Napoleon S Egypt

In this vivid and timely history, Juan Cole tells the story of Napoleon's invasion of Egypt. Revealing the young general's reasons for leading the expedition against Egypt in 1798 and showcasing his fascinating views of the Orient, Cole delves into the psychology of the military titan and his entourage. He paints a multi-faceted portrait of the daily travails of the soldiers in Napoleon's army, including how they imagined Egypt, how their expectations differed from what they found, and how they grappled with military challenges in a foreign land. Cole ultimately reveals how Napoleon's invasion, the first modern attempt to invade the Arab world, invented and crystallized the rhetoric of liberal imperialism.

In 1798, Napoleon Bonaparte, only twenty-eight, set sail for Egypt with 335 ships, 40,000 soldiers, and a collection of scholars, artists, and scientists to establish an eastern empire. He saw himself as a liberator, freeing the Egyptians from oppression. But Napoleon wasn’t the first—nor the last—who tragically misunderstood Muslim culture. Marching across seemingly endless deserts in the shadow of the pyramids, pushed to the limits of human endurance, his men would be plagued by mirages, suicides, and the constant threat of ambush. A crusade begun in honor would degenerate into chaos. And yet his grand failure also yielded a treasure trove of knowledge that paved the way for modern Egyptology—and it tempered the complex leader who believed himself destined to conquer the world.

Napoleon Bonaparte led forty thousand troops to Egypt in the French Revolutionary Wars against Britain. The French were in Egypt for three years in 17981801, during which time they associated with the Egyptian people and founded an academic institute called The Egyptian Institute. Zaynab, the daughter of a high religious shaykh of al-Azhar, visited the institute, learned French, and became close to the French. She became associated with Bonaparte through her fathers ambitions to use Bonaparte to further his religious career, quite as Bonaparte used the shaykh to give Muslim legitimacy to his position as ruler of Egypt in sevice to the Ottoman Sultan. Both were trying to use the other to their own advantage. The shaykhs daughter, Zaynab, gets caught in the middle and will pay the price of collaboration when the French are forced to abandon Egypt.

This panoramic volume tells the story of French art, culture and life from the 1770s to the 1820s: the first French voyages of discovery to Australia, the stormy period of social change with the outbreak of the French Revolution, and the rise to power of the young Napoleon Bonaparte and his wife Josephine.

The story of modern Egypt is more than just a cavalcade of colourful personalities. To get beneath the skin of the Egyptians themselves it is essential to recognize the pressures to which they have so long been subjected; to understand how, overburdened by history and exiled from power in their own land, they have been elbowed out by foreign manipulation to a point where explosive action was the only remedy.From the time that Napoleon brought Europe to Egypt in 1798, few areas of the globe have aroused more passions than this ancient land. Napoleon's own dreams of glory were short-lived, but he paved the way for Mohammed Ali - the 'rogue' Pasha that Palmerston wanted to 'chuck in the Nile' - to found a dynasty and very nearly take over the whole Ottoman Empire with his fellah armies. Less astute, his son Said was hoaxed by de Lesseps over the Suez Canal concession, and his grandson Ismail precipitated a British occupation with the de facto reign of the hard-line proconsuls such as Cromer and Kitchener.Although the British presence brought prosperity to Egypt and security for monarchs like Fouad and Farouk, it also caused growing frustration to the multiplying mass of the Egyptian people. Finally Gamal Abdel Nasser put an end to the ancien rgime and threw the Europeans out again - to embark on his astonishing career as aspirant leader of the Arab world.In this entertaining book, Raymond Flower unfolds the panorama of events, from the arrival of Napoleon to the death of Nasser, not only as it appears to an historian, but also to the man in the street in Cairo. Well qualified to do so, having lived there for part of the historic span he covers, Mr. Flower has known most of the significant figures in the days of Farouk as well as in the revolutionary Egypt, and thus is able to give an enthralling and well-balanced account of a vital period in recent history.

This book addresses some of the main themes of the study of Egypt during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. In a combination of case studies and discursive chapters, the status of Egypt as an important example of traditional Asian scholarship, and as an ancient model of imperialism itself, is examined. Contributions range from studies of nineteenth century antiquarianism, and the collecting of Egyptian antiquities as an extension of the territorial ambitions and rivalries of the European powers, to explorations of how Egypt is understood and interpreted in contemporary societies. Views of Ancient Egypt also considers the way in which Ancient Egypt has been adopted by less privileged members of some societies as a cultural icon of past greatness.

The early 19th century was the heroic age of Egyptology. It was also largely dominated by Napoleon, who had led his ill-considered invasion of Egypt (1798-1799). The eastern Mediterranean was under the control of the ramshackle Ottoman Empire, from whom the Greeks were to win their War of Independence. Apart from its archaeological importance, Egypt was also one of the most important cockpits in the struggle amongst the various European powers and their fight against the Turks. Bernardino Drovetti was the French consul in Egypt for most of the early 19th century. After an important career in the Napoleonic army, he came to Egypt in 1803 where he was to play a leading role in many fields: diplomacy, politics, archaeology and exploration, amassing no fewer than three collections of antiquities.

'My horse took the force of his sabre, but I was able to hack at his hands... Wounded quite badly, he went down only to try again. I was tired of this game, so I threw myself onto him and staved in his head.' Jonathan North presents an astonishing history of Napoleon's early 'bartering of lives for glory' based on the words of the soldiers.