Napoleon letter denying he ordered pope kidnapping sold at auction

PARIS: A hand-written letter from Napoleon denying his role in the kidnapping of Pope Pius VII in 1809 was sold at auction on Sunday outside Paris for 26,360 euros ($30,000), the auctioneer said.

The letter, signed “Napole”, went on sale the day after the funeral of Pope Francis, who died on Monday. The sale price was way above the estimate of 12,000-15,000 euros, according to the Osenat auction house.

The auction´s location in Fontainebleau, south of Paris, was highly symbolic as the town 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 Napoleon´s reign, at a political and religious level,” Jean-Christophe Chataignier, an expert in the Napoleonic era at Osenat, told AFP. “Napoleon knows this letter will be made public and that it´s intended for authorities everywhere,” he added.

French forces kidnapped Pope Pius VII in his private apartments in the Quirinal Palace in Rome. He remained a prisoner of Napoleon for five years. The pontiff had sought to maintain the Vatican´s sway over the French Catholic Church and resisted Napoleon´s desire to exert control over the clergy. In the letter addressed to French nobleman and ally Jean-Jacques-Regis de Cambaceres, Napoleon feigns ignorance of Pius VII´s detention.