My thirtieth and last article of 2016 is about the Second Empire, i.e. the reign of Emperor Napoléon III of the French from 1852 to 1870. Like the Emperor himself, the Empire was full of paradoxes, and it turned out to be the last time France was a monarchy. The article appears in the January 2017 issue of Majesty (Vol. 38, No. 1), which is on sale in Britain from today and in other countries within two weeks, while an excellent exhibition on the splendours of the Second Empire can be seen at the Musée d'Orsay in Paris until 15 January.
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