orig. Marie-Josèphe-Rose Tascher de la Pagerie
born June 23, 1763, Trois Ilets, Mart.
died May 29, 1814, Malmaison, France
Consort of Napoleon and empress of the French.
She married an army officer, Alexandre, vicomte de Beauharnais, in 1779. He was guillotined during the French Revolution, and Joséphine was imprisoned briefly. A leader of Paris society, she married Napoleon in a civil ceremony in 1796. She was an indifferent and extravagant wife, but during the Consulate she used her social position to advance her husband's political fortunes. After he became emperor (1804), she persuaded him to marry her again, with religious rites. She proved unable to give him a son, and in 1810 he arranged for their marriage to be nullified so that he could make a politically convenient marriage with Marie-Louise .
Joséphine, detail of an oil painting by François Gérard; in the Musée ...
Giraudon/Art Resource, New York