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May 05, 2021 200 years after the death of Napoleon Bonaparte, French emperor and great conqueror of Europe who died in exile on the island of Saint Helena on May 5, 1821, the president of the French Republic, Emmanuel Macron, celebrates the anniversary with a speech on the legacy left by the emperor, a figure both admired and controversial in the history of France. 



"Part of us"

The French president, Emmanuel Macron, recalled Napoleon Bonaparte 200 years after his death, rejecting the criticisms of those who considered the commemoration inappropriate due to the authoritarianism and the bloody military campaigns of the general, as well as his decision to restore slavery. In front of an audience of academics, Macron stressed the need to know the past "in its glorious events and errors".



"The fight against ignorance, love for knowledge and for history leads us not to give in to those who despise the past when it does not correspond to their conception of the present", said the French president. "Napoleon is part of us", added Macron, who denied he wanted to make an "exalted celebration", but claimed a "far-sighted commemoration" that came from "a frontal look at history".



The initiatives planned for the bicentenary - exhibitions, auctions and the publication of numerous books - must serve to "know what Napoleon has done to us and what we have done with Napoleon", explained Macron, who underlined how France "has renounced the worst things in the Empire "and safeguarded Bonaparte's best achievements, such as the civil code which sanctioned the equality of all citizens.



Macron today will also lay a crown outside on the emperor's tombs together with Jean-Christophe Napoleon Bonaparte, descendant of the leader. 



Distances from Napoleon

Emmanuel Macron's participation was balanced and prudent due to the controversy surrounding the figure of the emperor: his predecessors distanced themselves from the most cumbersome historical figure in the country, accused by the revisionism of the 'cancel culture' of being a coup, a bloodthirsty dictator and having restored slavery. Jacques Chirac did not participate in the events of the bicentenary of the battle of Austerlitz, celebrated as the apotheosis of Napoleon's military genius and Francois Hollande did not participate in those of Waterloo.



A delicate balance

Macron preferred not to ignore the anniversary, even if the Elysée states: "To commemorate is not to celebrate". 



The most difficult speech

A year after the presidential election, Macron criticized Bonaparte's "wrong" decision to restore slavery in 1802, eight years after it was abolished by the French Revolution. It has been highlighted how Napoleon's action, however, contributed to creating the modern French state, the Civil Code or the division of the Empire into departments.



The Doge of Venice against Macron and Napoleon

"The

Doge's

Office disputes the celebratory ceremony in Paris announced by the French Presidency for the bicentenary of Napoleon Bonaparte and proposes a meeting to President Emmanuel Macron to find a remedial solution to the very serious crimes of all kinds committed by French troops under the command of Napoleon Bonaparte, hitherto unpunished, but not deleted ".



This was underlined by the 121st 'Doge' Albert Gardin, who announces: "On the walls of Venice, we have put up a poster of the Doge's Office with an appeal to the Council of Europe to condemn every apology of Napoleon on a par with that of Adolf Hitler and open a democratic process on anti-Venetian crimes, against those responsible for the overthrow of Venetian institutions and the illegitimate occupations of the Serenissima that have followed one another since then, preventing the Venetians from exercising their rights to freedom and sovereignty ". "We give representation to the Venetian Republic which for us has never died and indeed represent its continuity", he explains.