Glancing round, Napoleon saw Talleyrand, his foreign minister, frown with disapproval as he stood with the other ministers on the approach to the cathedral. Napoleon could not help a slight chuckle at the sight of the aristocrat’s discomfort over the Emperor’s lack of decorum. Well, let him disapprove, Napoleon reflected. The old regime was gone, swept away by the revolution, and a new order had risen in its place. An order based upon the will of the people. Napoleon was grateful enough, and astute enough, to return their greeting as he turned to each side and waved back to the delighted crowd before he descended from the carriage. At once the footmen took up the train of his gold-embroidered red robes and followed him at a steady pace as he strode across the carpet towards the entrance of the cathedral.

Most of the guests, and his family, had already made their way inside and been ushered to their appointed seats. The ministers, as the senior servants of the state, would follow the Emperor and take up the most prestigious places close to the heart of the ceremony. Originally Napoleon had intended to lead his generals into the cathedral, but his brother, Joseph, and Talleyrand had urged him to present the coronation as a primarily civilian celebration. Even though the army had been the means by which Napoleon had assumed power over France, it was important that he present himself to the world as a political and not a military leader.Talleyrand still held out hope that a lasting peace might be achieved in Europe, as long as the other powers could be persuaded that the new Emperor was a statesman first, and a soldier second.

After so many years of war the short-lived Treaty of Amiens had given the people an appetite for peace and stability. Stability above all, and that meant the establishment of a new, permanent form of government. Napoleon had prepared the ground skilfully, proceeding from consul to First Consul, then First Consul for life, before he presented the people with the opportunity to approve his assumption of a new throne. Of course the senators had dressed it up as a necessary expedient to protect the Republic from its foreign and domestic enemies, but the Republic was no more. It had died in the birth throes of the empire. Already Napoleon had surrounded himself with the gaudy panoply of royalty and whittled down the powers of the senators, tribunes and representatives of the people. And there were plans to introduce a host of new aristocratic titles and awards to bolster the new regime. In time, Napoleon hoped, the empire would be accepted by the other European powers and there would be an end to the attempts on his life by Frenchmen in the pay of foreign nations.