Ludovic Vitet

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Ludovic Vitet

Ludovic Vitet (born October 18, 1802 in Paris , † June 5, 1873 in Versailles ) was a French politician and writer who was particularly committed to the preservation of monuments ( Monuments historiques ).

Family and education

Vitet came from a wealthy bourgeois family . He was the grandson of the convent member Louis Vitet (1736-1809) and son of Pierre-Jean Vitet and Amélie Arnaudtizon. Ludovic Vitet studied law at the École normal supérieure in Paris from 1819 to 1824 .

Working life

Vitet became a member of the editorial board of the newspaper Le Globe and also worked for the Revue française and the Revue des Deux Mondes .

Between 1827 and 1829 he wrote several plays ( Les Barricades , Les États de Blois , La mort de Henri III ) that made him famous. They were published in one volume in 1844 under the title La Ligue .

As one of the leading representatives of liberalism , Vitet was friends with Madame de Staël , Alessandro Manzoni and Sismondi . Together with friends he founded the association Aide-toi, le ciel t'aidera (“ Help yourself, God helps you ”) to support the Liberals in the 1827 election.

It was not until the July Revolution of 1830 that new perspectives opened up for him. He became prefect in 1830 under the Interior Minister François Guizot , who created the position of Inspecteur général des monuments historiques for him in the same year . After inspection trips, initially in northern France, Vitet delivered a report in 1831, which dealt with the condition of the buildings but also with the museums, libraries and archives. Further inspection trips took him to Burgundy , Lyonnais and southwest France, where he saved the cloister of Moissac . His successor in this office was Prosper Mérimée in 1834 .

On April 10, 1834, Vitet was appointed Secrétaire général of the Ministry of Economic Affairs. Until 1848 he was chairman of the Commission des monuments historiques , which he founded and which awarded funds for the restoration of monuments. In 1839 Vitet became a member of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres and in 1845 he was elected to the Académie française . Ludovic Vitet became a member of the Assembly of Deputies in 1834 and, at the same time, General Secretary of the Ministry of Finance and Conseiller d'État in 1836.

After the February Revolution of 1848 , Vitet was elected to the Assemblée législative in 1849 and became one of its vice-presidents. He belonged to the monarchist majority of the chamber, but was more against the policies of Napoleon III. Vitet was one of the members of parliament against the coup d'état of Napoleon III in 1851. protested. As a result, he was arrested and spent several days in prison.

Under the Second Empire , he withdrew from political life and devoted himself to literature and art. During the siege of Paris in 1870, he supported the republican movement and published articles in the Revue des Deux Mondes .

On February 8, 1871, he was elected to the Assemblée nationale , where he became one of its vice-presidents. Under Adolphe Thiers he was a member of the commission that negotiated peace with the German Reich .

Ludovic Vitet was President of the Commission des monuments historiques in the Third Republic , where he was involved in the revision of the list of monuments historiques .

Publications (selection)

  • Les Barricades. Scènes historiques. May 1588. Brière, Paris 1826.
  • Les États de Blois, ou la mort de MM. De Guise. Scènes historiques, Décembre 1588. Ponthieu, Paris 1827.
  • La mort de Henri III août 1589. Scenes historiques, faisant suite aux barricades et aux états de Blois. Fournier, Paris 1829.
  • Report au ministre de l'Intérieur sur les monuments, les bibliothèques, les archives et les musées des départements de l'Oise, de l'Aisne. Imprimerie Royale, Paris 1831.
  • Histoire des anciennes villes de France. Recherches sur leurs origines, sur leurs monuments, sur le rôle qu'elles ont joué dans les annales de nos provinces. 1re Série: Upper Normandy. Dieppe. 2 volumes. A. Mesnier, Paris 1833.
  • Eustache Lesueur. Hauman, Brussels 1841.
  • La Ligue, Scenes Historiques. 2 volumes. Gosselin, Paris 1844.
  • Monograph de l'église de Notre-Dame de Noyon (= Collection de Documents inédits sur l'histoire de France. Séries 3: Archeology. Vol. 31, ZDB -ID 1003691-x ). 2 volumes (Textbd .; Atlasbd.). Imprimerie Royale, Paris 1845.
  • Fragments and Mélanges. 2 volumes. Comptoir des imprimeurs unis, Paris 1845–1846;
    • Volume 1: Beaux arts, critique littéraire et artistique.
    • Volume 2: Archeologie du Moyen-âge.
  • Histoire financière du gouvernement de Juillet. Bureau de la Revue des deux mondes, Paris 1848.
  • Les États d'Orléans, Scènes Historiques. Levy, Paris 1849.
  • Le Louvre. Bureau de la Revue Contemporaine, Paris 1852 (Nouvelle édition avec un plan du Louvre. Le Louvre et le nouveau Louvre. Calmann Lévy, Paris 1882).
  • Etudes sur l'histoire de l'art. Series 1-4. Levy, Paris 1864.
    • Series 1: Antiquité. Gréce, Rome, Bas-Empire.
    • Series 2: Moyen Age.
    • Series 3–4: Temps medieves.
  • Le comte Duchâtel . Clichy, Paris 1875.
Vitet drawn by H. Lehmann, 1864

literature

  • Maurice Parturier (Ed.): Lettres de Mérimée à Ludovic Vitet (= La Palatine. Vol. 40, ZDB -ID 1216542-6 ). Plon, Paris 1934 (reprint. (= Format. Vol. 30). Editions du Comité des Travaux Historiques et Scientifiques, Paris 1998, ISBN 2-7355-0389-5 ).

Web links

Commons : Ludovic Vitet  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Bonnie Effros: Uncovering the Germanic Past. Merovingian archeology in France 1830-1914 . Oxford University Press. Oxford 2012, p. 37.
personal data
SURNAME Vitet, Ludovic
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Vitet, Louis
BRIEF DESCRIPTION French politician and writer
DATE OF BIRTH October 18, 1802
PLACE OF BIRTH Paris
DATE OF DEATH June 5, 1873
Place of death Versailles