Meanwhile it remains true. I know historians, even some who have had their area turned into movies. The ones that aren’t addicted to being curmudgeons know the cycle. Yes the movie will be horrifyingly inaccurate to the point of laughter, or tears, or both. But somewhere during the press cycle they start getting phone calls for interviews as somebody wants to make a documentary. And then after the movie their classes suddenly get a lot more popular.
It’s a basic reality of movies and TV, never watch anything that’s “about” your profession. It’s always wrong. Crime scene techs don’t watch CSI, programmers don’t watch computer movies, finance guys don’t Billions, strippers don’t watch Striptease. They just get aggravated.
Of course Napoleon didn’t shoot at the pyramids, but it looked cool.
https://www.grunge.com/825154/did-napoleon-really-shoot-off-the-great-sphinxs-nose/
Despite the historical legend that Napoleon Bonaparte’s men shot off the Sphinx’s nose with a cannon when they rolled through the region in 1798, we know for certain that the French military leader wasn’t responsible, according to Egypt Today. We know this because a painting from 1737 — a half a century before Napoleon and his men came calling — shows the stone beast without its nose.
What is believed to have happened, according to Mental Floss, is that a religious zealot and devout Muslim named Muhammad Sa’im al-Dahr was put off by the practice of area peasants making sacrifices to the Sphinx in order to prevent floods. Believing this to be an unacceptable act of idolatry, al-Dahr is said to have deliberately chopped off its nose with a hammer and chisel some time in the 14th century.
lol - the movie is horrible, and you’re still a stubborn PITA for YEARS, but I appreciate your input.
When his army marched into Italy he sent a list of 100 works of art to the pope and said wrap these for travel we will take them to Paris. (see the Louvre).
Napoleon had 2 archaeologists with him. He put them in charge of the Forum and other historic buildings. That is why Rome has what it has today, 220 years after he took Rome.
Prior to napoleon for centuries it was a fad in England and Germany for rich people to have Roman statues, most taken out of the Forum area. The forum is down a level from the street on the eastern side. people came by and dumped trash into the forum for centuries. The popes took stones from the Colosseum (a pagan place) for St Peters. Napoleon stopped all of that.