New evidence supports the theory that Napoleon Bonaparte was the victim of a slow, calculated murder by arsenic poisoning.

French scientists presented findings on Friday that they claim show "the little corporal" was exposed to very high levels of arsenic.

According to officials at the Forensic Institute of Strasbourg, tests on five separate samples of Napoleon's hair confirm "major exposure to arsenic."

It's thought the hair samples were preserved since Napoleon's death in exile on the island of St. Helena in 1821.

The test results were presented at a news conference featuring one of the leading proponents of the poison theory.

Canadian content

Ben Weider is a Canadian author of six books on the emperor and heads the International Napoleon Society. Weider also commissioned the study.

Weider claims that Napoleon was the victim of a British and French conspiracy and was done away with at the hands of his friend Count Charles de Montholon.

The poisoning theory is rejected by most mainstream historians. Officially, Napoleon died of stomach cancer.

But Paul Fornes, a forensic pathologist who studied the hair samples, said the cancer diagnosis was not supported by the autopsy performed on Napoleon's body a day after his death.

"The lesions to the stomach described by Francesco Antommarchi (the doctor who performed the autopsy) were not the cause of death," Fornes told a packed news conference in Paris.

Lab tests show high arsenic levels

The Strasbourg institute found levels of arsenic ranging from seven to 38 nanograms per milligram of hair. One nanogram per milligram is at the high end of an acceptable level of arsenic, the experts said.

The French scientists rejected suggestions that such a high level could come from other sources, like seafood or contaminated water.

The researchers who did the tests regularly appear as expert medical witnesses at criminal trials in France.

But some at the conference doubted whether the hair samples were authentic.

Weider plans to ask the French government to open Napoleon's tomb to compare DNA in the hair samples with that of his remains.

Napoleon, born in Corsica, died at age 52 on May 5, 1821, on the island of St. Helena, where he had been banished after his defeat at Waterloo.