Alfred Rambaud

Alfred Nicolas Rambaud (2 July 1842 – 10 November 1905) was a French historian.

Alfred Nicolas Rambaud was born in Besançon. After studying at the École Normale Supérieure, he completed his studies in Germany. He was one of that band of young scholars, among whom were also Ernest Lavisse, Gabriel Monod and Gaston Paris, whose enthusiasm was aroused by the principles and organization of scientific study as applied beyond the Rhine, and who were ready to devote themselves to their cherished plan of remodelling higher education in France. He was appointed répétiteur at the École des Hautes Études on its foundation in 1868.

His researches were at that time directed towards the Byzantine period of the Middle Ages, and to this period were devoted the two theses which he composed for his doctorate in letters, De byzantino hippodromo et circensibus factionibus (revised in French for the Revue des deux mondes, under the title of Le monde byzantin; le sport et l'hippodrome, 1871), and L'Empire grec au Xe siècle, Constantin Porphyrognete (1870).

This latter work is still accepted as a good authority, and caused Rambaud to be hailed as a master on the Byzantine period; but with the exception of one article on Digenis Acritas, in the Revue des deux mondes (1875), and one other on Michael Psellus, in the Revue Historique (vol. iii., 1876), Rambaud's researches were diverted towards other parts of the East: The Franco-Prussian War inspired him with the idea for some courses of lectures which developed into books: La domination française en Allemagne; les Français sur le Rhin, 1792–1804 (1873) and L'Allemagne sous Napoleon I. 1804–1811 (1874). He watched attentively the role played by Russia, and soon observed how much to the interest of France, a good entente with this power would be.

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