1.
Jean Chapelain
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Jean Chapelain was a French poet and critic during the Grand Siècle, best known for his role as an organizer and founding member of the Académie française. Chapelain acquired considerable prestige as a critic, but his own major work. His father wanted him to become a notary, but his mother, at an early age Chapelain began to qualify himself for literature, learning, under Nicolas Bourbon, and French and teaching himself Japanese and Spanish. De la Trousse, grand provost of France and his first published work was a preface for the Adone of Giambattista Marino, who printed and published that notorious poem at Paris. It was followed by a translation of Mateo Alemáns novel, Guzmán de Alfarache and by four extremely indifferent odes, one of them addressed to Cardinal Richelieu. The credit of introducing the law of the dramatic unities into French literature has been claimed for many writers, and especially for the Abbé dAubignac, whose Pratique du théâtre appeared in 1657. In 1656 he published, in a magnificent format, the first twelve cantos of his epic on Joan of Arc, La Pucelle. Six editions of the poem were disposed of in eighteen months and this was the end of the poetic reputation of Chapelain, the legist of Parnassus. Later the slashing satire of Nicolas Boileau-Despréaux resulted in Chapelain taking his place among the failures of modern art. Chapelains reputation as a critic survived, and in 1663 he was employed by Colbert to draw up an account of men of letters. In this pamphlet, as in his letters, he shows to far greater advantage than in his unfortunate epic, to him the young Jean Racine was indebted not only for advice, but also for the pension of six hundred livres which was so useful to him. The catholicity of Chapelains taste is shown by his De la lecture des vieux romans, in which he praises the chanson de geste, guirlande de Julie This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain, Chisholm, Hugh, ed. Chapelain, Jean. George Saintsburys History of Criticism, ii, 256-261, a very favourable assessment of Chapelain as a critic Robert Southeys Joan of Arc, an analysis of La Pucelle is given on pp. 23–79 Les Lettres de Jean Chapelain Lettres inédites
2.
France
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France, officially the French Republic, is a country with territory in western Europe and several overseas regions and territories. The European, or metropolitan, area of France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, Overseas France include French Guiana on the South American continent and several island territories in the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans. France spans 643,801 square kilometres and had a population of almost 67 million people as of January 2017. It is a unitary republic with the capital in Paris. Other major urban centres include Marseille, Lyon, Lille, Nice, Toulouse, during the Iron Age, what is now metropolitan France was inhabited by the Gauls, a Celtic people. The area was annexed in 51 BC by Rome, which held Gaul until 486, France emerged as a major European power in the Late Middle Ages, with its victory in the Hundred Years War strengthening state-building and political centralisation. During the Renaissance, French culture flourished and a colonial empire was established. The 16th century was dominated by civil wars between Catholics and Protestants. France became Europes dominant cultural, political, and military power under Louis XIV, in the 19th century Napoleon took power and established the First French Empire, whose subsequent Napoleonic Wars shaped the course of continental Europe. Following the collapse of the Empire, France endured a succession of governments culminating with the establishment of the French Third Republic in 1870. Following liberation in 1944, a Fourth Republic was established and later dissolved in the course of the Algerian War, the Fifth Republic, led by Charles de Gaulle, was formed in 1958 and remains to this day. Algeria and nearly all the colonies became independent in the 1960s with minimal controversy and typically retained close economic. France has long been a centre of art, science. It hosts Europes fourth-largest number of cultural UNESCO World Heritage Sites and receives around 83 million foreign tourists annually, France is a developed country with the worlds sixth-largest economy by nominal GDP and ninth-largest by purchasing power parity. In terms of household wealth, it ranks fourth in the world. France performs well in international rankings of education, health care, life expectancy, France remains a great power in the world, being one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council with the power to veto and an official nuclear-weapon state. It is a member state of the European Union and the Eurozone. It is also a member of the Group of 7, North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the World Trade Organization, originally applied to the whole Frankish Empire, the name France comes from the Latin Francia, or country of the Franks
3.
Humanities
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Humanities are academic disciplines that study aspects of human culture. In the Middle Ages, the term contrasted with divinity and referred to what is now called classics, today, the humanities are more frequently contrasted with natural, and sometimes social, sciences as well as professional training. The humanities include ancient and modern languages, literature, philosophy, religion, art, scholars in the humanities are humanity scholars or humanists. The term humanist also describes the position of humanism, which some antihumanist scholars in the humanities refuse. The Renaissance scholars and artists were also called humanists, some secondary schools offer humanities classes usually consisting of English literature, global studies and art. Human disciplines like history and cultural anthropology study subject matters that the method does not apply to—and instead mainly use the comparative method. Anthropology is the science of humans, a science of the totality of human existence. The discipline deals with the integration of different aspects of the sciences, humanities. In the twentieth century, academic disciplines have often been divided into three broad domains. The natural sciences seek to derive general laws through reproducible and verifiable experiments, the humanities generally study local traditions, through their history, literature, music, and arts, with an emphasis on understanding particular individuals, events, or eras. Anthropology does not easily fit into one of these categories, within the United States, anthropology is divided into four sub-fields, archaeology, physical or biological anthropology, anthropological linguistics, and cultural anthropology. It is an area that is offered at most undergraduate institutions, the word anthropos is from the Greek for human being or person. Eric Wolf described sociocultural anthropology as the most scientific of the humanities, the goal of anthropology is to provide a holistic account of humans and human nature. This means that, though anthropologists generally specialize in only one sub-field, they keep in mind the biological, linguistic, historic. The quest for holism leads most anthropologists to study a people in detail, using biogenetic, archaeological and it is possible to view all human cultures as part of one large, evolving global culture. Archaeology is the study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture, the archaeological record consists of artifacts, architecture, biofacts or ecofacts, and cultural landscapes. Archaeology can be considered both a science and a branch of the humanities. It has various goals, which range from understanding culture history to reconstructing past lifeways to documenting and explaining changes in human societies through time
4.
Institut de France
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The Institut de France is a French learned society, grouping five académies, the most famous of which is the Académie française. The Institute, located in Paris, manages approximately 1,000 foundations, as well as museums and it also awards prizes and subsidies, which amounted to a total of €5,028,190.55 for 2002. Most of these prizes are awarded by the Institute on the recommendation of the académies, the Institut de France was established on 25 October 1795, by the French government. Académie française – initiated 1635, suppressed 1793, restored 1803 as a division of the institute, Académie des inscriptions et belles-lettres – initiated 1663. Académie des sciences – initiated 1666, the Royal Society of Canada, initiated 1882, was modeled after the Institut de France and the Royal Society of London
5.
Humanists
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The term was coined in 1808 by the early nineteenth century German educational reformer and theologian Friedrich Niethammer and gradually adopted into English. Niethammer had wished to introduce into German education the humane values of ancient Greece, the word Humanism is ultimately derived from the Latin concept humanitas, and, like most other words ending in -ism, entered English in the nineteenth century. Those who earnestly desire and seek after these are most highly humanized. For the desire to pursue of that kind of knowledge, and the training given by it, has granted to humanity alone of all the animals. Gellius says that in his day humanitas is commonly used as a synonym for philanthropy – or kindness and he himself was involved in public affairs. By assigning pride of place to Paideia in his comment on the etymology of humanitas, gelliuss writings fell into obscurity during the middle ages, but during the Italian Renaissance, Gellius became a favorite author. Teachers and scholars of Greek and Latin grammar, rhetoric, philosophy, during the French Revolution, and soon after, in Germany, humanism began to refer to an ethical philosophy centered on humankind, without attention to the transcendent or supernatural. The designation Religious Humanism refers to organized groups that sprang up during the late-nineteenth and it is similar to Protestantism, although centered on human needs, interests, and abilities rather than the supernatural. The first Humanist Manifesto was issued by a conference held at the University of Chicago in 1933, signatories included the philosopher John Dewey, but the majority were ministers and theologians. But in the century, during the French Enlightenment, a more ideological use of the term had come into use. In 1765, the author of an article in a French Enlightenment periodical spoke of The general love of humanity. A virtue hitherto quite nameless among us, and which we will venture to call humanism, for the time has come to create a word for such a beautiful and necessary thing. The latter part of the 18th and the early 19th centuries saw the creation of numerous philanthropic and benevolent societies dedicated to human betterment. Humanism began to acquire a negative sense, the Oxford English Dictionary records the use of the word humanism by an English clergyman in 1812 to indicate those who believe in the mere humanity of Christ, i. e. Unitarians and Deists. Human-centered philosophy that rejected the supernatural may also be found circa 1500 BCE in the Lokayata system of Indian philosophy, nasadiya Sukta, a passage in the Rig Veda, contains one of the first recorded assertions of agnosticism. Another instance of ancient humanism as a system of thought is found in the Gathas of Zarathustra. Zarathustras philosophy in the Gathas lays out a conception of humankind as thinking beings, dignified with choice, in China, Yellow Emperor is regarded as the humanistic primogenitor. Sage kings such as Yao and Shun are humanistic figures as recorded, king Wu of Zhou has the famous saying, Humanity is the Ling of the world
6.
Louis XIV of France
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Louis XIV, known as Louis the Great or the Sun King, was a monarch of the House of Bourbon who ruled as King of France and Navarre from 1643 until his death in 1715. His reign of 72 years and 110 days is the longest of any monarch of a country in European history. In the age of absolutism in Europe, Louis XIVs France was a leader in the centralization of power. Louis began his rule of France in 1661, after the death of his chief minister. By these means he became one of the most powerful French monarchs, under his rule, the Edict of Nantes, which granted rights to Huguenots, was abolished. The revocation effectively forced Huguenots to emigrate or convert in a wave of dragonnades, which managed to virtually destroy the French Protestant minority. During Louis reign, France was the leading European power, and it fought three wars, the Franco-Dutch War, the War of the League of Augsburg. There were also two lesser conflicts, the War of Devolution and the War of the Reunions, warfare defined Louis XIVs foreign policies, and his personality shaped his approach. Impelled by a mix of commerce, revenge, and pique, in peacetime he concentrated on preparing for the next war. He taught his diplomats their job was to create tactical and strategic advantages for the French military, Louis XIV was born on 5 September 1638 in the Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye, to Louis XIII and Anne of Austria. He was named Louis Dieudonné and bore the title of French heirs apparent. At the time of his birth, his parents had married for 23 years. His mother had experienced four stillbirths between 1619 and 1631, leading contemporaries thus regarded him as a divine gift and his birth a miracle of God. Sensing imminent death, Louis XIII decided to put his affairs in order in the spring of 1643, in defiance of custom, which would have made Queen Anne the sole Regent of France, the king decreed that a regency council would rule on his sons behalf. His lack of faith in Queen Annes political abilities was his primary rationale and he did, however, make the concession of appointing her head of the council. Louis relationship with his mother was uncommonly affectionate for the time, contemporaries and eyewitnesses claimed that the Queen would spend all her time with Louis. Both were greatly interested in food and theatre, and it is likely that Louis developed these interests through his close relationship with his mother. This long-lasting and loving relationship can be evidenced by excerpts in Louis journal entries, such as, but attachments formed later by shared qualities of the spirit are far more difficult to break than those formed merely by blood
7.
Jean-Baptiste Colbert
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Jean-Baptiste Colbert was a French politician who served as the Minister of Finances of France from 1665 to 1683 under the rule of King Louis XIV. His relentless hard work and thrift made him an esteemed minister and he achieved a reputation for his work of improving the state of French manufacturing and bringing the economy back from the brink of bankruptcy. Historians note that, despite Colberts efforts, France actually became increasingly impoverished because of the Kings excessive spending on wars, Colbert worked to create a favourable balance of trade and increase Frances colonial holdings. He also founded royal tapestry works at Gobelins and supported those at Beauvais, Colbert worked to develop the domestic economy by raising tariffs and by encouraging major public works projects. Colbert also worked to ensure that the French East India Company had access to markets, so that they could always obtain coffee, cotton, dyewoods, fur, pepper. In addition, Colbert founded the French merchant marine, Colbert issued more than 150 edicts to regulate the guilds. One such law had the intention of improving the quality of cloth, the edict declared that if the authorities found a merchants cloth unsatisfactory on three separate occasions, they were to tie him to a post with the cloth attached to him. Colberts father and grandfather operated as merchants in his birthplace of Reims and he claimed to have Scottish ancestry. A general belief exists that he spent his youth at a Jesuit college, working for a Parisian banker. Before the age of 20, Colbert had a post in the war office, Colbert spent some time as an inspector of troops, eventually becoming the personal secretary of Le Tellier. In 1647, through means, Colbert acquired the confiscated goods of an uncle. In 1648, he and his wife Marie Charron, received 40,000 crowns from an unknown source, in 1657, he purchased the Barony of Seignelay. Colbert was recommended to King Louis XIV by Mazarin, while Cardinal Mazarin was in exile, Louis trust in Colbert grew. In 1652 Colbert was asked to manage the affairs of the Cardinal while he was away and this new responsibility would detach Colbert from his other responsibility as commissaire des guerres. Although Colbert was not a supporter of Mazarin in principle, he would defend the cardinals interests with unflagging devotion. Colberts earliest recorded attempt at tax reform came in the form of a mémoire to Mazarin, showing that of the taxes paid by the people, the paper also contained an attack upon the Superintendent Fouquet. The postmaster of Paris, a spy of Fouquets, read the letter, in 1661, Mazarin died and Colbert made sure of the Kings favour by revealing the location of some of Mazarins hidden wealth. In short, Colbert acquired power in every department except that of war, a great financial and fiscal reform at once claimed all his energies
8.
Latin
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Latin is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. The Latin alphabet is derived from the Etruscan and Greek alphabets, Latin was originally spoken in Latium, in the Italian Peninsula. Through the power of the Roman Republic, it became the dominant language, Vulgar Latin developed into the Romance languages, such as Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, French, and Romanian. Latin, Italian and French have contributed many words to the English language, Latin and Ancient Greek roots are used in theology, biology, and medicine. By the late Roman Republic, Old Latin had been standardised into Classical Latin, Vulgar Latin was the colloquial form spoken during the same time and attested in inscriptions and the works of comic playwrights like Plautus and Terence. Late Latin is the language from the 3rd century. Later, Early Modern Latin and Modern Latin evolved, Latin was used as the language of international communication, scholarship, and science until well into the 18th century, when it began to be supplanted by vernaculars. Ecclesiastical Latin remains the language of the Holy See and the Roman Rite of the Catholic Church. Today, many students, scholars and members of the Catholic clergy speak Latin fluently and it is taught in primary, secondary and postsecondary educational institutions around the world. The language has been passed down through various forms, some inscriptions have been published in an internationally agreed, monumental, multivolume series, the Corpus Inscriptionum Latinarum. Authors and publishers vary, but the format is about the same, volumes detailing inscriptions with a critical apparatus stating the provenance, the reading and interpretation of these inscriptions is the subject matter of the field of epigraphy. The works of several hundred ancient authors who wrote in Latin have survived in whole or in part and they are in part the subject matter of the field of classics. The Cat in the Hat, and a book of fairy tales, additional resources include phrasebooks and resources for rendering everyday phrases and concepts into Latin, such as Meissners Latin Phrasebook. The Latin influence in English has been significant at all stages of its insular development. From the 16th to the 18th centuries, English writers cobbled together huge numbers of new words from Latin and Greek words, dubbed inkhorn terms, as if they had spilled from a pot of ink. Many of these words were used once by the author and then forgotten, many of the most common polysyllabic English words are of Latin origin through the medium of Old French. Romance words make respectively 59%, 20% and 14% of English, German and those figures can rise dramatically when only non-compound and non-derived words are included. Accordingly, Romance words make roughly 35% of the vocabulary of Dutch, Roman engineering had the same effect on scientific terminology as a whole
9.
Palace of Versailles
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The Palace of Versailles, Château de Versailles, or simply Versailles, is a royal château in Versailles in the Île-de-France region of France. Versailles is therefore not only as a building, but as a symbol of the system of absolute monarchy of the Ancien Régime. First built by Louis XIII in 1623, as a lodge of brick and stone. The first phase of the expansion was designed and supervised by the architect Louis Le Vau and it culminated in the addition of three new wings of stone, which surrounded Louis XIIIs original building on the north, south, and west. After Le Vaus death in 1670, the work was taken over and completed by his assistant, charles Le Brun designed and supervised the elaborate interior decoration, and André Le Nôtre landscaped the extensive Gardens of Versailles. Le Brun and Le Nôtre collaborated on the fountains, and Le Brun supervised the design. During the second phase of expansion, two enormous wings north and south of the wings flanking the Cour Royale were added by the architect Jules Hardouin-Mansart. He also replaced Le Vaus large terrace, facing the garden on the west, with became the most famous room of the palace. The Royal Chapel of Versailles, located at the end of the north wing, was begun by Mansart in 1688. One of the most baffling aspects to the study of Versailles is the cost – how much Louis XIV, owing to the nature of the construction of Versailles and the evolution of the role of the palace, construction costs were essentially a private matter. Initially, Versailles was planned to be a residence for Louis XIV and was referred to as the kings house. Once Louis XIV embarked on his campaigns, expenses for Versailles became more of a matter for public record. To counter the costs of Versailles during the years of Louis XIVs personal reign. Accordingly, all materials that went into the construction and decoration of Versailles were manufactured in France, even the mirrors used in the decoration of the Hall of Mirrors were made in France. While Venice in the 17th century had the monopoly on the manufacture of mirrors, to meet the demands for decorating and furnishing Versailles, Colbert nationalised the tapestry factory owned by the Gobelin family, to become the Manufacture royale des Gobelins. In 1667, the name of the enterprise was changed to the Manufacture royale des Meubles de la Couronne, the Comptes meticulously list the expenditures on the silver furniture – disbursements to artists, final payments, delivery – as well as descriptions and weight of items purchased. Entries for 1681 and 1682 concerning the silver used in the salon de Mercure serve as an example. 5 In anticipation, For the silver balustrade for the bedroom,90,000 livres II
10.
Louvre
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The Louvre or the Louvre Museum is the worlds largest museum and a historic monument in Paris, France. A central landmark of the city, it is located on the Right Bank of the Seine in the citys 1st arrondissement, approximately 38,000 objects from prehistory to the 21st century are exhibited over an area of 72,735 square metres. The Louvre is the second most visited museum after the Palace Museum in China. The museum is housed in the Louvre Palace, originally built as a fortress in the late 12th century under Philip II, remnants of the fortress are visible in the basement of the museum. Due to the expansion of the city, the fortress eventually lost its defensive function and. The building was extended many times to form the present Louvre Palace, in 1692, the building was occupied by the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles Lettres and the Académie Royale de Peinture et de Sculpture, which in 1699 held the first of a series of salons. The Académie remained at the Louvre for 100 years, during the French Revolution, the National Assembly decreed that the Louvre should be used as a museum to display the nations masterpieces. The museum opened on 10 August 1793 with an exhibition of 537 paintings, because of structural problems with the building, the museum was closed in 1796 until 1801. The collection was increased under Napoleon and the museum renamed Musée Napoléon, the collection was further increased during the reigns of Louis XVIII and Charles X, and during the Second French Empire the museum gained 20,000 pieces. Holdings have grown steadily through donations and bequests since the Third Republic, whether this was the first building on that spot is not known, it is possible that Philip modified an existing tower. According to the authoritative Grand Larousse encyclopédique, the name derives from an association with wolf hunting den, in the 7th century, St. Fare, an abbess in Meaux, left part of her Villa called Luvra situated in the region of Paris to a monastery. This territory probably did not correspond exactly to the modern site, the Louvre Palace was altered frequently throughout the Middle Ages. In the 14th century, Charles V converted the building into a residence and in 1546, Francis acquired what would become the nucleus of the Louvres holdings, his acquisitions including Leonardo da Vincis Mona Lisa. After Louis XIV chose Versailles as his residence in 1682, constructions slowed, however, on 14 October 1750, Louis XV agreed and sanctioned a display of 96 pieces from the royal collection, mounted in the Galerie royale de peinture of the Luxembourg Palace. Under Louis XVI, the museum idea became policy. The comte dAngiviller broadened the collection and in 1776 proposed conversion of the Grande Galerie of the Louvre – which contained maps – into the French Museum, many proposals were offered for the Louvres renovation into a museum, however, none was agreed on. Hence the museum remained incomplete until the French Revolution, during the French Revolution the Louvre was transformed into a public museum. In May 1791, the Assembly declared that the Louvre would be a place for bringing together monuments of all the sciences, on 10 August 1792, Louis XVI was imprisoned and the royal collection in the Louvre became national property
11.
Antoine Anselme
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Antoine Anselme, born in LIsle-Jourdain in Armagnac on 13 January 1652 and died in his abbey of Saint-Sever on 8 August 1737, was a widely noted French preacher. Early nicknamed the little prophet for his gift of repeating to perfection with gestures the sermons he had heard and he studied at Gimont then Toulouse before becoming a priest. He twice won the prize for an Ode from the Academy of Floral Games and he began so successfully that he received the nickname of Little prophet which he always retained. Noticed by the Marquis de Montespan, who chose him as tutor of his son the Marquis dAntin, in 1681 the French Academy chose him to write the introduction of a Panegyric in praise of Saint Louis and thereafter was heard in all the parishes of the capital. Two years later he preached at court, the days of the Last Supper, in 1698 he preached Advent and Lent. In 1709 he brought his career to an end. In one of her letters Madame de Sevigne noted his intelligence, his eloquence, his charm, a Member of the Academy of Inscriptions in 1710, he died at the Abbey of Saint-Sever that was given to him by Louis XIV in 1699. Some odes in the Academy of Floral Games of Toulouse Panegyrics of Saints, sermons of Advent, Lent and various topics, Paris,1731,4 vols. Various essays published in the Memoirs of the Academy of Inscriptions between 1724 and 1729, particular in The Stamp - The Object of Art, ed. Faton, Dijon,2009, ill. The portrait of Antoine Anselme was painted by Hyacinthe Rigaud around 1719 if the date on the back of the only copy of the canvas is to be believed. The work is known from an engraving by Charles Simonneau dated 1717 according to Hulst who placed the making of the canvas in 1713
12.
Jean Sylvain Bailly
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Jean Sylvain Bailly was a French astronomer, mathematician, freemason, and political leader of the early part of the French Revolution. He presided over the Tennis Court Oath, served as the mayor of Paris from 1789 to 1791, and was ultimately guillotined during the Reign of Terror. Born in Paris, Bailly was the son of Jacques Bailly, an artist and supervisor of the Louvre, as a child he originally intended to follow in his familys footsteps and pursue a career in the arts. He became deeply attracted to science, however, particularly astronomy and he participated in the construction of an observatory at the Louvre. These achievements along with others got him elected to the French Academy of Sciences in 1763, in the years prior to the French Revolution, Baillys distinctive reputation as a French astronomer led to his recognition and admiration by the European scientific community. Due to his popularity amongst the groups, in 1777. Bailly published his Essay on The Theory of the Satellites of Jupiter in 1766. a The essay was an expansion of a presentation he had made to the Academy in 1763 and he later released the noteworthy dissertation On the Inequalities of Light of the Satellites of Jupiterb in 1771. In 1778, he was elected a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. He was admitted to the Académie française on 26 February 1784, from then on, Bailly devoted himself to the history of science. In a short period of time, Bailly made his way up the judicial ranks, from being the deputy of Paris, he was elected Estates-General on 20 May 1789. Soon after he was elected president of the National Assembly and led the famous proceedings in the Tennis Court on 20 June. Shortly after the storming of the Bastille on 14 July 1789, on 15 July 1789, Bailly took office as the mayor of Paris. Two days later he was met by Louis XVI at the Hôtel de Ville who was there to endorse the Revolution, Bailly presented him with the new symbol of the revolution, the tricolour cockade. In his function as mayor, he was attacked by Camille Desmoulins, Bailly continuously sought to promote the authority of the mayor while limiting the power of the General Assembly of the Commune. During his reign as mayor, Bailly secured the passage of a decree that declared Jews to be French citizens on 17 September 1791 and he was met with threats and ridicule for this action. This decree repealed the taxes that had been imposed on the Jews. After a failed attempt by the family to flee the country. On 17 July 1791, he imposed martial law and ordered the National Guard to disperse a large riotous assembly calling for the deposition of the King and he was thus, with Lafayette, held responsible for the Champ de Mars Massacre
13.
Charles Batteux
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Charles Batteux was a French philosopher and writer on aesthetics. Batteux was born in AllandHuy-et-Sausseuil, Ardennes, and studied theology at Reims, in 1739 he came to Paris, and after teaching in the colleges of Lisieux and Navarre, was appointed to the chair of Greek and Roman philosophy in the Collège de France. According to P. O. Kristeller, the step towards the system of the fine arts was taken by the Abbé Batteux in his famous. The first to set forth a system of the fine arts in a treatise devoted entirely to this subject. The reputation thus gained, confirmed by his translation of Horace, led to Batteuxs becoming a member of the Académie des Inscriptions and his Cours de belles lettres was afterwards included with some minor writings in the large treatise, Principes de la littérature. His philosophical writings were La morale dÉpicure tirée de ses propres écrits, in consequence of the freedom with which in this work he attacked the abuse of authority in philosophy, he lost his professorial chair. His last and most extensive work was a Cours détudes à lusage des élèves de lécole militaire in forty-five volumes, in Les Beaux Arts, Batteux developed a theory influenced by John Locke through Voltaires sceptical sensualism. He held that the arts are arts, for producing fine or beautiful things, always in imitation of la belle nature
14.
Pierre Louis Jean Casimir de Blacas
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Pierre Louis Jean Casimir de Blacas dAulps, 1st Count, then 1st Duke of Blacas, and later also 1st Prince of Blacas was a French antiquarian, nobleman and diplomat during the Bourbon Restoration. He was baptized at Avignon on 11 January 1771 and he was the son of an aristocrat from Provence and took an opposing view of the French Revolution. In 1790, while a sous-lieutenant in the Noailles dragoons from Tarn, from there, he went to the German frontier town of Coblenz and joined the counter-revolutionary émigré army of Louis XVIs cousin, the Prince of Condé. Later, he went through Italy before entering the service of Russia, despite the help of Joseph de Maistre, the King of Sardinias diplomatic envoy to the court of the Russian tsar Alexander I, he was only able to gain small advantages for the future king. However, his willingness to do anything for the prince, quickly gained Blacas the trust. In 1809, Blacas was made the pretenders grandmaster of the wardrobe, after the death of the Comte dAvaray in 1811, he became Provences closest advisor and favorite. On 22 April 1814, he married a fellow exile, Henriette Marie Félicité du Bouchet de Sourches de Montsoreau, in London. The Comte de Montsoreau was the nephew of the Marquise de Tourzel and he assumed a dominant role in the new kings Conseil du Roi, essentially acting as prime minister. But, unskilled, he made an assortment of errors, favoring members of the Ancien Régime too often, in addition, his cool and aloof behavior alienated many. On Napoleons return from Elba, Blacas accompanied the new king on his flight to Ghent, upon the kings return to Paris after the Battle of Waterloo, though, Blacas unpopularity led to his dismissal. In compensation, he was named a peer of France with the title of Comte de Blacas dAulps, soon, however, his place as royal advisor was taken over by the more moderate Élie Decazes. A scapegoat for the royalist excesses of 1814, Blacas was unofficially exiled as the French ambassador to the court of the Kingdom of Two Sicilies, whose capital was located in Naples. There, he negotiated the 1816 marriage of the Louis XVIIIs nephew, also in 1816, Blacas became a member of both the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres and the Académie des Beaux-Arts. Afterwards, he was appointed to be the French ambassador to the Holy See in Rome and he signed a concordat between Bourbon France and Pope Pius VII on 11 June 1817. In 1820, he received the Ordre du Saint-Esprit, while still ambassador in Rome, he was one of three French representatives to the Congress of Laibach in 1821. In addition, he worked closely with Italian archaeologist Carlo Fea in the excavation of the Roman Forum, together, they correctly identified the Temple of Castor and Pollux in 1816. Louis XVIII raised his title of comte to that of Duke of Blacas on 30 April 1821, after his death, the new king, Charles X, chose him to be one of his premier gentilhommes de la chambre. Blacas was also appointed superintendent to the Crown properties, during his administration, he supported orientalist Jean-François Champollion and created the Musée Egyptien within the Louvre
15.
Henri Cordier
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Henri Cordier was a French linguist, historian, ethnographer, author, editor and Orientalist. He was President of the Société de Géographie in Paris, Cordier was a prominent figure in the development of East Asian and Central Asian scholarship in Europe in the late 19th and early 20th century. Cordier was born in New Orleans, Louisiana in the United States and he arrived in France in 1852, and his family moved to Paris in 1855. He was educated at the Collège Chaptal and in England, in 1869 at age 20, he sailed for Shanghai, where he worked at an English bank. During the next two years, he published articles in local newspapers. In 1872, he was librarian of the North China branch of the Royal Asiatic Society. In this period, about twenty articles were published in Shanghai Evening Courier, North China Daily News, in 1876, he was named secretary of a Chinese government program for Chinese students studying in Europe. In Paris, Cordier was a professor at lÉcole spéciale des Langues orientales and he joined the faculty in 1881, and he was a professor from 1881-1925. Cordier was also a professeur at lÉcole Libre des Sciences Politiques, which is known as the National Foundation of Political Studies. Although he had only a knowledge of the language, Cordier made major contributions to Sinology. Cordier, as the Bibliotheca Sinica is sometimes referred to, is the standard enumerative bibliography of 70,000 works on China up to 1921. Even though the author did not know Chinese, he was thorough, endymion Wilkinson also praises Cordier for including the full titles, often the tables of contents, and reviews of most books. Cordier was an editor of Toung Pao, which was the first international journal of Chinese Studies. Along with Gustaaf Schlegel, he helped to establish the prominent sinological journal Toung Pao in 1890, Royal Asiatic Society, honorary member,1893. Royal Geographic Society, corresponding member,1908, académie des inscriptions et belles-lettres, member,1908. Cordiers published writings encompass 1,033 works in 1,810 publications in 13 languages and 7,984 library holdings, dictionnaire bibliographique des ouvrages relatifs à lEmpire chinois, Vol.1, Vol.2. 1, Vol.2, by F. Renouard de Ste-Croix, lImprimerie sino-européenne en Chine, bibliographie des ouvrages publiés en Chine par les Européens au XVIIe et au XVIIIe siècle. Dictionnaire bibliographique des ouvrages relatifs à lEmpire chinois, bibliotheca sinica, Vol.1, Vol.2, Vol.3, dictionnaire bibliographique des ouvrages relatifs à la péninsule indochinoise Bibliotheca Japonica
16.
Jean Denis, comte Lanjuinais
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Jean Denis, comte Lanjuinais, was a French politician, lawyer, jurist, journalist, and historian. At this period he wrote two important works which, owing to the state of public affairs, remained unpublished, Institutiones juris ecciesiastici. He refused to vote for the death of Louis XVI, alleging that the nation had no right to despatch a vanquished prisoner. Placed under arrest with the Girondists, he escaped to Rennes where he drew up a pamphlet denouncing the Montagnard Constitution under the curious title Le Dernier Crime de Lanjuinais. Together with Gui-Jean-Baptiste Target, Joseph-Marie Portalis and others he founded under the Empire an academy of legislation in Paris, closely associated with oriental scholars, and a keen student of oriental religions, he entered the Académie des Inscriptions in 1808. After the Bourbon Restoration, Lanjuinais consistently defended the principles of constitutional monarchy and he was President of the Chamber of Representatives from 4 June to 13 July 1815. His son, Victor Ambroise, vicomte de Lanjuinais, was also a politician and his interests lay chiefly in financial questions and in 1849 he became minister of commerce and agriculture in the cabinet of Odilon Barrot. He wrote a Notice historique sur la vie et les ouvrages du comte de Lanjuinais and this article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain, Chisholm, Hugh, ed. Lanjuinais, Jean Denis
17.
Louis Duchesne
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Louis Marie Olivier Duchesne was a French priest, philologist, teacher and a critical historian of Christianity and Roman Catholic liturgy and institutions. Louis brother, Jean-Baptiste Duchesne, settled in Oregon City, Oregon in 1849, Louis Duchesne was ordained to the priesthood in 1867. He taught for years in Saint-Brieuc, then went to study in Paris. From 1873 to 1876, he was a student at the École française in Rome. He was an amateur archaeologist and organized expeditions from Rome to Mount Athos, to Syria, in 1877, he obtained the chair of ecclesiastical history of the Catholic Institute, but left the theological faculty in 1883. He then taught at the Ecole Pratique des Hautes, where he influenced Alfred Firmin Loisy, a founder of the movement of Modernism, in 1895, he was appointed director of the École française. In 1887, he published the results of his thesis, followed by the first complete edition of the Liber Pontificalis. He also wrote Les Sources du martyrologe hyéronimien, Origines du culte chrétien, Fastes épiscopaux de lancienne Gaule and these works were universally praised, and he was appointed a commander of the Legion of Honor. However, his Histoire ancienne de lÉglise, 1906‑11 was considered too modernist by the Church during the Modernist crisis and was placed on the Index of Forbidden Books in 1912. In 1888, he became a member of the Académie des inscriptions et belles-lettres, abbe Duchesne was made an apostolic prothonotary in 1900. He died in 1922, in Rome, and is buried in the cemetery of Saint-Servan, london, Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge. Next printing 1919 and 1931 also in New York, Macmillan Company, K. Paul, Trench, Trübner & co. ltd. Fastes épiscopaux de lancienne Gaule, I, second edition Early history of the Christian church from its foundation to the end of the third century. Fastes épiscopaux de lancienne Gaule, II, Fastes épiscopaux de lancienne Gaule, III. Second edition Scripta minora, études de topographie romaine et de géographie ecclésiastique, - commemorating the 50th anniversary of the death of Louis Duchesne. The Politics of Modernism, Alfred Loisy and the Scientific Study of Religion, washington DC, Catholic University of America Press. Harvey Hill, Louis-Pierre Sardella, C. J. T. Talar, by Those Who Knew Them, French Modernists Left, Right, and Center. Washington DC, Catholic University of America Press, joassart, B. editor Monseigneur Duchesne et les Bollandistes, Correspondance 2002
18.
Bernard Le Bovier de Fontenelle
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Fontenelle was born in Rouen, France and died in Paris just one month before his 100th birthday. His mother was the sister of great French dramatists Pierre and Thomas Corneille and his father, François le Bovier de Fontenelle, was a lawyer who worked in the provincial court of Rouen and came from a family of lawyers from Alençon. He trained in the law but gave up after one case, devoting his life to writing about philosophers and scientists, especially defending the Cartesian tradition. In spite of the merit and value of his writings. He was a commentator and explicator and occasionally a passionate, though generally good-humoured and he was educated at the college of the Jesuits, the Lycée Pierre Corneille. At the Lycée he showed a preference for literature and distinguished himself and he began as a poet, writing a poem in Latin at the age of 13 and more than once competed for prizes of the Académie française, but he never won anything. He visited Paris from time to time and became friendly with the abbé de Saint-Pierre, the abbé Vertot and he witnessed, in 1680, the total failure of his tragedy Aspar. Fontenelle afterwards acknowledged the public verdict by burning his unfortunate drama and his opera of Thétis et Pélée,1689, was not much better, and it may be significant that none of his dramatic works are still performed. His Poésies pastorales are also mediocre and his Lettres galantes du chevalier dHer. Published anonymously in 1685, was a collection of letters portraying worldly society of the time. In 1686 his famous allegory of Rome and Geneva, slightly disguised as the rival princesses Mreo and Eenegu, in the Relation de lîle de Bornéo and he wrote extensively on the nature of the universe, Behold a universe so immense that I am lost in it. I no longer know where I am, I am just nothing at all. Our world is terrifying in its insignificance and it consisted of two essays, the first of which was designed to prove that oracles were not given by the supernatural agency of demons, and the second that they did not cease with the birth of Jesus. A noted gourmand, he attributed his longevity to eating strawberries, at ninety-two one woman wrote that he was as lively as a man of twenty-two. When, in his nineties he met the beautiful Madame Helvétius, he reportedly told her, Ah Madame. Perhaps the best known of his éloges, of which there are sixty-nine in all, is that of his uncle Pierre Corneille. This was first printed in the Nouvelles de la republique des lettres and, the other important works of Fontenelle are his Éléments de la géometrie de linfini and his Théorie des tourbillons. In the latter he supported the views of René Descartes concerning gravitation and he is noted for the accessibility of his work – particularly its novelistic style
19.
Antoine Galland
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Antoine Galland was a French orientalist and archaeologist, most famous as the first European translator of One Thousand and One Nights which he called Les mille et une nuits. His version of the tales appeared in volumes between 1704 and 1717 and exerted a significant influence on subsequent European literature and attitudes to the Islamic world. Jorge Luis Borges has suggested that Romanticism began when his translation was first read, Galland was born at Rollot in Picardy. After completing school at Noyon, he studied Greek and Latin in Paris, after a brief visit to France, where his collection of ancient coins attracted some attention, Galland returned to the Levant in 1677. In 1679 he undertook a voyage, being commissioned by the French East India Company to collect for the cabinet of Colbert. On the expiration of this commission, he was instructed by the government to continue his research, when dHerbelot died in 1695, Galland continued his Bibliothèque orientale, a huge compendium of information about Islamic culture. It was finally published in 1697 and was a contribution to European knowledge about the Middle East. After the deaths of Thévenot and dHerbelot, Galland lived for time at Caen under the roof of Nicolas Foucault. There he began, in 1704, the publication of Les mille et Une Nuits, in 1709 he was appointed to the chair of Arabic in the Collège de France. He continued to discharge the duties of this post until his death in 1715, the former of these works appeared in an English translation in 1795. His Contes et fables indiennes de Bidpai et de Lokrnan was published posthumously in 1724, among his numerous manuscripts are a translation of the Quran and a Histoire générale des empereurs Turcs. His journal was published by Charles Schefer in 1881, Galland had come across a manuscript of The Tale of Sindbad the Sailor in Constantinople during the 1690s and, in 1701, he published his translation of it into French. Its success encouraged him to embark on a translation of a 14th-century Syrian manuscript of tales from The Thousand, the first two volumes of this work, under the title Mille et Une Nuit, appeared in 1704. The twelfth and final volume was published posthumously in 1717 and he chose to include seven of these tales in his version of the Nights. Mystery still surrounds the origins of some of the most famous tales, for instance, there are no Arabic manuscripts of Aladdin and Ali Baba, the so-called orphan tales, which pre-date Gallands translation. The immediate success the tales enjoyed was partly due to the vogue for fairy stories, Galland was also eager to conform to the literary canons of the era. He cut many of the passages as well as all of the poetry. This caused Sir Richard Burton to refer to Gallands delightful abbreviation and adaptation which in no wise represent the eastern original
20.
Stanislas Julien
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Julien was a student of Jean-Pierre Abel-Rémusat, and succeeded him as the chair of Chinese at the Collège de France upon Rémusats death in 1832. The quantity and quality of Juliens scholarship earned him wide renown, born at Orléans on 13 April 1797, Julien initially struggled to obtain higher education due to his familys relative poverty. In 1821 he was appointed assistant professor of Greek, in the same year he published an edition of The Rape of Helen of Coluthus, with versions in French, Latin, English, German, Italian and Spanish. He attended the lectures of Jean-Pierre Abel-Rémusat on Chinese, in late 1823 Julien met Jean-Pierre Abel-Rémusat, the first-ever professor of Chinese at the Collège de France, and began studying Chinese with him. Soon afterwards he translated the modern Greek odes of Kalvos under the title of La Lyre patriotique de la Grèce, in 1827 he was appointed sublibrarian to the Institut de France. In 1832 he succeeded Abel-Rémusat as professor of Chinese at the Collège de France, in 1833 he was elected a member of the Académie des Inscriptions. He next turned to the Taoist writings, and translated in 1835 Le Livre des récompenses et des peines 太上感應篇 Taishang Ganying Pian, in 1842 saw the publication of his translation of the 道德經 Dao De Jing. Then he turned his attention to the Buddhist literature of China, six years later he published Les Avadanas, contes et apologues indiens inconnus jusquà ce jour, suivis de poésies et de nouvelles chinoises. No hard and fast rule can therefore possibly be laid down for the decipherment of Chinese transcriptions of Sanskrit words, known for his impatience and bad temper, he had bitter controversies with his fellow sinologists. His Indian studies led to a controversy with Joseph Toussaint Reinaud, among the many subjects to which he turned his attention were the native industries of China, producing the Histoire et fabrication de la porcelaine chinoise 景德鎮陶錄 Jingdezhen Taolu. In another volume he published an account of the Industries anciennes et modernes de lEmpire chinois. In politics Julien was imperialist, and in 1863 he was made a commander of the Légion dhonneur in recognition of the services he had rendered to literature during the Second French Empire. In 1872 the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres established the Prix Stanislas Julien, Le Livre de la Voie et de la Vertu, composé dans le VIe siècle avant lère chrétienne, par le philosophe Lao-Tseu, traduit en français et publié avec le texte chinois et un commentaire perpétuel. Histoire de la Vie de Hiouen-Thsang, Histoire et Fabrication de la Porcelaine Chinoise. Syntax Nouvelle de la Langue Chinoise, footnotes Works cited This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain, Chisholm, Hugh, ed. article name needed. Incense at the Altar, Pioneering Sinologists and the Development of Classical Chinese Philology, new Haven, Connecticut, American Oriental Society. Works by Stanislas Julien at Project Gutenberg Works by or about Stanislas Julien at Internet Archive
21.
Jean Mabillon
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Dom Jean Mabillon, O. S. B. was a French Benedictine monk and scholar of the Congregation of Saint Maur. He is considered the founder of palaeography and diplomatics, Mabillon was born in the town of Saint-Pierremont, then in the ancient Province of Champagne, now a part of the Department of Ardennes. He was the son of Estienne Mabillon and Jeanne Guérin, at age 12 he entered the Collège des Bons Enfants in Reims and in 1650 entered the seminary. He left the seminary in 1653 and instead became a monk in the Maurist Abbey of Saint-Remi and his devotion to his studies there left him ill, and he was sent to Corbie Abbey in 1658 to regain his strength. In Saint-Germain, Mabillon edited the works of Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, the later work was undertaken in collaboration with Luc dAchery, an older scholar and long-lasting librarian of Saint-Germain-des-Prés, who had collected the historical materials which Mabillon used. A foreword which Mabillon later added used the lives of the saints in order to illustrate the history of the early Middle Ages, manuscripts from many archives are addressed, and references made to items dating back to Dagobert I. Concerned often with distinguishing genuine documents from forgeries the work is now seen as the work of palaeography. Mabillon writes, I do not deny that in some documents are false and others interpolated. Rather, it is necessary to devise and hand down rules for distinguishing genuine manuscripts from those that are false, I undertook this task after long familiarity and daily experience with these documents. For almost twenty years I had devoted my studies and energies to reading and examining ancient manuscripts and archives, and this work brought Mabillon to the attention of Jean-Baptiste Colbert, who offered him a pension, and King Louis XIV. He began to travel throughout Europe, to Flanders, Switzerland, Germany, there were, however, opponents to Mabillons work. In 1701 Mabillon was appointed by the king as one of the members of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres. In 1707 he died and was buried in the church of Saint-Germain-des-Prés, according to a modern historian and critic, Mabillon was the greatest historical scholar of his century. The Mabillon station of the Paris Métro is named after him, Jean Mabillon, De re diplomatica - Digital Reproduction
