Désiré Raoul-Rochette

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Désiré Raoul-Rochette, drawn by Jean-Auguste-Dominique Ingres around 1830

Désiré Raoul Rochette (called Raoul-Rochette , born March 9, 1789 in Saint-Amand , Cher department , † July 5, 1854 in Paris ) was a French classical archaeologist . As an archaeologist and specialist in ceramics, epigraphy and numismatics, he was the leading scholar of antiquity in the France of his epoch.

life and work

Raoul-Rochette, son of a doctor, graduated from high school in Bourges and studied at the École Normale Supérieure in Paris with brilliant success .

Geneve, lac, 1816

In 1813 he became professor of history at the Lycée Louis-le-Grand in Paris. The following year he received first prize for his Histoire critique del'établissement des colonies grecques in a competition organized by the Classe d'histoire et de littérature ancienne (the forerunner of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres). This success brought him at the age of 26 through a royal decree of March 21, 1816 membership in the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres . Married to a daughter of the sculptor Jean-Antoine Houdon , he attended the salons in Paris and received his French and foreign colleagues himself. As editor of the Journal des savants from 1817 until his death, he was responsible for the classical studies. He therefore enjoyed an international reputation, which favored his exchange with the important scholars of Europe.

From 1818 to 1848 he was the successor to Aubin-Louis Millin (1759-1818) curator of the Cabinet des Médailles of the Parisian Bibliothèque royale . His courses in archeology, founded by his predecessor, which he held in the Bibliothèque royale since 1828, were unique in France, but also enjoyed great prestige in Germany, England and Italy.

The friendly relations with Karl Benedikt Hase (1780–1864) made it easier for him to contact some of the most important German classical scholars. He had extensive correspondence with them, as well as with his English and Italian colleagues: It provides impressive evidence of the powerful vitality that filled the international scientific community at the time. He endeavored to establish classical and oriental archeology as an autonomous discipline, just like his German colleagues Eduard Gerhard (1795–1867), Karl Otfried Müller (1797–1840) and Ludwig Ross (1806–1859). His correspondence with these scholars is of great importance for the history of classical studies and the international exchange of this epoch.

He wrote his scientific works with a view to an 'art history of antiquity' , which should begin with Egypt and the ancient Orient and then include Greece and Italy. As Ludwig Ross was convinced that Greek culture was influenced by the Orient, he began pioneering research in order to finally conceive a 'comparative archeology' . In order to get to know the material reality of the ancient cultures, he made numerous trips to the Mediterranean area. So he traveled to Italy and Sicily in 1826/27, just at the time when the discoveries of painted graves in Etruria were piling up ( Tarquinia- Corneto). When the necropolis of Vulci with its countless painted vases was discovered on the property of Lucien Bonaparte , Prince of Canino , in 1828 , he was the first to draw the attention of the public and the scholarly world to this extraordinary find. Like his colleague and correspondent Eduard Gerhard, he advocated the Greek origin of the vases found in the graves. His Monuments inédits d'antiquité figurée grecque, étrusque et romaine (Paris 1828/29) are based on the results of this fundamental trip to Italy.

He has been a member since the establishment of the Istituto di corrispondenza archeologica in Rome in 1829 and took an active part in the work of this first international association for archeology. He was also a foreign member of the Academy of Sciences in Göttingen (1827) and the Bavarian Academy of Sciences (1830) as well as a corresponding member of the Berlin Academy (1832). He traveled again to Italy in 1832, 1843 and 1851. But he was also interested in Greece and, like his colleague Karl Benedikt Hase, was a member of the Académie commission in 1829, which drafted the program for the scientific expedition to Morea in 1829 . In 1838 he traveled to Greece on behalf of the Ministry of Education, accompanied by an architect, to the excavations that Ludwig Ross undertook on the Acropolis, but also to Delos and Assos . Two trips to Germany in 1843 and 1846 gave him personal acquaintance with some of his German correspondents. He was also involved in founding the École française d'Athènes . In 1838 he became Secrétaire perpétuel of the Académie des Beaux-Arts . After the revolution of 1830 he lost royal support and became hostile to Jean Antoine Letronne (1787–1848), with whom he got into a bitter argument about “painting among the Greeks” .

Through his course in archeology and through his entire work, Désiré Raoul-Rochette has made a decisive contribution to the development of scientific archeology, to which his extensive international correspondence played a major role.

Bibliography (selection)

Lettres sur la Suisse , 1829

A complete bibliography in Ève Gran-Aymerich, Jürgen von Ungern-Sternberg: L'Antiquité partagée. Correspondances franco-allemandes 1823–1861. Karl Benedikt Hase, Désiré Raoul-Rochette, Karl Otfried Müller, Otto Jahn, Theodor Mommsen (= Mémoires de l'Académie des inscriptions et belles-lettres. 47). Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, Paris 2012, ISBN 978-2-87754-272-2 , pp. 385-396.

  • Histoire critique de l'établissement des colonies grecques. 4 volumes. Treuttel et Würtz et al., Paris et al. 1815, (digital copies: Volume 1 , Volume 2 , Volume 3 , Volume 4 ).
  • Antiquités grecques du Bosphore-Cimmérien. Firmin Didot, Paris 1822, ( digitized version ).
  • Considérations sur le caractère des arts de l'antique Égypte. Trouvé, Paris 1823, ( digitized ).
  • Monuments inédits d'antiquité figurée, grecque, étrusque et romaine. Recueillis pendant un voyage en Italie et en Sicile, dans les années 1826 et 1827. 2 volumes. Self-published ao, Paris 1828.
  • Notice on quelques médailles grecques inédites, appartenant à des rois inconnus de la Bactriane et de l'Inde. In: Journal des Savants. 1834, pp. 328-344 , pp. 385-394 .
  • Peintures Antiques Inédites Précédées de Recherches sur l'Emploi de la Peinture dans la Décoration des Édifices Sacrés et Publics, chez les Grecs et chez les Romains; Faisant Suite aux Monuments Inédits. Imprimerie Royale, Paris 1836, ( digitized ).
  • Lettres archéologiques sur la peinture des Grecs. Part 1. Brockhaus et Avenarius, Paris et al. 1840, ( digitized ).
  • Choix de peintures de Pompéi. La Plupart de Sujet Historique Lithographiées en Couleur par M. Roux et Publiées avec l'Explication Archéologique de Chaque Peinture et une Introduction sur l'Histoire de la Peinture chez les Grecs et chez les Romains. Delivery 1–7. Imprimérie Royale et al., Paris et al. 1844–1853, ( digitized ).
  • Mémoires d'archéologie comparée, asiatique, grecque et étrusque. Imprimérie Royale, Paris 1846–1848, (digital copies: Mémoire 1 , Mémoire 2 ).
  • Sur la topographie d'Athènes. In: Journal des Savants. 1851, pp. 257-272 , pp. 353-371 , pp. 424-440 , pp. 549-562 , pp. 609-625 , pp. 735-751 .

literature

Web links

Remarks

  1. ↑ No more published. Michael O. Krieg: Not more than that. Volume 2: M - Z. Supplements (= Bibliotheca Bibliographica. 2, 2). Krieg, Bad Bocklet et al. 1954, p. 172.
  2. ↑ A planned 8th delivery did not appear. This should contain the “Introduction sur l'histoire [...]”, the main title page, the “préface” and the “table des matières”.
personal data
SURNAME Raoul-Rochette, Désiré
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Raoul-Rochette (short form)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION French classical archaeologist
DATE OF BIRTH March 9, 1789
PLACE OF BIRTH Saint-Amand , Cher department
DATE OF DEATH July 5, 1854
Place of death Paris