The battle of Jena, October 14, 1806

Horace Vernet painted this battlefield in 1836, 30 years after the fighting and under a very different ruler. King Louis-Philippe was turning the palace of Versailles into a museum of French history, and he wanted the great Napoleonic victories on its walls, a way of gathering old rivalries under one national story. Jena, fought on 14 October 1806, was among Napoleon's most crushing wins over Prussia. Vernet places the emperor on horseback at the centre, calm amid the smoke, with his cavalry commander Murat and his chief of staff Berthier beside him. The canvas is enormous, over five metres tall, built to be seen from across the long Gallery of Battles where it still hangs among dozens of others.