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Napoleon's Privates: 2,500 Years of History Unzipped | 
 enlarge | Author: Tony Perrottet
Publisher: HarperEntertainment
Category: Book
List Price: $14.95
Buy New: $8.92
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Avg. Customer Rating:  10 reviews
Sales Rank: 26365
Media: Hardcover
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 256
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 8.3 x 5.5 x 1.1
ISBN: 0061257281
Dewey Decimal Number: 900
EAN: 9780061257285
ASIN: 0061257281
Publication Date: July 1, 2008
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Product Description
When Tony Perrottet heard that Napoleon's "baguette" had been stolen by his disgruntled doctor a few days after the Emperor's death, he rushed out to New Jersey. Why? Because that's where an eccentric American collector who had purchased Napoleon's member at a Parisian auction now kept the actual relic in an old suitcase under his bed. The story of Napoleon's privates triggered Perrottet's quest to research other such exotic sagas from history, to discover the actual evidence behind the most famous age-old mysteries: Did Churchill really send condoms of a surprising size to Stalin? Were champagne glasses really molded upon Marie Antoinette's breasts? What was JFK's real secret service? What were Casanova's best pickup lines? Napoleon's Privates is filled with offbeat, riotously entertaining anecdotes that are guaranteed to amaze, shock, and enliven any dinner party.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 5 more reviews...
 What the History Books Failed to Mention August 20, 2008
This book contains a wealth of historical gems. In over fifty chapters, the author presents a series of historical snippets most of which have, for obvious reasons, been omitted from standard history texts. Although most of the topics are sex-oriented in some way, not all of them are in that category; some involve gastronomy (in various forms), odd habits, celebrity quirks, etc. The writing style is refreshing to say the least; that is, it is irreverent, tongue-in-cheek, accessible, engaging, witty, down-to-earth and in many cases absolutely hilarious. The references that are indicated at the end of each chapter, the authorities that were consulted, as named in the acknowledgments, as well as the author's own expertise give the reader confidence as to the accuracy of the stories that are presented. This is a book that can be thoroughly enjoyed by absolutely anyone. History has never been so much fun to read.
Caught with their pants down! August 15, 2008
This book is, shall we say, filled with all kinds a tidbits that hit below the belt. Shockingly funny, often extremely irreverent, Napoleon's Privates certainly won't leave anyone hanging (gasp)! While this book certainly won't find its way into history classes (at least I would hope not), it takes a fresh (and very bare) look at historical figures and practices ranging from urine taxes to whether or not Hitler was dealing with a full set (of gonads, that is).
Certainly, Napoleon's Privates is a quick read that would make for great material to take to the beach or to the "reading room."
 Everything you've never wanted to know about famous figures, and never thought to ask... August 9, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
Finally... The answers to all those important questions that have plagued mankind over the years. Who's buried in Custer's tomb? How many children did Jefferson have with his slave Sally Hemings? And was Napoleon's "private parts" go to the grave with him? These and many other "critical" questions are answered in Napoleon's Privates: 2,500 Years of History Unzipped by Tony Perrottet. Yeah, nothing much in here *has* to be known to get by in life, but it's a fun read and a look at history that's not normally discussed in polite company.
(Normally, I'd list the table of contents here to give the prospective reader an idea of what's included. But each "chapter" is only a couple pages long, the titles are full questions or statements, and it goes on for three pages. The listing would be longer than my review. Trust me when I say they touch on a whole lot of strange and bizarre items...)
Perrottet's idea for the book started when he heard that Napoleon's "privates" had been absconded with at death, and were now in the possession of a guy who lived in New Jersey. After tracing down that particular story, he started following up on many other salacious rumors of people and places. Did J. Edgar Hoover, the gruff head of the FBI for many years, actually go to parties in drag? The rumors say yes, but the evidence is lacking and the main accuser had a bit of a motive for spreading the story. Were ancient Olympian athletes pure and natural, untouched by today's level of performance enhancing substances? Nope, they were just as driven to win at any cost, using potions, charms, and rituals designed to offer up an edge over the competition. They would have had to have been to try things like Ethiopian dirt, the flesh of a spotted gecko, or squeezed mustard-rocket leaf (known as the Semen of Hercules). Yuck... All those giants of industry, those "robber barons" who built the foundation of many of our industries? Perrottet charts a number of them, looking at their childhood, their big break, the signature coupe, their bid for respectability, their secret tip, and finally, their "inspirational quote". Easy to get choked up with Jay Gould's classic "I can hire one half of the working class to kill the other half."
This smallish book is filled with historical factoids that probably won't make much of a difference in how you live your life. But it's a fun read, and it'll offer up some alternative perspectives on who and/or why certain historical figures behaved as they did. I definitely won't look at a champagne class the same way again...
This one will keep you reading well into the night, probably either stunned or flabbergasted. July 22, 2008
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
Not many of us have ever heard of the "Secret Cabinets" let alone visited special places that were designated rooms within the great museums of Europe as the Louvre, the Prado, the British Museum, and the Museo Nazionale in Naples. It is within the walls of these chambers where anything that was deemed shocking and immoral was kept hidden, and if you wished to have access or a viewing you had to fill out an application or bribe the security guard.
Historian and author Tony Perrottet in his Napoleon's Privates: 2, 500 Years of History Unzipped has now opened the door to a candy store of delightful and titillating stories that resemble some of the goodies that would have been found in these secret cabinets. As he states in his introduction, "a collection of the choicest morsels culled from the dark recesses of Western History, for the edification of the curious." After reading these tidbits, if you still believe history is boring, then I am afraid nothing will change your mind.
How about this little morsel? On May 8th, 1945 Dr. Faust Shkaravaski found, after performing an autopsy on Hitler, that his scrotum sack had survived the botched SS cremation intact-"singed but preserved-but was definitely minus a bollock." Stalin kept this news from the Allies and only in 1968 did the news leak out in the West. As a result, there was a swarm of all kinds of theories and explanations that kept historians quite busy. The three principal theories were Hitler was born that way; it was an old war wound and the Soviets made the whole thing up.
Ron Rosenbaum author of Explaining Hitler, who has apparently spent a great deal of time and effort in researching the subject matter, has concluded that it was all one big practical joke contrived by the Soviets in order to mess with Western minds.
Just as Aids today has taken on epidemic proportions, so too was syphilis and other venereal diseases in Paris of the 1890s. At the time, Paris was considered to be the sex capital of the world and one authority on sexually transmitted diseases estimated that fifteen percent of the city's adult population was infected. Among the well-known celebrities who contacted syphilis were Gustave Flaubert, Charles Baudelaire, Guy de Maupassant, Edouard Manet, Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec, and Paul Gaugin.
If you are wondering about the title of the book and if there is a story about Napoleon's privates, yes, there is a very interesting one.
It seems that Napoleon's penis had drifted around Europe and the United States since the emperor's demise in 1821 and as described, "dried out like beef jerky and kept in a leather presentation box adorned with a gold-embossed crown." I guess what most irks the French is that it presently has found a home in a suitcase under a bed in suburban New Jersey. How can this have occurred? Read the book to find out?
Perrottet also reveals some delectable and irreverent tales about Cleopatra, Casanova, Thomas Jefferson, Columbus, Alexander the Great, George Washington, John F. Kennedy, Catherine the Great, Hercules, Abe Lincoln, the Marquis de Sade's mother-in-law, the Vatican Hall of Shame, and many more that will keep you reading well into the night, probably either stunned or flabbergasted.
Norm Goldman, Publisher & Editor Bookpleasures
Juicy history July 21, 2008
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
Tony Perrottet's latest books is a fun and intriguing read. After a few chapters (on the history of Nepoleon's penis, the theories about Hitler's one testicle, the medieval church's rigid control over how sex should be performed), I realized that if more histories included the juicy details of the past, we'd all have a much better appreciation of history. The book is laugh-out-loud funny and brain-teasingly intriguing at the same time.
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