Christine Proust (born 1953) is a French
historian of mathematics
The history of mathematics deals with the origin of discoveries in mathematics and the mathematical methods and notation of the past. Before the modern age and the worldwide spread of knowledge, written examples of new mathematical developments ...
and
Assyriologist
Assyriology (from Greek , ''Assyriā''; and , '' -logia'') is the archaeological, anthropological, and linguistic study of Assyria and the rest of ancient Mesopotamia (a region that encompassed what is now modern Iraq, northeastern Syria, southea ...
known for her research on
Babylonian mathematics
Babylonian mathematics (also known as ''Assyro-Babylonian mathematics'') are the mathematics developed or practiced by the people of Mesopotamia, from the days of the early Sumerians to the centuries following the fall of Babylon in 539 BC. Babyl ...
. She is a senior researcher at the SPHERE joint team of
CNRS
The French National Centre for Scientific Research (french: link=no, Centre national de la recherche scientifique, CNRS) is the French state research organisation and is the largest fundamental science agency in Europe.
In 2016, it employed 31,637 ...
and
Paris Diderot University
Paris Diderot University, also known as Paris 7 (french: Université Paris Diderot), was a French university located in Paris, France. It was one of the inheritors of the historic University of Paris, which was split into 13 universities in 197 ...
, where she and Agathe Keller (who studies mathematical Sanskrit texts) are co-directors of the SAW project (Mathematical Sciences in the Ancient World) headed by
Karine Chemla
Karine Chemla (born in Tunis February 8, 1957) is a French historian of mathematics and sinologist who works as a director of research at the Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS). She is also a senior fellow at the New York Universi ...
(an expert in ancient Chinese mathematics).
Education and career
Following a two-decade long career as a secondary mathematics teacher, including an
agrégation
In France, the ''agrégation'' () is a competitive examination for civil service in the French public education system. Candidates for the examination, or ''agrégatifs'', become ''agrégés'' once they are admitted to the position of ''professe ...
in Mathematics in 1992, Proust studied
epistemology
Epistemology (; ), or the theory of knowledge, is the branch of philosophy concerned with knowledge. Epistemology is considered a major subfield of philosophy, along with other major subfields such as ethics, logic, and metaphysics.
Episte ...
and
history of science
The history of science covers the development of science from ancient times to the present. It encompasses all three major branches of science: natural, social, and formal.
Science's earliest roots can be traced to Ancient Egypt and Meso ...
at Paris Diderot University, earning a
diplôme d'études approfondies
A Master of Advanced Studies or Master of Advanced Study (MAS, M.A.S., or MASt) is a postgraduate degree awarded in various countries. Master of Advanced Studies programs may be non-consecutive programs tailored for "specific groups of working pro ...
in 1999 and a doctorate in 2004, supervised by . She completed a
habilitation
Habilitation is the highest university degree, or the procedure by which it is achieved, in many European countries. The candidate fulfills a university's set criteria of excellence in research, teaching and further education, usually including a ...
at Paris Diderot in 2010, and became a director of research in the SPHERE laboratory in 2011.
Proust was a member of the
Institute for Advanced Study
The Institute for Advanced Study (IAS), located in Princeton, New Jersey, in the United States, is an independent center for theoretical research and intellectual inquiry. It has served as the academic home of internationally preeminent scholar ...
in Princeton during 2009, a visiting scholar at the
Institute for the Study of the Ancient World
The Institute for the Study of the Ancient World (ISAW) is a center for advanced scholarly research and graduate education at New York University. ISAW's mission is to cultivate comparative, connective investigations of the ancient world from the ...
at
New York University
New York University (NYU) is a private research university in New York City. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded by a group of New Yorkers led by then-Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin.
In 1832, the ...
during 2010, and a resident at the ''Institut Méditerranéen de Recherches Avancées'' in Marseille during 2010–2011.
Scholarship
In her thesis work, Proust edited and analyzed two long-neglected collections of
Old Babylonian
Old Babylonian may refer to:
*the period of the First Babylonian dynasty (20th to 16th centuries BC)
*the historical stage of the Akkadian language
Akkadian (, Akkadian: )John Huehnergard & Christopher Woods, "Akkadian and Eblaite", ''The Camb ...
mathematical tablets that constitute part of the vast trove of artifacts excavated at
Nippur
Nippur (Sumerian language, Sumerian: ''Nibru'', often logogram, logographically recorded as , EN.LÍLKI, "Enlil City;"The Cambridge Ancient History: Prolegomena & Prehistory': Vol. 1, Part 1. Accessed 15 Dec 2010. Akkadian language, Akkadian: '' ...
by
John Punnett Peters
John Punnett Peters (December 16, 1852 – November 10, 1921) was an American Episcopal clergyman and Orientalist.
Biography
John Punnett Peters was born in New York City on December 16, 1852. He graduated from Hopkins School in 1868 and then ...
,
John Henry Haynes
John Henry Haynes (27 January 1849 – 29 June 1910) was an American traveller, archaeologist and photographer, best known for his work at the first two American archaeological excavations in the Mediterranean, and Mesopotamia at Nippur and Asso ...
and
Hermann Hilprecht Hermann Volrath Hilprecht (July 28, 1859 – March 19, 1925) was a German-American Assyriologist and archaeologist.
Biography
Hilprecht was born in 1859 at Hohenerxleben (now a part of Staßfurt), Germany. He graduated from Herzogliches Gymnasium ...
in the late 1800s. This work resulted in the publication of two books, 'Tablettes mathématiques de Nippur' and 'Tablettes mathématiques de la collection Hilprecht'.
The first is an edition of the tablets housed at the
Museum of the Ancient Orient
The Museum of the Ancient Orient (Turkish language: ''Eski Şark Eserleri Müzesi'') is a museum in Istanbul, and part of the group of Istanbul Archaeology Museums, located just in front of the main Archaeology Museum building. The building of th ...
in Istanbul and an improved reconstruction of the curriculum for elementary scribal education in mathematics at Old Babylonian Nippur, the second an edition of the tablets housed in the Hilprecht Collection at the
University of Jena
The University of Jena, officially the Friedrich Schiller University Jena (german: Friedrich-Schiller-Universität Jena, abbreviated FSU, shortened form ''Uni Jena''), is a public research university located in Jena, Thuringia, Germany.
The un ...
. (Other Nippur tablets at the
University of Pennsylvania
The University of Pennsylvania (also known as Penn or UPenn) is a private research university in Philadelphia. It is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and is ranked among the highest-regarded universitie ...
and had been previously studied by
Eleanor Robson
Eleanor Robson, (born 1969) is a British Assyriologist and academic. She is Professor of Ancient Middle Eastern History at University College London. She is a former chair of the British Institute for the Study of Iraq and a Quondam fellow of A ...
.)
Proust's work produced the most detailed reconstruction of the process of elementary scribal education at Old Babylonian Nippur, including the curriculum and timelines, the interaction of education in Sumerian language and mathematics (Sumerian was a foreign language to the Akkadian speakers of the Old Babylonian era), and the interaction between metrological calculation and abstract calculation using sexagesimal place-value notation.
With Alexander Jones she curated the exhibit ''Before Pythagoras: The Culture of Old Babylonian Mathematics'' (2010–2011) at the Institute for the Study of the Ancient World (ISAW) in New York in which a number of mathematically important clay tablets, including
YBC 7289
YBC 7289 is a Babylonian clay tablet notable for containing an accurate sexagesimal approximation to the square root of 2, the length of the diagonal of a unit square. This number is given to the equivalent of six decimal digits, "the greatest ...
and
Plimpton 322
Plimpton 322 is a Babylonian clay tablet, notable as containing an example of Babylonian mathematics. It has number 322 in the G.A. Plimpton Collection at Columbia University. This tablet, believed to have been written about 1800 BC, has a table ...
were on display. Proust has also been involved in study of the papers and correspondence of the noted historian
Otto Neugebauer
Otto Eduard Neugebauer (May 26, 1899 – February 19, 1990) was an Austrian-American mathematician and historian of science who became known for his research on the history of astronomy and the other exact sciences as they were practiced in anti ...
, who largely initiated the study of mathematical cuneiform texts in the mid-twentieth century. Some of this material was on display at the ISAW exhibit
Books
Proust is the author of ''Tablettes mathématiques de Nippur'' (De Boccard, 2007) and of ''Tablettes mathématiques de la collection Hilprecht'' (Harrassowitz, 2008).
She is the editor of books including:
*''Scientific Sources and Teaching Contexts Throughout History: Problems and Perspectives'' (with Alain Bernard, Springer, 2014)
*''A Mathematician's Journeys: Otto Neugebauer and Modern Transformations of Ancient Science'' (with Alexander Jones and John Steele, Springer, 2016)
*''Scholars and Scholarship in Late Babylonian Uruk'' (with John Steele, Springer, 2019)
Recognition
Proust was the 2011 winner of the , given by the
French Academy of Sciences
The French Academy of Sciences (French: ''Académie des sciences'') is a learned society, founded in 1666 by Louis XIV of France, Louis XIV at the suggestion of Jean-Baptiste Colbert, to encourage and protect the spirit of French Scientific me ...
in recognition of the body of her work and, in particular, for her publication of the Nippur tablets. She became a corresponding member of the
International Academy of the History of Science The International Academy of the History of Science (french: Académie Internationale d'Histoire des Sciences) is a membership organization for historians of science.
The academy was founded on 17 August 1928 at the Congress of Historical Science by ...
in 2019.
References
Weblinks
Homepage
{{DEFAULTSORT:Proust, Christine
1953 births
Living people
20th-century French historians
French women historians
French women mathematicians
French Assyriologists
French historians of mathematics
Paris Diderot University alumni
21st-century French historians