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Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of IHeart Radio and Grim and Mild from Aaron Manky.

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If I went up to a historically literate stranger on the street and told them I was writing an episode

of this podcast on Napoleon's wife. I imagine the reply would be, oh, Josephine! Napoleon and

Josephine. Josephine and Napoleon. They are considered one of history's great love stories,

even by people with only a passing familiarity with European politics of the early 19th century.

In the first Sex and the City movie, for example,

Napoleon's letters to Josephine are specifically referenced as an example of the height of romantic writing.

A famous painting of Napoleon's coronation in which the emperor raises a crown high in anticipation of lowering it onto Josephine's head, who's kneeling at the center of the canvas,

is on display currently at the Louvre, awing visitors with its massive size,

almost 33 feet wide and more than 20 feet tall.

Quite literally, Josephine and Napoleon loom large. But Napoleon did not end his life

married to Josephine. Though the two were married for almost 14 years, when Josephine reached her mid-40s

and the two had still not produced an heir, Napoleon was

pressured to divorce her in order to preserve the future of his empire. Of course, this led to

the looming question. Who would Napoleon marry next? Josephine, he had married for love. Now, as an emperor at the

height of his power, he would need to be marrying for political reasons in order to position

France favorably on the grand stage of Europe. He would be marrying a princess, a daughter from a noble family, someone who would, ideally,

be able to provide him a son and cement an international alliance.

In the end, his second wife would successfully achieve the first of those goals, not quite the second.

Marie-Louise of Austria was raised, believing in Napoleon as something of a boogeyman,

...