Michel Fourmont
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Michel Fourmont (1690–1746) was a French
antiquarian An antiquarian or antiquary () is an fan (person), aficionado or student of antiquities or things of the past. More specifically, the term is used for those who study history with particular attention to ancient artifact (archaeology), artifac ...
and classical scholar, Catholic priest and traveller. A member of the
Académie des Inscriptions An academy (Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of secondary or tertiary higher learning (and generally also research or honorary membership). The name traces back to Plato's school of philosophy, ...
, he was one of the scholars sent by
Louis XV Louis XV (15 February 1710 – 10 May 1774), known as Louis the Beloved (french: le Bien-Aimé), was King of France from 1 September 1715 until his death in 1774. He succeeded his great-grandfather Louis XIV at the age of five. Until he reache ...
to the eastern Mediterranean to collect inscriptions and manuscripts. He is now best remembered for the destruction of antiquities in Ancient Sparta and for having presented as genuine some forged inscriptions.


Life

His father was Étienne Fourmont of
Herblay Herblay-sur-Seine (, literally ''Herblay on Seine''; before 2018: ''Herblay'') is a commune in the department of Val-d'Oise, France. It is located from the center of Paris, in its northwest suburbs. It is twinned with Yeovil, UK. Geography Cli ...
in the Paris region, a surgeon and official;
Étienne Fourmont Étienne Fourmont (23 June 1683 – 8 December 1745) was a French scholar and Orientalist who served as professor of Arabic at the Collège de France and published grammars on the Arabic, Hebrew, and Chinese languages. Although Fourmont is r ...
(1683–1745) was his brother. He became a Catholic priest, and an orientalist pupil of his brother in Paris Fourmont became a private tutor, and was given the Chair of
Syriac Syriac may refer to: *Syriac language, an ancient dialect of Middle Aramaic *Sureth, one of the modern dialects of Syriac spoken in the Nineveh Plains region * Syriac alphabet ** Syriac (Unicode block) ** Syriac Supplement * Neo-Aramaic languages a ...
at the Collège royal in 1720. He was admitted as an associate of the Académie des inscriptions et belles-lettres in 1724. In 1728 Fourmont was sent by Louis XV to
Constantinople la, Constantinopolis ota, قسطنطينيه , alternate_name = Byzantion (earlier Greek name), Nova Roma ("New Rome"), Miklagard/Miklagarth (Old Norse), Tsargrad ( Slavic), Qustantiniya (Arabic), Basileuousa ("Queen of Cities"), Megalopolis (" ...
and
Greece Greece,, or , romanized: ', officially the Hellenic Republic, is a country in Southeast Europe. It is situated on the southern tip of the Balkans, and is located at the crossroads of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Greece shares land borders with ...
, leaving in 1729 with François Sevin. They were under instructions from
Jean-Paul Bignon The Abbé Jean-Paul Bignon, Cong.Orat. (19 September 1662, Paris – 14 March 1743, Île Belle) was a French ecclesiastic, statesman, writer and preacher and librarian to Louis XIV of France. His protégé, Joseph Pitton de Tournefort, named ...
, the king's librarian, to search out surviving Byzantine manuscripts, and the journey was supported by the
Comte de Maurepas ''Comte'' is the French, Catalan and Occitan form of the word 'count' (Latin: ''comes''); ''comté'' is the Gallo-Romance form of the word 'county' (Latin: ''comitatus''). Comte or Comté may refer to: * A count in French, from Latin ''comes'' * A ...
, for the greater glory of French scholarship. Fourmont traveled in Greece and the
Aegean Sea The Aegean Sea ; tr, Ege Denizi (Greek language, Greek: Αιγαίο Πέλαγος: "Egéo Pélagos", Turkish language, Turkish: "Ege Denizi" or "Adalar Denizi") is an elongated embayment of the Mediterranean Sea between Europe and Asia. It ...
for over a year, but had little luck in finding early manuscripts of ancient authors sitting in monastic libraries. He would report to Maurepas in February 1730: Therefore, Fourmont made collecting ancient Greek inscriptions his primary focus. Fourmont would report to Count Maurepas that he copied 1,500 ancient inscriptions (300 in Sparta). His technique was brutally direct. Workmen were hired to dismantle any structure that might contain ancient stones with letters on them. Fourmont reported paying 1,200 man-days of labour to dismantle monuments in search of ancient marbles. In a letter to Bignon dated 20 April 1730, Fourmont wrote: In the same letter he wrote: Fourmont was called back to France before he could visit ancient Olympia as planned. Back in France, Fourmont published only a short report. He was elected a member of the
Royal Society The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...
on 4 November 1742.


Legacy

Later travelers to Greece were horrified at Fourmont's descriptions of the ancient monuments he destroyed. Fourmont is alleged to have written in one of his letters that he had destroyed certain inscriptions after transcribing them. The British traveler
Edward Dodwell Edward Dodwell (30 November 176713 May 1832) was an Irish painter, traveller and a writer on archaeology. Biography Dodwell was born in Ireland and belonged to the same family as Henry Dodwell, the theologian. He was educated at Trinity Colleg ...
reported that when he visited Sparta (in 1806) he was shown marbles that Fourmont had mutilated so as to make their inscriptions illegible. That some of Fourmont's most important inscriptions from Amyclae could not be relocated helped fuel scholarly suspicions that he had either forged or seriously misrepresented the inscriptions he reported. In 1791
Richard Payne Knight Richard Payne Knight (11 February 1751 – 23 April 1824) of Downton Castle in Herefordshire, and of 5 Soho Square,History of Parliament biography London, England, was a classical scholar, connoisseur, archaeologist and numismatist best k ...
published ''An Analytical Essay on the Greek Alphabet'', in which he argued that Fourmont had forged some inscriptions in his collection. A controversy began. Fourmont's collection of inscriptions was transcribed in 1815 by
Immanuel Bekker August Immanuel Bekker (21 May 17857 June 1871) was a German philologist and critic. Biography Born in Berlin, Bekker completed his classical education at the University of Halle under Friedrich August Wolf, who considered him as his most promi ...
. The collection of 26 texts from
Amyclae Amyclae or Amyklai ( grc, Ἀμύκλαι) was a city of ancient Laconia, situated on the right or western bank of the Eurotas, 20 stadia south of Sparta, in a district remarkable for the abundance of its trees and its fertility. Amyclae was one o ...
, about which doubts had been raised, were identified as forgeries by
August Böckh August Böckh or Boeckh (; 24 November 1785 – 3 August 1867) was a German classical scholar and antiquarian. Life He was born in Karlsruhe, and educated at the local gymnasium; in 1803 he left for the University of Halle, where he studied th ...
. Where inscriptions could be relocated, Fourmont's transcriptions of the Greek text frequently proved inaccurate: "Corrupt, like most of the Fourmontiana", in Böckh's verdict. All Fourmont's published work was thus invalidated; but there remained a substantially larger collection of unpublished material. Dodwell's verdict is harsh but probably accurate: "Great ambition, and a little learning, with an unfeeling indifference for the monuments of antiquity, incited him to destroy some of the most venerable and interesting records of ancient history."


Notes

{{DEFAULTSORT:Fourmont, Michel 1690 births 1746 deaths 18th-century French Roman Catholic priests French classical scholars Fellows of the Royal Society