THE BONAPARTE HOUSE - NATIONAL MUSEUM

Maison Bonaparte was originally called Casa Bozzi, and only gradually came to be owned by the Bonaparte family. It was Napoleon's birthplace, and his birth chamber can still be admired today. Partly occupied by the Bonaparte family since 1682, Napoleon was born here on the sofa in the antechamber on August 15, 1769. He spent part of his childhood there. What the visitor sees on his tour does not reflect the lifestyle of the time, for during the short-lived Anglo-Corsican kingdom, the family had left Ajaccio and the house was plundered by Pasquale Paoli's followers, then requisitioned by the English from 1794 to 1796. In 1798, Napoleon's widowed mother refurbished the house with Directoire furniture purchased from a Marseille dealer, and added a superb gallery on the terrace, which at the time was Ajaccio's most beautiful ballroom and reception room. A magnificent banister was later added at the request of Laëtitia Bonaparte. Napoleon saw these renovations and embellishments only once, on his return from exile in Egypt in September 1799. As he was attached to the house and felt comfortable in it, as he himself wrote, he set about restoring and refurnishing it. Some of the Directoire furniture acquired by Letizia Bonaparte in Marseille can still be seen in certain rooms, including the Salon Letizia. There are also 4 chests of drawers and a secretary made in Milan by the cabinetmaker Maggiolini, as well as three Busca marble fireplaces, all donated by Joseph Bonaparte. After the house was restored, Napoleon III turned it into a museum. Donated to the state in 1923 by Prince Victor Napoléon, sole heir to Empress Eugénie and Napoléon III, it was classified as a historic monument in 1923. Today, the house is a national museum, and visitors can tour its various rooms, especially the second floor, which opens onto the period-furnished apartments. On the second floor, maps, objects and portraits retrace the history of Corsica and the family in the ^18th century.

Opposite the house is a small island of greenery featuring a bust of the King of Rome by Vezin.

The Maison Bonaparte became a national museum in 1967, run by the Direction des Musées de France.