Pierre Briant (born 30 September 1940 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 ...

) is a French

Iranologist Iranian studies ( fa, ايران‌شناسی '), also referred to as Iranology and Iranistics, is an interdisciplinary field dealing with the research and study of the civilization, history, literature, art and culture of Iranian peoples. It ...

, Professor of History and Civilisation of the Achaemenid World and the Empire of Alexander the Great at the

Collège de France The Collège de France (), formerly known as the ''Collège Royal'' or as the ''Collège impérial'' founded in 1530 by François I, is a higher education and research establishment ('' grand établissement'') in France. It is located in Paris n ...

(1999 onwards),

Doctor Honoris Causa An honorary degree is an academic degree for which a university (or other degree-awarding institution) has waived all of the usual requirements. It is also known by the Latin phrases ''honoris causa'' ("for the sake of the honour") or ''ad hon ...

at the

University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chicago is consistently ranked among the b ...

, and founder of the website achemenet.com. He studied History at the

University of Poitiers The University of Poitiers (UP; french: Université de Poitiers) is a public university located in Poitiers, France. It is a member of the Coimbra Group. It is multidisciplinary and contributes to making Poitiers the city with the highest studen ...

(1960–1965), and reached his ''doctorat d'État'' in 1972. His works deal mainly with the

Achaemenid Empire The Achaemenid Empire or Achaemenian Empire (; peo, 𐎧𐏁𐏂, , ), also called the First Persian Empire, was an ancient Iranian empire founded by Cyrus the Great in 550 BC. Based in Western Asia, it was contemporarily the largest em ...

, and related matters as

Alexander the Great Alexander III of Macedon ( grc, wikt:Ἀλέξανδρος, Ἀλέξανδρος, Alexandros; 20/21 July 356 BC – 10/11 June 323 BC), commonly known as Alexander the Great, was a king of the Ancient Greece, ancient Greek kingdom of Maced ...

or the

Hellenistic Era In Classical antiquity, the Hellenistic period covers the time in Mediterranean history after Classical Greece, between the death of Alexander the Great in 323 BC and the emergence of the Roman Empire, as signified by the Battle of Actium in 3 ...

. In the words of

Matthew Stolper Matthew Wolfgang Stolper is Professor of Assyriology and the John A. Wilson Professor of Oriental Studies in the Oriental Institute at the University of Chicago. He received a B.A. from Harvard in 1965, an M.A. from the University of Michigan in ...

, Briant "has shown a generation of scholars once isolated from each other that they are members of a common intellectual project of great consequence."

Works

*''Antigone le Borgne (Les Débuts de sa Carrière et les Problèmes de l'Assemblée Macédonienne)'' (1973) - doctoral thesis. *''Alexandre le Grand'' (1974, 2005) *''Rois, Tributs et Paysans, Études sur les Formations Tributaires du Moyen-Orient Ancien'' (1982) *''Etat et Pasteurs au Moyen-Orient Ancien' in Production Pastorale et Société'' (1982) *''L'Asie Centrale et les Royaumes Proche-orientaux du Premier Millénaire (c. VIIIe-IVe s. av. n. è.)'' (1984) *"Pouvoir central et polycentrisme culturel dans l'Empire achéménide (Quelques réflexions et suggestions)", in ''Achaemenid History I: Sources,structures and synthesis'' (ed.

Heleen Sancisi-Weerdenburg Heleen W.A.M. Sancisi-Weerdenburg (23 May 1944, in Haarlem – 28 May 2000, in Utrecht), was a Dutch ancient historian, specializing in classical Greek and Achaemenid history. Sancisi-Weerdenburg began her studies in ancient history at the Univer ...

), (1987) *"Institutions perses et histoire comparatiste dans l'historiographie grecque", in ''Achaemenid History II: The Greek sources'' (eds. H. Sancisi-Weerdenbur & Amélie Kuhrt) (1987) *''De la Grèce à l'Orient : Alexandre le Grand'', collection «

Découvertes Gallimard (, ; in United Kingdom: ''New Horizons'', in United States: ''Abrams Discoveries'') is an editorial collection of illustrated monographic books published by the Éditions Gallimard in pocket format. The books are concise introductions to pa ...

» (nº 27), série Histoire. Paris: Gallimard (1987; new edition in 2005, under the title ) **''Alexander the Great: The Heroic Ideal'', '

New Horizons ''New Horizons'' is an Interplanetary spaceflight, interplanetary space probe that was launched as a part of NASA's New Frontiers program. Engineered by the Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) and the Southwest Research ...

' series, London: Thames & Hudson (1996) **''Alexander the Great: Man of Action, Man of Spirit'', "

Abrams Discoveries Abrams may refer to: * Abrams (surname), a list of notable people with the surname * '' Abrams v. United States'', 250 U.S. 616 (1919), U.S. Supreme Court decision regarding free speech during times of war * M1 Abrams, main battle tank * Abrams, Wi ...

" series, New York: Harry N. Abrams (1996) *"Ethno-classe dominante et populations soumises dans l'Empire achéménide: le cas de l'Égypte", in ''Achaemenid History III: Method and Theory'' (eds. A. Kuhrt & H. Sancisi-Weerdenburg) (1988) *''Darius : Les Perses et l'Empire'', collection « Découvertes Gallimard » (nº 159), série Histoire. Paris: Gallimard (1992) *''Dans les Pas des Dix-Mille'' (ed) (1995) *''Histoire de l'Empire Perse. De Cyrus à Alexandre'' (1996) - in English, ''From Cyrus to Alexander: A History of the Persian Empire'' (2002). *''Darius dans l'Ombre d'Alexandre'' (2003)

References

Briant's page at the Collège de France

External links

AchemenetAchaemenid museum
*P. Briant
Class system in Median and Achaemenid periods
in

Encyclopaedia Iranica An encyclopedia (American English) or encyclopædia (British English) is a reference work or compendium providing summaries of knowledge either general or special to a particular field or discipline. Encyclopedias are divided into articles ...

. {{DEFAULTSORT:Briant, Pierre People from Angers 1940 births Collège de France faculty Living people 20th-century French historians 21st-century French historians Corresponding members of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres French Iranologists Chevaliers of the Légion d'honneur French male non-fiction writers Corresponding Fellows of the British Academy

Works

See also

References

External links