Abstract EN:

The creation of a new nobility by Napoleon I in 1808 is the outcome of the work of social restructuring undertaken since, 1799. This aristocraty must form the meting-pot of the elites forming at the same time a loval group devoted to the defense of Napoleon's throne. Recruted to an amount of 60 per cent among the various strate of the middle class, the imperial nobility has access to honours through feats of arms or civil service ; moreover it proves a sens of precocious cultural integration into the customs of nobiliary life. However, the unity of the group is shattered in 1815, two fifths of it experiences a social downgrading whereas the rest often misses the opportunity of setting up its unity of the defence of the bonapartist cause. Furthmore the newly created nobles of the first Empire constitute an elite blended through numerous marriages with members of the elite of the 19th century, upper middle class and various nobilities. They manage to assert themselves as an aristocracy, preserving their wealth, displaying their notoriety in the heart of the fashionable life of the 19th century and moreover defending their honour and the memory of their family, thus adhering entirely to a culture of order. Eventually, the imperial nobility constitutes an ideal observation post of the social mobility in the 19th century.