the life of Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821) has been fodder for countless publications and famous films, from Abel Gance’s work of 1927 (with a runningtime of five hours and a half) to Ridley Scott’s of 2023 (four hours), yet little has been written about his bed and his tomb. But it is interesting to compare the lit de camp, that is, the portable camp cot on which he would breathe his last on the island of Saint Helena, with the final resting surface that the monumental sarcophagus at Les Invalides in Paris is: the functional beauty of a practical man who needs respite versus the lavish funerary boat with the coffin-eiderdown where his remains repose for eternity...[+]