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Thomas Mann, in his speech1 at Freud's eightieth birthday, spoke about the 'lived vita', according to a mythological model. On November 29, 1936, Freud wrote an outline of a letter to Thomas Mann in which he stated that he had asked himself, after having read Mann's Josephs Legende, whether there is any historically important figure in which 'the Joseph fantasy was effective as a secret demonic motor behind his complex life picture'. Freud is of the opinion that many a circumstance is in favor of the hypothesis that this was the case with Napoleon who had an elder brother named Joseph whom the young Napoleon hated intensely. He later identified himself with Joseph and changed this hatred into an intense love, simultaneously displacing the hostility towards other innocent persons. Napoleon also loved his mother very much and tried to take the place of his father in caring for the siblings. He married a young widow named 'Josephine' and was never able to turn against her even though she treated him badly. The Egyptian expedition may have expressed a desire for the realization of the Joseph fantasy which was later fulfilled in Europe: 'He takes care of the brothers by raising them to princes and kings. The good-for-nothing Jerome is perhaps his Benjamin.'