A letter written by Napoleon that denies his role in the kidnapping of Pope Pius VII in 1809 was sold at an auction on Sunday outside Paris for € 26,360 ($ 30,000), said the auctioneer.
The letter, signed “Napole”, went on sale the day after the funeral of Pope Francis, who died on Monday. The sale price exceeded the estimate of € 12,000- € 15,000, according to Osenat’s auction house.
The location of the auction in Fontainebleau, south of Paris, was very symbolic since the city was where the head of the Catholic Church was imprisoned after being initially held in Savona in Italy.
“This arrest is one of the events that will define the reign of Napoleon, at the political and religious level,” said Jean-Christophe Chataignier, an expert in the Napoleonic era in Osenat, said AFP. “Napoleon knows that this letter will be public and is intended for authorities everywhere,” he added.
The French forces kidnapped Pope Pius VII in his private apartments in the Quirinal Palace in Rome. He remained a prisoner from Napoleon for five years.
The Pontiff had tried to maintain the influence of the Vatican on the French Catholic Church and resisted Napoleon’s desire to exercise control over the clergy.
‘Against my will’
In the letter addressed to the French noble and ally Jean-Jacques-Regis de Cambaceres, Napoleon pretends the ignorance of Pius VII’s arrest.
“It was without my orders and against my will that the Pope was taken from Rome; again it is without my orders and against my will that bring him to France,” he wrote.
“But they only informed me of this 10 or 12 days after it had already been carried out. From the moment I learned that the Pope stays in a fixed place, and that my intentions can be known in time and carry out, I will consider what measures I must take,” he added.
Napoleon’s memories regularly go on sale at an auction in a commercial flourishing marked by an intense interest of collectors.
Two guns that once intended to use to commit suicide were sold in France last July for 1.7 million euros, while one of its characteristic ‘bicorne’ hats established a record price for its possessions when it was acquired for € 1.9 million in November 2023.
A sword that belonged to Napoleon and was especially ordered for the personal use of the French emperor will be auctioned in Paris next month, with an estimated price of € 700,000 to € 1 million.
