The secret of Bonaparte's beauty.
In the portrait of Robert Lefèvre, Pauline Bonaparte poses next to the bust of her brother Napoleon, who is famous for her looks and has spent a lot of time and energy trying to perpetuate them. She is a fashion trendsetter who loves gemstones and loves to wear jewelry tiaras and embellishments on gowns. She is also notorious for wearing unimaginative see-through dresses. One of the famous stories of her daily beauty regimen is to soften and whiten with milk baths**. She once visited the home of a family who was unable to shower, and Pauline unabashedly demanded that a hole be made in the ceiling above and that the servant pour milk on her in the bathtub.
At the glorious moment when Napoleon swept across Europe, his youngest and most beloved sister, Pauline Bonaparte, shunned politics. She chose a life full of love adventures and was known for her love and beauty.
Napoleon's sister.
Pauline Bonaparte was Napoleon's sister and her brother's favorite of Napoleon's seven siblings. She was the only one who did not participate in Napoleon's political power play. When her siblings ascended to the throne across Europe, Pauline said, "I don't like the crown. If I want one, I deserve it;But I saved the taste to my relatives. ”
Pauline Bonaparte, born on October 20, 1780 in Ajaccio, Corsica, was the sixth of eight children of lawyers Charles Marie Bonaparte and María Letizia La Morino. In contrast to her ambitious older brother, Pauline chose a life full of love adventures rather than reshaping the political map of Europe. She conquered a long list of lovers with her beauty and boldness, and despite the constant scandals, she won the admiration of European high society as a fashion icon.
Few women enjoy beauty more than she does,".
This is what the French general Louis Stanislas de Girardin said of her. For Napoleon himself, she was "the best creature" and "the only one who never asked for anything".
Although Pauline is often frivolous and incompetent, she also has a loyal and courageous side. When Napoleon was exiled to Elba in 1814 after Russia's failed military campaign, she was the only one of his siblings to visit Napoleon (and help him financially). During his second exile to St. Helena after the defeat at Waterloo, Pauling even asked to spend some time with him on a remote island in the South Atlantic.
Family wealth. Although her father died when she was five years old, Pauline grew up in the arms of a comfortable family until she was a teenager. Then, by 1793, life became even more difficult: her brother Lucien was embroiled in a political controversy that forced the family to flee Corsica for mainland France. When they arrived in Marseille, they were living in poverty. In the same year, Napoleon made his first military fame and began to climb his family's fortune.
Pauline never had a formal education, and women of higher social status had to go through a formal education in order to get a wealthy husband. At the age of 15, she was beautiful enough to attract the attention of her brother's comrades. After one or two flirtaties, she fell in love with the old French revolutionary Stanislas Fréron. He gets entangled with another ** (26 years older than Pauline) and is rejected by Pauline's mother. Suitors are endless. Napoleon said to an aspirant: "You have nothing." She didn't have anything. How much is that?Nothing. In the end, her brother convinced her to consider Charles Leclerc. They were married in 1797, and a year later, their only son, Demead, was born.
Wives, widows, princesses.
A shiny hilt owned by Pauline's second husband, Camilo Boghesse.
In 1801, in order to quell the ongoing revolution in Saint-Domingue (in present-day Haiti) and to preserve the sugar revenues the country received from its colonies, Napoleon (now First Consul) sent Pauline's husband to the Caribbean with 23,000 French soldiers. In 1802, Pauline and her son followed, and Leclerc achieved an initial victory over the rebellion led by Toussaint Louvertur.
Leclerc's success was short-lived. When the fighting resumed, yellow fever broke out, and the French ** team began to suffer heavy losses. In the midst of low morale, Pauline is self-centered, providing a social pastime by hosting balls and celebrations. She also turned her family's mansion into a field hospital. Leclerc urged his wife to return to France, but she refused. Leclerc wrote to Napoleon that she chose to follow her husband's fate, "for better or for worse." In November 1802, Leclerc died of yellow fever, and Pauline and her son returned to France.
Although Pauline was deeply saddened by her husband's death, she soon began a romantic relationship. Her love life always caused gossip, but was often caught and exaggerated by Napoleon's royalist enemies. "Pauline is often called a nymphomaniac by supporters of the Bourbons, and she doesn't care if her partner is male or female, or whether they are his officers or Haitians who oppose the French ** team when she is in Haiti with Leclerc," Flora Fraser said. The goal was always to damage her brother's reputation. "The author of the book "Pauline Bonaparte: Venus of the Empire" writes.
Napoleon coveted imperial power and knew that his reputation must be beyond reproach. The image of his sister is closely linked to his, so he once again finds a new husband for Pauline: Prince Camilo Borgese, a very wealthy and well-connected man, whose presence will help Napoleon to strengthen his ties with French-occupied Italy, and the two married in June 1803.
Divorce. 
The crown of ears of wheat by Pauline Bonaparte.
Marie-Étienne Nitot founded the French jewelry brand Chaumet in 1780 and was Napoleon's official jeweler. This 1811 épis de blés (crown of ears of wheat) belonged to Pauline. It is made of gold and silver, set with diamonds, and sold for more than $850,000 at auction in 2021.
Initially, Pauline admired the 28-year-old prince's Mediterranean-inspired beauty, not to mention the title of princess, generous annuity, possessions, and the use of the famous Borghese jewelry. However, reality soon strikes her, Pauline is soon disillusioned, her marriage deteriorates, and she begins to call her husband a "calm idiot", among other ridicules.
Pauline's health began to bother her. In 1804, Prince Borghese took Pauline to the Baths of Pisa to heal her wounds, but she was not allowed to take her son with her. When she left, the six-year-old had a fever and died. Pauline blames the prince. Their incompatible marriage now broke down, and she persuaded Napoleon to allow her to return to Paris instead of traveling to Rome with Prince Borghese. She despises her husband and takes refuge in love again.
Immortal beauty.
Soon after they were married, Borges commissioned Antonio Canova, the greatest neoclassical sculptor of the time, to depict his new wife. The artist wanted a mythological theme that alluded to Diana, the Roman goddess of hunting.
Pauline laughed at this incongruous idea and chose Venus, the Roman goddess of love. The resulting masterpiece was called "Venus Victrix" and became Pauline's most famous masterpiece. By portraying herself as Venus, Pauline's innate vanity couldn't be more obvious. But, as Fraser points out, it also shows her "disregard for convention, and even the joy of breaking it."
Victorious Venus.
Pauline Bonaparte poses for the sculptor Antonio Canova, who depicts her as a Roman goddess.
Pauline's decision to pose was notorious at the time for a woman of her stature, but the sculpture's virtuosity earned widespread admiration when it was completed in 1808. As Canova suggests, at night under the light of a torch**, the statue's smooth polished marble looks like a real human body. Today, Pauline's figure continues to amaze visitors to the Galleria Borghese in Rome.
Napoleon seems to have ignored much of Pauline's unconventional behavior. This choice contrasts with the emphasis on "good morals" and the restriction of women's rights acquired during the French Revolution when he was appointed Emperor of France in 1804. For Napoleon, the empire was one thing, the family was another, and no one embodied this contrast better than his sister.
Villa Paulina.
Pauline Bonaparte's residence in Rome became the seat of the French embassy in the Holy See.
Be faithful to the end. Over the years, Pauline's health problems have worsened. She experienced chronic abdominal pain and traveled to various spas for relief or ** solutions. She often insisted on carrying her on a stretcher to avoid walking. Her demands became increasingly capricious. She instructed her attendants to use her as a footstool, or to put her cloak on the ground so she could rest.
When Napoleon was forced into exile on St. Helena in 1815, Pauline returned to Rome to lobby the British authorities to release her brother. Five years later, when reports of Napoleon's decline came, she repeatedly asked for permission to join him, "to be present as he took his last breath." He died in 1821 while she was still waiting for an answer.
Her own health was gradually ruined by stomach cancer. In 1825, after 20 years of separation from her husband, Pauline returned to live with him at the Palazzo Borghese. Three months later, Pauline Bonaparte died there at the age of 45.