The Tribunat was one of the four assemblies set up in France by the Constitution of Year VIII (the other three were the Council of State, the Corps législatif and the Sénat conservateur).
Its first president was the historian Pierre Daunou, whose independent spirit led to his dismissal from the post by Napoleon Bonaparte in 1802.
Shortly after the coup d'état of 18 Brumaire, the Tribunat became a focus of opposition to the regime the First Consul was in the process of setting up.
Also, on 7 January, Benjamin Constant entered the Tribunat and, in a speech that made him leader of the opposition, denounced "the regime of servitude and silence" Bonaparte was preparing.
The Tribunat was made up of liberal personalities like Constant, whose independent point of view Bonaparte saw as prejudicial to the public order and political unity he was trying to establish.
Thus it was first purged after its opposition to the projected Code civil in 1802 (a purge made possible by a manoeuvre - the Tribunat was partially renewed at the regular interval, but it was unknown who in the Tribunat would be the first to be removed, and therefore Napoleon chose his opponents), then suppressed by a decree of the Senate in 1807, with its remaining functions and members absorbed into the Corps législatif.
Their functions are the same as those assigned to the questors of the Legislative Body by articles 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24 and 25 of the organic senatus-consultum of 24 Frimaire, Year XII.