Étienne Fourmont
Étienne Fourmont | |
|---|---|
| Born | 23 June 1683 |
| Institutions | Collège de France |
| Chinese name | |
Hanyu Pinyin | Fù Ěrméng |
Étienne Fourmont (23 June 1683 – 8 December 1745) was a French scholar and
Arabic at the Collège de France
and published grammars on the Arabic, Hebrew, and Chinese languages.
Although Fourmont is remembered as a pioneering
Arcadius Huang, whom he had helped catalog the royal sinological collection, and that he frequently plagiarized the works of other scholars.[1]
Life and career
Born at
Oriental languages. Shortly after leaving the college he published a Traduction du commentaire du Rabbin Abraham A ben Esra sur l'Ecclésiaste.[2]
In 1711
Arcadius Huang, a Catholic Chinese convert, in cataloging the French royal collection of works in Chinese and compiling a Chinese dictionary. One day, Fourmont was discovered copying Huang's work, and after Huang's death there was suspicion that Fourmont had not given Huang adequate credit.[3] Huang died in 1716, and Fourmont immediately appropriated his work for himself.[4][5] He completed Huang's catalogue and published it in Paris in 1737 as Catalogus Codicum Manuscriptorum Bibliothecae Regiae (Royal Library Catalog of Manuscripts).[4] He also wrote Réflexions critiques sur les histoires des anciens peuples (1735), and several dissertations printed in the Memoires of the Academy of Inscriptions.[6]
Fourmont's most notable work was his 1737 grammar of Chinese: Linguae Sinarum mandarinicae hieroglyphicae grammatical duplex patine et cum characteribus Sinensium. This work is simply a copy of Francisco Varo's earlier Chinese grammar, with the addition of Chinese characters.[1]
He became professor of
Royal Society of London
, and in 1742 a member of that of Berlin. He died at Paris on 8 December 1745.
His brother, Michel Fourmont (1690–1746), was also a member of the Academy of Inscriptions, and professor of the Syriac language in the Royal College.
Selected works
- --, Les Racines De La Langue Latine, Mises En Vers François (Paris: Chez Pierre-Augustin Le Mercier, 1706)
- --, Examen Pacifique De La Querelle De Madame Dacier Et De Monsieur De La Motte Sur Homere. (Paris: Chez Jacques Rollin, 1716). Reprinted: Geneva: Slatkine Reprints, 1971.
- --, Meditationes Sinicae: In Quibus 1. Consideratur Linguae Philosophicae Atque Universalis Natura Qualis Esse, Aut Debeat, Aut Possit. : 2. Lingua Sinarum Mandarinica Tum in Hieroglyphis Tum in Monosyllabis Suis ... Ostenditur : 3. Datur Eorumdem Hieroglyphorum Ac Monosyllaborum Atque Inde Characterum Linguae Sinicae Omnium ... Lectio & Intellectio ... : 4. Idque Omne, Progressu a Libris Mere Europaeis (De Sinica Tamen) Ad Libros Mere Sinicos, Facto (Lutetiae Parisiorum: Chez Musier le Père ... Jombert ... Briasson ... Bullot ; ex typographia Bullot, 1737). GOOGLE BOOK
- --, Lingua Sinarum Mandarinicae Hieroglyphicae Grammatica Duplex, Latine Et Cum Characteribus Sinensium. Item Sinicorum Regiae Bibliothecae Librorum Catalogus (Lutetia Parisorum, 1742). Download or view: Bayerische StaatsBibliotek digital
- --, Joseph de Guignes, Michel-Ange-André Le Roux Deshauterayes, Jean Debure, Reflexions Sur L'origine, L'histoire Et La Succession Des Anciens Peuples, Chaldeens, Hebreux, Pheniciens, Egyptiens, Grecs, &C., Jusqu'au Tems De Cyrus Nouvelle Edition, Augmentée De La Vie De L'auteur, & D'une Table Alphabétique Des Matieres (A Paris, chez De Bure l'aîné, quai des Augustins, à l'Image S. Paul. M. DCC. XLVII., 1747).
Footnotes
- ^ a b Honey (2001), pp. 20–21.
- ^ . Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 10 (11th ed.). 1911. p. 758.
- ^ Danielle Elisseeff , Moi Arcade, interprète du roi-soleil , édition Arthaud, Paris, 1985.
- ^ a b Honey (2001), p. 20.
- ^ App (2010), pp. 191–197.
- ISBN 9058672484. [1]
References and further reading
- This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Fourmont, Étienne". Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 10 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 758.
- App, Urs (2010). The Birth of Orientalism. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press., esp. "Fourmont's Dirty Little Secret" (pp. 191- 197).
- Honey, David B. (2001). Incense at the Altar: Pioneering Sinologists and the Development of Classical Chinese Philology. American Oriental Series 86. New Haven, Connecticut: American Oriental Society. ISBN 0-940490-16-1.,
- Leung, Cécile (2002). Etienne Fourmont, 1683–1745 : Oriental and Chinese Languages in Eighteenth-Century France. (Leuven: Leuven University Press; Ferdinand Verbiest Foundation, Leuven Chinese Studies). ISBN 9058672484. GOOGLEBOOK
- Authority Page WorldCat
- Cordier, Henri (1886). Notes Pour Servir À L'histoire Des Études Chinoises En Europe, Jusqu'à L'époque De Fourmont L'aîné. Leiden?: Brill?.
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