First distribution of the Eagles — 5 décembre 1804

Three days after the coronation, the Emperor presented their bronze eagles to the regiments and national guards on the Champ-de-Mars, in driving rain. Each unit swore to defend its emblem 'at the cost of its blood'; losing one's eagle would become the supreme disgrace. The rite founded the cult of the standard that held the Grande Armée together until Waterloo.

An emblem chosen instead of a flag

The regime needed a rallying sign that pointed neither to the Bourbons nor to Jacobin symbols. The eagle, borrowed from Rome and from Charlemagne, imposed itself: it spoke of imperial continuity rather than dynastic loyalty. Chaudet supplied the model, a gilt bronze eagle set on a plinth bearing the regiment's number.

Technically the emblem was a staff surmounted by the eagle, to which a flag was attached. But it was the eagle that was sworn to, and the eagle that would be defended: the distinction would decide a great many deaths.

The ceremony on the Champ-de-Mars

On 5 December 1804, three days after the coronation, the army and the national guards were assembled on the Champ-de-Mars in driving rain. The Emperor handed each corps its eagle and received its oath: to defend it at the cost of their blood.

The scene would be painted by David as a companion piece to the Coronation, and the ceremony repeated at the creation of every regiment. It turned a regulation object into a collective relic.

The cult of the eagle

Losing an eagle became the supreme disgrace: it was hidden, burnt, thrown into a river rather than let fall into enemy hands. Captured enemy eagles were counted separately in the bulletins and displayed at the Invalides; those the enemy took from the Grande Armée were displayed in the same way in London or Vienna.

In 1815, on the return from Elba, the watchword was 'the flight of the Eagle' — the emblem had become the regime itself. The Bourbons had the eagles destroyed in 1814 and 1815: only a handful of originals survive today.