one can see why.

Napoleon watched as columns of enemy troops

streamed down off the Pratzen Heights,

intent on carrying out an elaborate scheme to turn the French flank

and get astride the road to France.

Working from a vantage point to the south of the battlefield,

the Emperor first ensured that both his flanks were secure,

and then massed a central striking force of 35,000 soldiers,

focusing them upon the enemy centre,

which was becoming steadily weaker.

Here I am, on the Zuran - Napoleon's headquarters

for the opening stages of the Battle of Austerlitz.

It was here that he met his marshals and generals

and told them exactly what he wanted them to do.

Up here, too, would have been well over 100 other staff officers

and they were under the overall command

of Marshal Alexander Berthier.

Now, he was an organisational genius.

He was able to dictate for 12 hours a day.

He had a filing system that allowed him to know

where every single unit of the French Army was,

and he had a photographic memory.

He was also something of a diplomat - and he had to be.

He somehow managed to persuade his mistress

to share a chateau with his wife,

and vice versa.

At 9am, some two hours into the battle,

the enemy centre on the Pratzen Heights was sufficiently weak

for Marshal Soult to attempt to carry out

a classic Napoleonic manoeuvre.

Napoleon had seven marshals at the Battle of Austerlitz,

six of whom had their own corps.

He used some to fix the enemy into position

and others to fight that war of manoeuvre at which he so excelled.

With split-second timing,

he sent Soult's division of 16,000 men to attack the Russians,

up there on the Pratzen Heights.

The Russians did what they could.

They sent in reinforcements, but it was too late.

Every general dreams about the chance

of smashing through the enemy centre -

and here, at Austerlitz, Napoleon did just that.

As his assault intensified,

the Russians could no longer hold their position.

Here was a decisive moment of the battle -

a tactic worthy of Julius Caesar.

As Napoleon later wrote of Julius Caesar's attack

on the enemy centre in a battle in 45 BC...

"There is a moment in combat

"when the slightest manoeuvre is decisive and gives superiority.

"It is the drop of water that starts the overflow."

This was that moment.

In a desperate attempt to stave off catastrophe,

the Russians mounted a powerful counterattack

with their Imperial Guard.

But it was to no avail.

Napoleon's Imperial Guard was sent in

and the Russians were defeated decisively.

More fighting broke out in villages across the battlefield

and the close combat was brutal.

The woods here at Sokolnice

saw some of the most violent clashes of the entire battle.

There was a lot of bayonet work.

The village changed hands nine times.

In one regiment alone, 11 out of the 12 company commanders

were either killed or wounded -

and one general had four horses shot from under him.

It was a brutal, vicious, bloody form of warfare,

but it changed the odds for Napoleon.

By mid-afternoon, Napoleon sensed the coming victory

and rode up to the Pratzen Heights

to oversee the final destruction of the enemy.

By five o'clock, the Battle of Austerlitz was over.

27,000 Russians and Austrians

were either dead, wounded or taken prisoner -

for French losses of fewer than 8,000.

A great victory had been won.

Enemy standards were laid at Napoleon's feet.

All around, the regimental bands played martial hymns.

The following day,

the sons of the innkeepers, barrel-coopers and flower-sellers -

Napoleon's marshals -

had every right to swagger through the corridors of Slavkov Castle.

Austerlitz was a decisive victory.

It completely vindicated Napoleon's creation of the Grande Armee.

It was his jackpot - not least in the financial sense.

He imposed swingeing reparations on the Austrians of 40 million francs.

The day after the battle, he put out an order of the day, saying,

"Soldiers, I am pleased with you" -

and well he might have been.

"Soldiers -

"you have decorated your eagles with an immortal glory.

"My people will see you again with joy

"and it will be enough for you to say,

"'I was at the Battle of Austerlitz,'

"for them to reply, 'There is a brave man!'"

Austerlitz was the finest victory of Napoleon's career

and a moment of personal affirmation.

The ascendancy of the new meritocracy of France

over the old aristocracy of Europe had been confirmed.

No less a person than the Emperor of Austria and the Holy Roman Empire,

Francis II, now asked to meet Napoleon in person.

A great moment, described by one of those present as...

"An Emperor of Germany come to humble himself

"by suing for peace to the son of a small Corsican family,

"made arbiter of the destinies of Europe."

Napoleon returned to France, feted by the people,

and the mayors of Paris erected this magnificent arch to his glory.

Yet he knew that the security of his Empire

and the security of the French Revolution itself

were still at stake.

The British had not made peace.

They'd financed the Third Coalition

and there was a chance that they would finance more.

In a bulletin after the Battle of Austerlitz,

he described the British as

"perfidious islanders and cowardly oligarchs".

To me, the Arc du Carrousel

represents France's return to its global superpower status.

But it's also a symbol of the triumph,

under Napoleon's rule, of the self-made man.

For the Emperor had done everything in his power

to protect the interests of the richer peasantry,

the small businesses, the strivers of France

against the monarchists and aristocrats.

Yet the new values were anathema to the old nations of Europe -

the Europe of kings.

They accused Napoleon of vanity and belligerence,

but this was simply untrue.

Although Napoleon has been constantly attacked as a warmonger,

in fact, most of the wars were caused by a series of coalitions -

seven in all - that were formed against the French Revolution

and subsequently, against him.

The ideas of the French Revolution were what the great powers,

the coalition powers, hated and feared,

especially when personified by this man,

who was not one of them -

who was not a king from hundreds of years back,

like the Austrians and the Russians were.

So they totally felt that he threatened - his very existence -

threatened them, and in a sense, it did.

The confidence of the antirevolutionary powers

had been emboldened by the victory of the British

at the Battle of Trafalgar.

While Napoleon and his army were advancing to Austerlitz,

Admiral Nelson had resoundingly defeated

the combined French and Spanish navies.

Towards the end of the battle,

Nelson was shot dead by a French marksman.

As a trigger for national emotion in Britain,

Trafalgar and the death of Lord Nelson

are up there with victory in the Battle of Britain,

winning the World Cup and the death of Lady Di -

but all taking place on the same day.

At the time, Napoleon wasn't overly concerned.

He had half a million Austrian and Russian troops on his mind.

Trafalgar simply reinforced

the immovable, aggressive power of Britain.

Within just a year, a new Fourth Coalition of powers,

encouraged and paid for by Britain,

formed to attack Napoleon once again.

This time, Prussia led the offensive,

in alliance with Russia, Saxony, Sweden and Britain

and she declared war in October 1806.

The counterattack of Marshal Davout at the Battle of Auerstadt,

defeating a force nearly thrice his number,

the cavalry charge of Marshal Murat at Eylau,

the Charge of the Cuirassiers at the Battle of Friedland,

this war was the crowning glory of the Marshalate.

The pace of French victory was astonishing

and in the peace that followed,

the defeat of Prussia, Russia

and the capture of prized assets such as Berlin,

the marshals reaped fine reward.

Lannes became the Duke of Montebello, in Italy.

Marshal Ney, the Duke of Elchingen, in Bavaria.

Davout, the Duke of Auerstadt, in Thuringia.

And Soult, the Duke of Dalmatia.

To all appearances, the French Empire was all-powerful.

Yet the way in which Napoleon now chose to run his Empire

was inherently weak.

Because the French Revolution

had not spawned sister revolutions across Europe,

Napoleon was obliged to rule as a monarch,

embracing all the old politics of dynasties and treaties

and marriage alliances.

He sent his brother Joseph

to become King of Naples, there,

and, after that, King of Spain.

He sent Louis to become King of Holland,

and his brother Jerome to become King of Westphalia.

Now, this policy of ruling Europe through his family

proved to be a terrible Achilles heel

and a source of awful frustration for him -

because they weren't any good.

"You can play the fool in your own country,"

he said to Louis in 1807, "..but you can't play it in mine."

With monarchies, dynastic legacy is all.

At her palace at Malmaison,

his wife, the Empress Josephine, was living life to the full.

She had commissioned leading architects to decorate the interior,

and expenditure on her lifestyle, especially her clothes,

had ratcheted up to an estimated - and astonishing -

one million francs a year.

However, the Empress was now infertile.

Her children were ineligible to succeed Napoleon,

because they didn't have his blood -

and Napoleon knew that he wasn't infertile,

since he had a baby by a previous mistress.

The favourite of his 22 mistresses

was the beautiful, blue-eyed Countess Maria Walewska,

the 20-year-old wife of an elderly Polish noble.

Napoleon had met her in January 1807, near Warsaw

and immediately afterwards put a cloying pen to paper.

"Marie, my sweet Marie, my first thought is of you.

"My first desire is to see you again."

Feminine, soft, bookish and frugal,

Marie was the polar opposite to Josephine.

Josephine brought in bills.

As the libertine and revolutionary Marquis de Sade once said...

"The money she gets, she spends with a gambler's fervour -

"her unbridled luxury would swallow up the income of many provinces."

She loved pearls and elaborate sets of gems with diamonds,

and had a wardrobe of astonishing extravagance,

with one gown decorated with real rose petals,

another made from toucan feathers, each tipped with a pearl.

There were spectacular rows over Josephine's spending,

and Napoleon thought her disloyal in her self-interest.

As he wrote to her in February 1807...

"You tell me that your glory consists in your happiness.

"That is not what one says in marriage.

"One should say, "My glory consists in the happiness of my husband."

As the child of a revolution

that had replaced primogeniture and blood inheritance

with the will of the people,

Napoleon knew that without a son by Josephine,

he lacked the legitimacy of kings.

As he would tell his Minister of the Interior, Jean-Antoine Chaptal...

"Five or six families share the thrones of Europe

"and it pains them to see that

"a Corsican has come to sit on one of them.

"I can only keep myself there by force.

"My Empire would be destroyed if I stopped being intimidating."

So now, in the absence of an heir

and in order to neutralise

the threat to France of the European powers,

Napoleon went on the offensive.

From 1793 onwards, the British Government had bankrolled

global aggression against France.

Buoyed by the dramatic growth of her economy between 1799 and 1804,

Britain had poured some 14% of her annual tax yield into the effort.

Britain could afford this, since she dominated world trade

and, in particular, the markets in cotton, iron and steel.

It was the command of the oceans

that allowed Britain to exploit to the full

the promise of the Industrial Revolution.

So Napoleon decided to leverage

the immense scope and power of his Empire

to fight a war of economic blockade against Britain.

He instituted a Europe-wide blockade.

"I will conquer the sea," he said,

"through the power of the land."

In a decree published in Berlin,

Napoleon prohibited all trade with Britain,

declared all British subjects on the Continent to be prisoners of war

and ordered the seizure of all merchandise

from Britain and her colonies,

much of which was publicly burnt.

Any country that refused to participate in the blockade

was assumed to be an enemy of France, and treated as such.

Napoleon knew that the British political class

were dead set on destroying him and the Revolution.

Now, the idea of an economic blockade

against the most powerful trading nation in the world

might sound like an incredibly ambitious project,

but to my mind, it actually betrays a lack of confidence.

Yes, France was the most powerful

trading nation in Europe at the time,

but it was miles behind the Britain of the Industrial Revolution.

Napoleon knew he couldn't compete,

so he changed the rules of the game.

To reinforce the isolation of Britain,

Napoleon now sought to divide the Coalition politically.

Russia had been a cornerstone

of the force for counter-revolution in the world -

a country that was so antithetical to the principles of revolution

that it even retained serfdom, a feudal form of human bondage.

But in July 1807,

Napoleon agreed a peace agreement with Russia.

In a no-expense-spared event,

to all intents and purposes, the first modern superpower summit,

the Emperor met Tsar Alexander I

on a huge, specially-constructed and rather lavish raft

on the River Niemen at Tilsit,

close to the modern border of Lithuania and Russia.

Rounds of meetings, state dinners

and the exchange of sumptuous gifts

concluded with the agreement of Russia

to join the blockade against Britain.

In the words of Napoleon's private secretary at the time,

Louis Antoine Bourrienne,

"Tilsit was one of the culminating points of modern history."

Writing enthusiastically to the Empress Josephine,

Napoleon shared news of the deal, and teased her...

"The Queen of Prussia is really charming.

"She flirts a lot with me, but don't be jealous.

"I am a waterproof cloth and all that just slides off.

"It would cost me too much to play the lover."

The deal with Russia was risky,

because it relied upon Napoleon's trust and Tsar Alexander's goodwill.

Napoleon's new ally was a complicated, occasionally mystical

and deeply conflicted personality.

He had assumed power after effectively turning a blind eye

to the assassination of his own father.

And he'd only agreed to peace with Napoleon

because the alternative was another battle with the French,

which he would surely lose.

Yet Napoleon chose to trust Alexander.

A fault of nature, but also of necessity -

to enforce the blockade of England and legitimise his political power -

legitimacy that could be conferred by the Romanovs,

rulers of Russia since 1613.

Much of what Napoleon does after Tilsit

betrays a sensitivity to humiliation

that might seem incongruous in such a self-confident man.

But he was sensitive.

He was sensitive to the fact that unlike the monarchs of Austria

and Russia and Prussia and various other monarchies,

who had been there for generations,

Napoleon was the first of his royal house

and so, a humiliation of France would cost him his place

in a way that it simply wouldn't with all of those other monarchs.

To secure his legacy,

Napoleon now addressed the problem of the lack of an heir

in the very way in which monarchs of Old Europe

had secured their legacies

and decided on an arranged, political marriage.

By 1809, the Emperor had tired of Josephine,

his expensive sweetheart from the Revolutionary era.

In April, Austria had broken her agreement with France,

struck after the Battle of Austerlitz,

and with the support of Britain,

declared war on Napoleon in yet another Coalition - a fifth.

The campaign was not an easy one for the French.

They suffered a rare defeat at the Battle of Aspern-Essling -

but, after regrouping, they defeated the Austrians resoundingly

at the two-day Battle of Wagram,

the largest battle in the history of Europe up to that time.

Returning from the campaign,

Napoleon embarked on an affair with his sister's lady-in-waiting,

and ordered that the door connecting Josephine's and his bedrooms

at the Palace of Fontainebleau be bricked up.

Soon afterwards, he sought an end to their marriage.

On 30th November 1809,

the final icy scenes of the melodrama took place.

Napoleon and Josephine had dinner together.

She was fighting back the tears.

He said nothing, except to ask what time it was.

When coffee was brought in, which she usually poured,

he poured it himself...

and as the granules of sugar slowly dissolved, he just gazed at her.

And then, finally, he made a gesture,

asking her to leave the room.

She left for an adjacent drawing room.

Through the door, Napoleon heard a shrieking wail from Josephine,

who had flung herself on the floor and was crying and moaning.

A palace chamberlain helped Napoleon carry her down

a narrow staircase to her apartments.

Divorce proceedings soon followed.

For some time, the Austrian Foreign Ministry

had been scheming for Napoleon to marry the Archduchess Marie Louise,

the eldest child of the Emperor Francis.

It was a coupling they hoped

would salvage Austria's position in Europe.

As a personality,

Marie Louise could not have been more different from Josephine -

not least because she was the gentle, naive daughter

of an emperor.

"So long as she is kind", Napoleon is quoted as saying

"and gives me a healthy son,

"I will love her as though

"she were the most beautiful woman in the world."

Within just four months of his divorce,

Napoleon and Marie Louise were married.

The relationship between the two turned out surprisingly well,

not least because she quickly kept her side of the bargain.

At 9:20 on the morning of Wednesday the 20th March 1811,

in the Tuileries Palace,

Marie Louise gave birth to a 9lb baby boy.

Napoleon was delighted.

At the baptism ceremony at the Cathedral of Notre Dame,

he took the infant from the arms of his mother

and raised him up twice, to show him to the public.

Marriage had won for Napoleon a legacy for his work

and a legitimacy to his rule.

His military skill had won him glory on the battlefield.

His political action -

aggressive, pragmatic,

but potentially over-trusting.

Napoleon's marriage to Marie Louise

turned him from the Corsican adventurer

into an in-law of the grandest dynasty of Europe.

The birth of the King of Rome secured his own dynasty.

Equally secure were the benefits of the French Revolution.

No-one could turn the clock back now.

Napoleon was at the zenith of his power.

But his very success

had consolidated his enemies' opposition to him.

He was about to play directly into their hands.

Therein lay his downfall.