Francis Rapp (27 June 1926 – 29 March 2020) was a French

medievalist The asterisk ( ), from Late Latin , from Ancient Greek , ''asteriskos'', "little star", is a typographical symbol. It is so called because it resembles a conventional image of a heraldic star. Computer scientists and mathematicians often voc ...

specializing in the

history of Alsace The History of Alsace begins when the area was inhabited by nomadic hunters in paleolithic times. Later, control of Alsace shifted among competing European powers, including most recently the Holy Roman Empire and Germany, on the one hand, and Fran ...

and

medieval Germany The Germani tribes i.e. Germanic tribes are now considered to be related to the Jastorf culture before expanding and interacting with the other peoples. The concept of a region for Germanic tribes is traced to time of Julius Caesar, a Roman ge ...

. An ''

emeritus ''Emeritus'' (; female: ''emerita'') is an adjective used to designate a retired chair, professor, pastor, bishop, pope, director, president, prime minister, rabbi, emperor, or other person who has been "permitted to retain as an honorary title ...

'' university professor, he was a member of the

Académie des inscriptions et belles-lettres The Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres () is a French learned society devoted to history, founded in February 1663 as one of the five academies of the Institut de France. The academy's scope was the study of ancient inscriptions ( epig ...

since 1993.

Life

Youth

Born in

Strasbourg Strasbourg (, , ; german: Straßburg ; gsw, label=Bas Rhin Alsatian, Strossburi , gsw, label=Haut Rhin Alsatian, Strossburig ) is the prefecture and largest city of the Grand Est region of eastern France and the official seat of the Eu ...

, the son of lawyer Léon Rapp, Rapp was born into a Catholic and patriotic family. He did his secondary studies at the

Jean Sturm Gymnasium The Jean Sturm Gymnasium (french: Gymnase Jean-Sturm, german: Gymnasium Jean Sturm) is a private Protestant school in Strasbourg, teaching children from the third year of secondary education through to the Baccalaureat. History The school, w ...

and practiced

scouting Scouting, also known as the Scout Movement, is a worldwide youth movement employing the Scout method, a program of informal education with an emphasis on practical outdoor activities, including camping, woodcraft, aquatics, hiking, backpacking ...

within the

Scouts de France Scouts et Guides de France (''Scouts and Guides of France'', SGdF) is the largest Scouting and Guiding association in France. It was formed on 1 September 2004 from the merger of two Roman Catholic Scouting organizations: the Guides de France (f ...

. Breaking with forced incorporation, he joined a clandestine scouting group that gathered about twenty young people at the

Mont Sainte-Odile , photo = Ottrott Mont Sainte-Odile.JPG , photo_caption = Mont Sainte-Odile and the Monastery , elevation_m = 764 , elevation_ref = Official maps of IGN available on the ''Géoportail''. , prominence_m = , prominence_ref= , range = Vos ...

from December 1942. At the end of the 1960s he joined the

Association des Guides et Scouts d'Europe The Association des Guides et Scouts d'Europe (AGSE, ''Association of the Guides and Scouts of Europe'') is a Roman Catholic Scouting and Guiding organization in France. It was founded in 1958 and serves about 26,600 members. The organization wa ...

and was commissioner of the Alsace Province until the mid-1980s.

Academic career

Rapp graduated as a major of the agrégation d'histoire in 1952, then was a teacher at the Lycée Fustel-de-Coulanges de Strasbourg between 1952 and 1953 and a resident of the

Fondation Dosne-Thiers The Fondation Dosne-Thiers is a history library located in the 9th arrondissement of Paris at 27, place St-Georges, Paris, France. It is open to researchers who obtain recommendations from a member of the Institut de France. Description The foun ...

from 1956 to 1961; he was a lecturer at the faculté des lettres de Nancy from 1961 to 1972, then an assistant in

medieval history In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire a ...

at the

Marc Bloch University The University Marc Bloch, also known as Strasbourg II or UMB was a university in Strasbourg, Alsace, France. As of 2006, it had around 13,000 students. Its name used to be ''Université des Sciences Humaines'' (University of Social Sciences), but i ...

of Strasbourg. After becoming a Doctor of Letters in 1972, he was a lecturer and then a professor at the

University of Strasbourg The University of Strasbourg (french: Université de Strasbourg, Unistra) is a public research university located in Strasbourg, Alsace, France, with over 52,000 students and 3,300 researchers. The French university traces its history to the ea ...

from 1974. A lecturer in the

history of Christianity The history of Christianity concerns the Christian religion, Christian countries, and the Christians with their various denominations, from the 1st century to the present. Christianity originated with the ministry of Jesus, a Jewish teach ...

at the between 1972 and 1991, Rapp was an associate professor at the

university of Neuchâtel The University of Neuchâtel (UniNE) is a French-speaking university based in Neuchâtel, Switzerland. The university has four faculties (schools) and more than a dozen institutes, including arts and human sciences, natural sciences, law and eco ...

and a

visiting scholar In academia, a visiting scholar, visiting researcher, visiting fellow, visiting lecturer, or visiting professor is a scholar from an institution who visits a host university to teach, lecture, or perform research on a topic for which the visitor ...

at several universities in North America and Europe. Rapp was a member of the Consultative Committee of Universities, the Higher Council of University Bodies, the National Committee of the

Centre national de la recherche scientifique 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 Basic research, also called pure research o ...

, the Scientific Council and the Board of Directors of the

École nationale des chartes The École Nationale des Chartes (, literally National School of Charters) is a French ''grande école'' and a constituent college of Université PSL, specialising in the historical sciences. It was founded in 1821, and was located initially at ...

and the

École française de Rome The École française de Rome (EFR) is a French research institute for history, archaeology, and the social sciences; overseen by the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, and a division of the Ministère de l'Enseignement supérieur et ...

. He was also a member of the , the Académie des Marches de l’Est and the

Göttingen Academy of Sciences and Humanities The Göttingen Academy of Sciences (german: Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Göttingen)Note that the German ''Wissenschaft'' has a wider meaning than the English "Science", and includes Social sciences and Humanities. is the second oldest of the se ...

. A member of the editorial board of the review ''

Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte Archive for Reformation History (german: Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte; ARG) is a specialised international annual academic journal for the Reformation era. It is a bilingual joint publication of the German Verein für Reformationsgeschichte ...

'' and a contributor to the ''Encyclopédie de l'Alsace'' and the ', Rapp was elected in 1993 as a member of the

in the seat of

Emmanuel Laroche Emmanuel Laroche (11 July 1914 – 16 June 1991) was a French linguist and Hittitologist. An expert in the languages of ancient Anatolia (Indo-European and Hurrian), he was professor of Anatolian studies at the Collège de France (1973–1985 ...

. Rapp died on 29 March 2020 in

Angers Angers (, , ) is a city in western France, about southwest of Paris. It is the prefecture of the Maine-et-Loire department and was the capital of the province of Anjou until the French Revolution. The inhabitants of both the city and the prov ...

at the age of 93, following an infection from

COVID-19 Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is a contagious disease caused by a virus, the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2). The first known case was COVID-19 pandemic in Hubei, identified in Wuhan, China, in December ...

Honours

* Chevalier of the

Légion d'honneur The National Order of the Legion of Honour (french: Ordre national de la Légion d'honneur), formerly the Royal Order of the Legion of Honour ('), is the highest French order of merit, both military and civil. Established in 1802 by Napoleon ...

* Commandeur de l'Ordre national du Mérite (He was promoted to the rank of Officer on 24 June 2005, and then received the rank of Commandeur by decree dated 13 May 2016.) * Commandeur de l'ordre des Palmes académiques

Awards

Prix Guizot The Prix Guizot is an annual prize of the Académie française, which has been awarded in the field of history since 1994 by Fondations Guizot, Chodron de Courcel, Yvan Loiseau and Eugène Piccard. It is awarded to the author of a work of general ...

(2001). * of the

Académie française An academy (Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of secondary education, secondary or tertiary education, tertiary higher education, higher learning (and generally also research or honorary membershi ...

(1983).

Publications

Rapp's publications are listed in the database, including; * ''Inventaire des sources manuscrites de l’histoire d’Alsace conservées dans les bibliothèques publiques de France'', Paris, Fédération des sociétés d’histoire et d’archéologie d'Alsace, 1956. * ''Le château-fort dans la vie médiévale : le château-fort et la politique territoriale'', Strasbourg, Centre d'Archéologie médiévale, 1968. * ''L’Église et la vie religieuse en Occident à la fin du Moyen Âge'', Paris,

PUF PUF may refer to: * Physical unclonable function, in computer security, a physically-implemented secure identifier * The University Presses of France *Permanent University Fund, for Texas public universities * Pau Pyrénées Airport in France (I ...

, coll. "Nouvelle Clio", 1971, . * ''Réformes et réformation à Strasbourg. Église et société dans le diocèse de Strasbourg (1450–1525)'', Paris, Ophrys, 1974. * ''Grandes figures de l’humanisme alsacien. Courants, milieux, destins'', Strasbourg, Istra, 1978. * ''Histoire de Strasbourg des origines à nos jours'' nder his dir. 9 vols, Strasbourg, Dernières nouvelles de Strasbourg, 1981. * ''Les origines médiévales de l’Allemagne moderne. De Charles IV à Charles Quint (1346–1519)'', Paris, , 1989, . * ''Histoire des diocèses de France :'' ''Le Diocèse de Strasbourg'', Paris, , 1997. * ''Koenigsbruck : l’histoire d’une abbaye cistercienne'' (with ), Strasbourg, Société d’histoire et d’archéologie du Ried Nord, 1998. * ''Le Saint-Empire romain germanique, d’Otton le Grand à Charles Quint'', Paris,

Éditions du Seuil Éditions du Seuil (), also known as ''Le Seuil'', is a French publishing house established in 1935 by Catholic intellectual Jean Plaquevent (1901–1965), and currently owned by La Martinière Groupe. It owes its name to this goal "The ''seuil'' ...

, 2003. * ''Christentum und Kirche im 4. und 5. Jahrhundert'', Heidelberg, Universitätsverlag Winter, 2003, * ''Christentum IV : Zwischen Mittelalter und Neuzeit (1378–1552)'', Stuttgart, Kohlhammer, 2006, * ''Maximilien d'Autriche'', Paris, , 2007. * ''Protestants et protestantisme en Alsace de 1517 à nos jours'' nder his dir. Strasbourg, Fédération des sociétés d’histoire et d’archéologie d'Alsace, 2007. * ''Strasbourg'' nder his dir. Paris, La Nuée Bleue, 2010.

References

External links

Rapp, Francis
on Persée
"Francis Rapp, vivre dans Strasbourg annexée"
''France 3''. {{DEFAULTSORT:Rapp, Francis Musicians from Strasbourg 1926 births 2020 deaths 20th-century French historians 21st-century French historians French medievalists Academic staff of the University of Neuchâtel Members of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres Chevaliers of the Légion d'honneur Commanders of the Ordre national du Mérite Commandeurs of the Ordre des Palmes Académiques Alsatian people Deaths from the COVID-19 pandemic in France 20th-century French male writers 21st-century French male writers French male non-fiction writers Academic staff of the University of Strasbourg Historians of Germany Scouting and Guiding in France