11 de abril

Biography

Jean-François the young person belonged to a family originating in Valbonnais in Dauphiné. Raise out of the commun run, it is able to speak the Latin at the nine years age, the Hebrew at thirteen years and the Arab at fourteen years. He studies with Figeac, then with Grenoble. As of the college, it impassions for the study of the Egyptian hiéroglyphes and thanks to his brother Champollion-Figeac, it succeeds in getting a copy of the inscriptions of the Pierre de Rosette, which with the characteristic to be written in two languages and three writings: in hiéroglyphes, Greek Démotique and . Understanding that the deciphering of this language forgotten since of the centuries passes by the study of the close languages, it assembles to Paris in 1806 to study, inter alia, the Copte and the Amharique. At that time, he writes with his brother: I deliver myself entirely to the copte. I want to know the Egyptian as my French because on this language my great work on the papyruses égyptiens. will be based

The deciphering of the hiéroglyphes is a long term job: begun before 1807, he discovers in 1808 the principle of bindings (regrouping) of the signs. He postulates then, on analogies with one of the dialects coptes, the absence of vowels in the Egyptian writing. In 1810, it puts forward the idea that the signs can be ideograms (expressing an idea) or sound records (expressing a sound). In 1812, it establishes a chronology of the writings, the cursive ones (Hiératique and demotic) being a version simplified and posterior with the hiéroglyphes.

In 1816, it is exiled in Figeac, because of its opinions Bonapartists and must stop its research. It develops to with it with his brother a system of primary school education based on the management. It returns to Grenoble in 1817 and Marie with Rosine Blanc.

Become professor-assistant of history at the university of Grenoble, it continues the study of the hiéroglyphes. In 1819 it is persuaded, after the observation of the papyri of the Livre of dead the that the hieratic one is a simplification of the hiéroglyphes. Starting from 1821, it deciphers the first royal cartouches of which that of Ptolémée {{V}} on the Pierre de Rosette, then that of Cléopâtre on the basis of obelisk and a bilingual papyrus. September 27th, 1822, he writes the Lettre with Mr. Dacier relating to the alphabet of the phonetic hiéroglyphes in which he announces his discovery of a system of deciphering of the hiéroglyphes: It is a complex system, an at the same time figurative writing all, symbolic system and phonetics, in the same text, the same sentence, I would say almost in same a mot.

It will take two more years for Champollion to publish its Précis hieroglyphic system of the former Egyptians and to open the doors of scientific Egyptology. Its discoveries however cause controversies and criticisms on behalf of its contemporaries, in particular of his former Master Silvestre of Sacy , for which the Hieroglyphica of Horapollon were the bible on the matter.

It is named in 1826, conservative charged with the Egyptian collections to the Musée of Louvre. He convinces the king Charles {{X}} to buy the collection of the British consul in Egypt, Mr. Salt, then made other major acquisitions of which most famous is that of the Obélisque of Louxor which is lying in 1831 and drawn up in Paris, Place of the Harmony in December 1833.

Of 1828 with 1830, it carries out finally its dream: it leaves for a scientific expedition in Egypt and collects many data and objects there. Of return to Paris, he is elected with the Académie of the inscriptions and the humanities after the fall of Charles thousand-year-old Ve front J. - C. and obtains the pulpit of Egyptian Antiquity to the Collège de France. He gives his inaugural lesson in to it 1831. However, exhausted by its work, he dies in Paris on March 4th, 1832 at the 42 years age and is buried with the Cimetière of the Father-Lachaise in Paris.

Its name was given, amongst other things, with a college of Grenoble and Dijon, with another with Figeac, Lattes like at the university of Albi.

Career

College with Grenoble in Isere
Study of the Eastern languages with Paris
Professor-assistant of history to the Preserving University of Grenoble
of the Egyptian museum of the Louvre
Pulpit of Egyptian Antiquity to the Collège de France

Champollion museums

a museum devoted to Jean-François Champollion was created in the native house of the father of Egyptology with Figeac in the Batch. It is inaugurated on December 19th, 1986 in the presence of the President of the French Republic François Mitterrand and Jean Leclant, perpetual secretary of the Académie of the inscriptions and the humanities. After two years of work and extension, the museum reopened in 2007. In addition to the life and the work of the discoverer, the museum recalls the history of the writing. A whole frontage is covered with pictograms, of ideograms originating in the whole world.

House Sharp Champollion with in the Isere, old property of the brother of the Egyptologist.

Publications

Random links: