Étienne Marc Quatremère (12 July 1782, Paris18 September 1857, Paris) was a French Orientalist.

Biography

Born into a

Jansenist Jansenism was a 17th- and 18th-century theological movement within Roman Catholicism, primarily active in France, which arose as an attempt to reconcile the theological concepts of free will and divine grace in response to certain development ...

family, Étienne and his mother, who knew

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

, had to go into hiding in the countryside when his father, a clothing merchant made a member of the

French nobility The French nobility () was an Aristocracy, aristocratic social class in France from the France in the Middle Ages, Middle Ages until its abolition on 23 June 1790 during the French Revolution. From 1808 to 1815 during the First French Empire, ...

by king

Louis XV of France Louis XV (15 February 1710 – 10 May 1774), known as Louis the Beloved (), 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 reached maturity (then defi ...

with the mention by the king to continue in his trading and shop keeping however, was executed in 1793 during the French Revolution.Irwin, 148 Later he studied

Arabic Arabic (, , or , ) is a Central Semitic languages, Central Semitic language of the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family spoken primarily in the Arab world. The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) assigns lang ...

under Silvestre de Sacy, (1758–1838), a member of the French nobility since 1813 and the son of a public notary with

Jewish Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...

roots, becoming later a rector at the

University of Paris The University of Paris (), known Metonymy, metonymically as the Sorbonne (), was the leading university in Paris, France, from 1150 to 1970, except for 1793–1806 during the French Revolution. Emerging around 1150 as a corporation associated wit ...

, in the School of Living Oriental Languages. Employed in 1807 in the manuscript department of the imperial library, he passed to the chair of

Greek Greek may refer to: Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor of all kno ...

in the university of

Rouen Rouen (, ; or ) is a city on the River Seine, in northwestern France. It is in the prefecture of Regions of France, region of Normandy (administrative region), Normandy and the Departments of France, department of Seine-Maritime. Formerly one ...

in 1809, entered the Academy of Inscriptions in 1815, taught

Hebrew Hebrew (; ''ʿÎbrit'') is a Northwest Semitic languages, Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family. A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages, it was natively spoken by the Israelites and ...

and

Aramaic Aramaic (; ) is a Northwest Semitic language that originated in the ancient region of Syria and quickly spread to Mesopotamia, the southern Levant, Sinai, southeastern Anatolia, and Eastern Arabia, where it has been continually written a ...

in the

Collège de France The (), formerly known as the or as the ''Collège impérial'' founded in 1530 by François I, is a higher education and research establishment () in France. It is located in Paris near La Sorbonne. The has been considered to be France's most ...

from 1819, and finally in 1838 became professor of Persian in the School of Living Oriental Languages, on the death of Silvestre de Sacy. Quatremère's first work was ''Recherches ... sur la langue et la littérature de l'Egypte'' (1808), showing that the language of ancient

Egypt Egypt ( , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country spanning the Northeast Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to northe ...

must be sought in Coptic. His ''Mémoires géographiques et historiques sur l'Égypte… sur quelques contrées voisines'' was published in 1811. This publication forced Jean-François Champollion, the famous decoder of the

Rosetta Stone The Rosetta Stone is a stele of granodiorite inscribed with three versions of a Rosetta Stone decree, decree issued in 196 BC during the Ptolemaic dynasty of ancient Egypt, Egypt, on behalf of King Ptolemy V Epiphanes. The top and middle texts ...

, to publish, prematurely, an "Introduction" to his ''L'Égypte sous les pharaons''. Since both works concern the Coptic names of Egyptian towns, and Champollion's was published later, Champollion was accused by some of plagiarism. In fact "neither he nor Quatremère had copied from one another, and very obvious differences of approach were apparent in their publications". Quatremère edited and translated part of

Al-Maqrizi Al-Maqrīzī (, full name Taqī al-Dīn Abū al-'Abbās Aḥmad ibn 'Alī ibn 'Abd al-Qādir ibn Muḥammad al-Maqrīzī, ; 1364–1442) was a medieval Egyptian historian and biographer during the Mamluk era, known for his interest in the Fat ...

's, (1364–1442), ''Arabic History of the Memaluke Sultans'' (2 vols., 1837–41), "not because he had all that much interest in the history of

Mamluk Mamluk or Mamaluk (; (singular), , ''mamālīk'' (plural); translated as "one who is owned", meaning "slave") were non-Arab, ethnically diverse (mostly Turkic, Caucasian, Eastern and Southeastern European) enslaved mercenaries, slave-so ...

Egypt, but rather because he was fascinated by the vocabulary of fifteenth-century Arabic and particularly in those lexicographic nuggets that had not been defined in the standard of Arabic dictionaries". He published among other works ''Mémoires sur les Nabatéens'' (1835); a translation of

Rashid-al-Din Hamadani Rashīd al-Dīn Ṭabīb (;‎ 1247–1318; also known as Rashīd al-Dīn Faḍlullāh Hamadānī, ) was a statesman, historian, and physician in Ilkhanate Iran.Ibn Khaldun Ibn Khaldun (27 May 1332 – 17 March 1406, 732–808 Hijri year, AH) was an Arabs, Arab Islamic scholar, historian, philosopher and sociologist. He is widely acknowledged to be one of the greatest social scientists of the Middle Ages, and cons ...

's (1332–1406) ''Prolegomena''; and a vast number of useful memoirs in the ''Journal asiatique''. His numerous reviews in the '' Journal des savants'' are also worth mention. Quatremère made great lexicographic collections in Oriental languages, fragments of which appear in the notes to his various works. His manuscript material for Syriac was utilized in

Robert Payne Smith Robert Payne Smith (7 November 1818 – 31 March 1895) was Regius Professor of Divinity at the University of Oxford and Canon of Christ Church from 1865 until 1870, when he was appointed Dean of Canterbury by Queen Victoria on the advice of W ...

's ''Thesaurus''; of the slips he collected for a projected

, Persian and Turkish lexicon some account is given in the preface to Dozy, ''Supplément aux dictionnaires arabes''. They were acquired by the Munich Court Library in 1858 and are now being held by its successor, the

Bavarian State Library The Bavarian State Library (, abbreviated BSB, called ''Bibliotheca Regia Monacensis'' before 1919) in Munich is the central " Landesbibliothek", i. e. the state library of the Free State of Bavaria, the biggest universal and research libra ...

. A biographical notice by Barthélemy Sainte-Hilaire is prefixed to Quatremère's ''Mélanges d'histoire et de philologie orientale'' (1861). Quatremère's grave is in the 32nd division of the Père Lachaise Cemetery of Paris.

Sources

* Lesley & Roy Adkins (2000). ''The Keys of Egypt''. London: HarperCollins. * Robert Graham Irwin (2006). ''For Lust of Knowing''. London: Allen Lane.

References

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Quatremere, Etienne Marc 1782 births 1857 deaths Scientists from Paris Burials at Père Lachaise Cemetery Academic staff of the Collège de France French orientalists French Arabists Members of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres Members of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences Members of the Bavarian Academy of Sciences Members of the Prussian Academy of Sciences