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Specialist Notes
The document demonstrates the importance that the Emperor attached to this structure, a gem of military architecture of all times, as a key point of the defensive system of his empire, but also the almost obsessive attention to every detail which Napoleon demonstrated in the most remote corners of his dominion and his perfect knowledge of the terms and technical details of the various disciplines. Napoleon personally dictated to his adopted son Eugenio a series of very detailed provisions for the finishing of the defensive structures of Palmanova. “My son, while reflecting on the work to be done this year in Palma Nova, I have come to the following idea”... in fact, he states in the letter that: “we will finish covering the countershoes of the lunettes, as had been decided, but they will not be done the shoes if not of two lunettes", and "the 250,000 francs allocated for the shoe of the third lunette are instead used to build fourteen masonry redoubts", or fourteen passages that flank the covered walkways of the lunettes, so that "at the end of the year the structure has achieved a further degree of strength". He also orders the Viceroy to write to General Chasseloup [Gen.] in this regard. François Chasselooup-Laubat, Commander-in-Chief of the Engineers of the Grande Armée from 1806 and general director of the works of the strongholds in Italy from 1808] "let him know that I give importance to these works which will make this work perfectly safe from attacks".
A great historical document, of the utmost importance for understanding how Napoleon's military strategy was constructed - even down to the smallest details.