Immediately under the dome in Les Invalides in Paris lies the body of Napoleon Bonaparte. He has been here since 1861 in an impressive marble tomb decorated with volutes on a rectangular slab.
The ambitious French emperor, who won and lost a series of military campaigns, wanted to be buried in Paris. At his request, he declared that he wanted to be buried on the banks of the river Seine. The deadly remains of Napoleon cannot be immediately adjacent to the river. But in 1861, the French king, Louis-Philippe, went on to position him in an excellent position under the recently completed dome by architect Louis Visconti. The complex of buildings in which the House of Invalides is located, including the chapel under which Napoleon is buried, is clearly visible to the hay.
Today "Invalids" are part of the museums and monuments associated with the military history of France, as well as nursing homes and hospitals for war veterans. Here are also buried family members and officers who served under Napoleon.
This was actually the third burial place of Napoleon since his death forty years ago in 1821. Before the dome was completed, it lay in the nearby chapel of St. Jerome after a state funeral in 1840. The funeral was the culmination of an episode known as the Retour des Cendres (Return of the Ashes), including the exhumation and transport of Napoleon’s body from St. Helena in the South Atlantic.
One would have thought that St. Helena was just the last territory to be captured by Napoleon’s imperial strategy. In fact, his career ended in 1815 after losing the Battle of Waterloo, and he was exiled to this remote island to spend the last six years of his life living at Longwood House.
Saint Helena, located two thousand kilometers from any large array, was supposed to be a deserted place for Napoleon to spend his last days. In death, Napoleon was buried with dignity under the dome of a chapel in the House of Invalides in Paris.
