Napoleon Bonaparte rose from minor Corsican nobility to Emperor of France in fifteen years, conquered most of Europe, rewrote its legal systems, and then lost everything twice — first on the frozen roads retreating from Moscow, and finally at Waterloo. His military genius is undisputed; the cost of his ambition was somewhere between three and six million dead.

This episode traces Napoleon from his Corsican childhood through the Revolutionary Wars, the Egyptian campaign, the coronation, the Grande Armee’s victories, the Russian catastrophe, and the two exiles that bookended the most consequential military career since Alexander the Great.

• Napoleon’s Corsican origins, his artillery training, and his rapid rise during the Revolutionary Wars
• The Egyptian campaign, the coup of 18 Brumaire, and the self-coronation as Emperor
• Austerlitz, the Continental System, and the invasion of Russia that destroyed the Grande Armee
• Elba, the Hundred Days, Waterloo, and the final exile on St. Helena where he died