Henri Estienne (French: [etjɛn]; 1528 or 1531 – 1598), also known as Henricus Stephanus, was a 16th-century French printer and classical scholar. He was the eldest son of Robert Estienne.
Estienne was born in Paris.
He displayed in his youth a genuine enthusiasm for Greek and Latin. His father took special pains with his education. As part of his general training, he undertook in his nineteenth year a protracted journey to Italy, England, and Flanders, where he busied himself in collecting and collating manuscripts for his father's press.
In 1554 he published at Paris his first independent work, the Anacreon. Then he went again to Italy, helping Aldus at Venice, discovering a copy of Diodorus Siculus at Rome, and returning to Geneva in 1555.
In 1557 he seems to have had a printing establishment of his own. In the spirit of modern times, he advertised himself as the "Parisian printer" (typographus parisiensis). The following year he assumed the title illustris viri Huldrici Fuggeri typographus from his patron, Ulrich Fugger.
In 1559 Estienne assumed charge of his father's presses. He then distinguished himself as the publisher, editor, and collator of manuscripts. Works of Athenagoras of Athens, Aristotle, and Aeschylus appeared in 1557; Diodorus Siculus, 1559; Xenophon, 1561; Sextus Empiricus, 1562; Thucydides, 1564; Herodotus, both 1566 and 1581; and Sophocles, in 1568. He improved old translations, or made new Latin translations, of many Greek authors.