Napoleon Bonaparte

Cultural  

1. A French general, political leader, and emperor of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries. Bonaparte rose swiftly through the ranks of army and government during and after the French Revolution and crowned himself emperor in 1804. He conquered much of Europe but lost two-thirds of his army in a disastrous invasion of Russia. After his final loss to Britain and Prussia at the Battle of Waterloo, he was exiled to the island of St. Helena in the south Atlantic Ocean.

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Because Napoleon was short, overly aggressive men of short stature are sometimes said to have a “Napoleon complex.”

Napoleon's name is often connected with overreaching military ambition and delusions of grandeur.

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Napoleon Bonaparte

However, the award has been controversial since being established by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1802.

From BBC ● Jul. 14, 2026

Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov in 2023 ordered a 43-metre-tall golden statue of himself straddling an Akhal-Teke in a pose reminiscent of Napoleon Bonaparte.

From Barron's ● Jun. 5, 2026

In 1815, following the Battle of Waterloo, Napoleon Bonaparte wrote a letter of surrender to the Prince Regent in England.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 8, 2026

That’s probably how Napoleon Bonaparte felt, three-quarters of the way through the battle of Waterloo.

From Salon ● Sep. 14, 2025

He’d made what Charles Krauthammer described in Time magazine, somewhat facetiously, as the greatest comeback since Napoleon Bonaparte sailed a single-masted fleet from the island of Elba in 1815.

From "Endgame" by Frank Brady