The Spur of the Moment Land Deal that Created an Empire
As you can see, it's easy to take great men and accomplishments for granted. After all, Napoleon was a brilliant general, so it's easy to assume that no matter what else happened, he would have taken power in France, and got closer to conquering the world than anyone else in modern history.
Well...
The Ridiculous Coincidence
The thing was, Napoleon wasn't born in France, but on the French island of Corsica, in 1769. And as recently as the year before that, Corsica wasn't French.
Before the day the Corsican landscape presumably tore apart to deliver baby Napoleon from the earth in a storm of fire, the island was ruled by Genoa. More specifically, it was ruled by whichever filthy rich bearded Genoese banker bribed the duke enough to be granted governorship. Unfortunately, the island was constantly rebelling or being conquered by random Turks.
Finally, after five centuries of struggling, Genoa said "**** it" and gave up on Corsica. Honestly, it was pretty shitty, anyway. The duke sold it to some French guy.
Then that guy handed it over to the French crown, for whatever reason. Over the next several years, French soldiers were smuggled onto the island and stuffed into the citadels.
Finally, in 1768, Genoa and France signed a treaty, officially ceding the island to France.
And How Did it Change The World?
Out popped Napoleon Bonaparte a year later. Even though he was born to an Italian family, it was technically on French soil--and even then only tentatively, as Corsica was revolting again. Thus, he became a French citizen, which allowed him to join the French Army.
Fast forward a couple of decades. The French Revolution comes to Corsica, and the next thing anyone knows, some random Italian idiot from some backwater island nobody had ever heard of, is ruling France, and doing a hell of a job.
If the land deal had gotten delayed, or the treaty signed later, or any one of a thousand things had happened to delay the handover for a year, no Napoleon.
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