Bonaparte

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This article is about the family of Napoleon Bonaparte. There is also an article on the Argentinian paleontologist, José Bonaparte. For the Olympic medallist, see Bonaparte (horse). There have been a few people named Charles Bonaparte.

Of Italian origin, the Bonaparte (originally Buonaparte) family is the family of the Corsican Napoleon I, who was elected as first consul of France on November 10, 1799 with the help of his brother, Lucien Bonaparte, president of the Council of Five Hundred at Saint-Cloud.

Napoleon I was crowned Emperor of the French 1804-1814, 1815; the Bonaparte family also provided kings of Spain, Naples, Holland and Westphalia, and a second French Emperor, Napoleon III. Supporters of the Bonaparte family's claim to the throne of France are known as Bonapartists.

The original coat of arms of the Bonapartes
The original coat of arms of the Bonapartes

The family, formerly known as Buonaparte, was a minor Italian nobility coming from a Tuscan stock of Lombards origin, set in Lunigiana. The family moved to Florence and later brake in two branches; the original one, Buonaparte-Sarzana, have been compelled to leave Florence since of defeated Ghibellines part and later with Francesco Buonaparte, coming to Corsica in 16th century when the island was a Genoese possession. The arms of the Buonaparte family were: Gules two bends sinister between two stars or. In 1804 Napoleon changed the arms to Azure an imperial eagle or. The change applied to all members of his family except for his brother Lucien, and the son of Jerome's first marriage.

Following his conquest of most of Western Europe, the first Napoleon made his elder brother Joseph (1768-1844) king first of Naples (1806-1808) and then of Spain (1808-1813), his third brother Louis (1778-1846) king of Holland (1806-1810) (subsequently forcing his abdication after his failure to subordinate Dutch interests to those of France) and his youngest brother Jérôme Bonaparte (1784-1860) king of Westphalia, the short-lived realm created from some of the states of northwestern Germany (1807-1813).

Napoleon's son Napoleon François Charles Joseph (1811-1832) was created king of Rome (1811-1814) and was later styled Napoleon II by loyalists of the dynasty, though he never actually ruled as Emperor. Charles Louis Napoleon (1808-1873), son of Louis Napoleon, was president of France in 1848-1852 and emperor in 1852-1870, reigning as Napoleon III; his son, Eugene Bonaparte (1856-1879), styled the Prince Imperial, died fighting the Zulus in Natal, South Africa. With his death, the family lost much of its remaining political appeal, though claimants continue to assert their right to the imperial title. A political movement for Corsican independence surfaced in the 1990s which included a Bonapartist restoration in its programme.

Contents

[edit] Crowns held by the family

Imperial coat of arms
Imperial coat of arms

[edit] Emperors of the French

[edit] Kings of Holland

  • Louis I (1806-1810), also Grand Duke of Berg and Celeves (1809-1813)
  • Louis II (1810)

[edit] Kings of Naples

[edit] King of Westphalia

[edit] King of Spain

[edit] Grand Duchess of Tuscany

[edit] The family tree

Carlo-Maria (Ajaccio 1746-Montpellier 1785) married Maria Letizia Ramolino (Ajaccio 1750 - Rome 1836) in 1764. He was a minor official in the local courts. They had eight children:

  1. Joseph (Corte 1768-Florence 1844), King of Naples and Spain, married Julie Clary, sister of Napoleon's childhood sweetheart, Désirée, who was to become the wife of Charles XIV of Sweden.
  2. Napoléon (1769-1821) Emperor
  3. Lucien (Ajaccio 1775-Viterbo 1840)
  4. Maria-Anna or Elisa (Ajaccio 1777-near Trieste 1820), grand-duchess of Tuscany
    • 5 children
  5. Louis, (1778 - 1846) married Hortense de Beauharnais, Napoleon's stepdaughter
  6. Maria Paola or Pauline (Ajaccio 1780-Florence 1825), married in 1797 to French general Charles Leclerc and later married Prince Borghese.
  7. Maria Annunziata or Caroline, married Joachim Murat
  8. Jérôme (Ajaccio 1784-Massy, Essonne,1860), King of Westphalia

[edit] Current descendants

The current head of the family is the Prince Napoléon (Charles Marie Jérôme Victor Bonaparte, born 1950), great-great-grandson of Jérôme Bonaparte by his second marriage; he has a son Jean (born 1986) and a brother, Jérôme Bonaparte, (born 1957), unmarried. There are no remaining descendants in male line from any other of Napoleon's brothers. There are, however, numerous descendants of Napoleon's illegitimate, but recognized son Walewski from his union with Marie, Countess Walewski.

current decendents... Prestwood family[now remarried] children and grandchildren.

Prestwoods of the United States

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