Hauréau

Jean-Barthélemy Hauréau (9 November 1812, Paris – 29 April 1896, ibid) was an 19th-century French historian, journalist and administrator.

Born in Paris, he was educated at the Louis-le-Grand and Bourbon colleges in his native city, and won high honours at his public examination. After graduating he became a journalist, and soon was a contributor to several democratic papers: La Tribune, Le National, Le Droit, and La Revue du Nord; at Le National, he was praised by Théophile Gautier as the "tribune" of romanticism. At the age of twenty he published a series of apologetic studies on the Montagnards — in later years, regretting his youthful enthusiasm, he attempted to destroy the studies. In 1838 he took the chief editorship of the Courrier de la Sarthe and was appointed librarian of the city of Le Mans, which position he retained until 1845, when he was dismissed on account of comments of his on the daring speech of the Mayor of le Mans to the Duke of Nemours. He returned to Paris and once more became one of the editors of Le National.

At this time he seemed destined for a political career, and after the revolution of February 24, 1848 was elected to the National Assembly; but close contact with revolutionary men and ideas cooled his old ardour. Throughout his life he opposed innovation, not only in politics and religion, but also in literature. After the coup d'état he resigned his position as director of the manuscript department of the Bibliothèque Nationale, to which he had been appointed in 1848, and refused to accept an administrative post until after the fall of the empire. Having acted as director of the national printing press from 1870 to 1881, he retired, but in 1893 accepted the post of director of the Fondation Thiers. He was also a member of the council of improvement of the École des Chartes.

For over half a century he wrote on the religious, philosophical, and more particularly the literary history of the Middle Ages. Appointed librarian of the town of Le Mans in 1838, he was first attracted by the history of Maine, and in 1843 published the first volume of his Histoire littéraire du Maine (4 vols., 1843–1852), which he subsequently recast on a new plan (10 vols., 1870–1877). In 1845 he brought out an edition of vol. ii of Gilles Ménage's Histoire de Sablé. He then undertook the continuation of the Gallia christiana, and produced vol. xiv (1856) for the province of Tours, vol. xv (1862) for the province of Besançon, and vol. xvi (1865–1870) for the province of Vienne. This work gained him admission to the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres (1862).

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