Nation of shopkeepers

The phrase "a nation of shopkeepers", commonly attributed to Napoleon, is a reference to England or the United Kingdom.

There is reason to doubt that Napoleon ever used it. No contemporaneous French newspaper mentions that he did. The phrase was first used in an offensive sense by the French revolutionary Bertrand Barère de Vieuzac on June 11, 1794 in a speech to the National Convention: “Let Pitt then boast of his victory to his nation of shopkeepers”. Later, during the Napoleonic wars, the British press mentioned the phrase, attributing it either to “the French” or to Napoleon himself.