N & E
Napoleon & Empire

Napoleonic Timeline of 1769-1788

1769

15 August 1769 – Napoleon Bonaparte was born in Ajaccio  (Corsica), in the Casa Buonaparte   – the ancestral home of the Bonaparte family  – from Carlo Maria (Charles-Marie) Buonaparte and Letizia (Laetitia) Ramolino.

1771

21 July 1771 – He was baptized at  the Ajaccio Cathedral  by his great-uncle, Archdeacon Lucien; his godfather was the prosecutor Laurent Giubeca, his godmother his aunt Gertruda Paravicini.

19 August 1771 – The Corsica High Council officialy recognized the Bonapartes' nobility.

1778

15 December 1778 – First trip to mainland France, with his father and his elder brother Joseph Bonaparte.

30 December 1778 – He arrived at Autun, Burgundy.

1779

1st January 1779 – Napoleon Bonaparte was admitted to the Collège d'Autun [46.94913, 4.29723].

15 May 1779 – He joined the Military School of Brienne [48.38897, 4.52821] , southern Champagne, one of twelve middle schools in France designated to prepare 600 children of poor nobility for a career in arms.

1784

21 June 1784 ‒ Napoleon received a visit from his father, the only one since having left Corsica.

17 October 1784 – Napoleon left the Military School of Brienne for the French capital, accompanied by four fellow students and their Principal, Father Berton.

19 October 1784 – The young men, who had embarked in Troyes on a water coach, disembarked at the port of Saint-Paul and discovered Paris.

22 October 1784 – Napoleon entered the Royal Military School of Champ-de-Mars [48.85253, 2.30342], in Paris.

The Military School of Paris
The Military School of Paris

1785

24 February 1785 – Napoleon's father Charles-Marie Bonaparte died of cancer in Montpellier, southern France.

28 October 1785 – Napoleon Bonaparte got his Second-Lieutenant's diploma. His first assignment was with the artillery regiment of La Fère, in the garrison at Valence, a city upon the Rhône river.

1786

12 August 1786 – Departure to Lyon, with his battalion. Some days later, he offered the local Academy a dissertation on the following topic: What are the feelings which should be recommended the most in order to make men happy?.

30 August 1786 – Return to Valence.

1st September 1786 – A first leave break enabled Napoleon to return to Corsica, via Aix [nowadays Aix-en-Provence] where he met his uncle Joseph Fesch and his younger brother Lucien Bonaparte.

15 September 1786 – Arrival at Ajaccio.

1787

21 April 1787 – Another leave for family reasons.

12 September 1787 – He left Corsica to Paris.

22 November 1787 – Napoleon Bonaparte had his first sexual experience with a prostitute at the Palais-Royal  in Paris.

1st December 1787 – His leave was extended for a six month period.

1788

1st January 1788 – Napoleon Bonaparte returned to Ajaccio.

1st June 1788 – He joined his regiment at Auxonne , a small town southeast Dijon, Burgundy.

Sources

This page has as its main source the Napoleonic chronology established by Gérard Walter for his edition of The Memorial of Saint Helena, in the French classics series La Pléiade, published by the Éditions Gallimard, Paris.