Pierre Chaunu

Pierre René Chaunu ( born August 17, 1923 in Belleville -sur -Meuse, † October 22, 2009 in Caen ) was a French historian and professor at the University of Paris IV Pierre Chaunu was considered a specialist for Latin America and the social and religious history of France the 16th, 17th and 18th century. He was an important representative of the quantitative access to history in the tradition of the Annales school.

Life and work

He was born the son of a railway worker in the small town of Belleville in Lorraine, on the edge of the battlefield of Verdun, and the memory of the just past mass extinctions during the First World War counted according to their own statements to the formative impressions of his youth. His mother died young and he was raised by his maternal aunt. He studied during the German occupation in Paris at the Sorbonne history ( after he initially wavered between medicine and history), among others, Fernand Braudel and Ernest Labrousse. After graduating in 1947, he was two years history teacher at the Lycée in Bar- le- Duc. In 1948 on the initiative of Braudel and Lucien Febvre, the Annales school practique their home in the sixth section of the Ecole des hautes études found ( Chaunu assisted this Febvre ) received Chaunu the chance on the history of Latin America to apply their methods to the colonial period ( in 1949 published he a book about it in the Que sais -je - series ). 1948 to 1951 he conducted research to Madrid and Seville with his wife Huguette Chaunu ( Catella ). Then he returned and was during the evaluation of the materials for his dissertation Séville et l' Atlantique until 1956 teacher at the Lycée in Vanves. His dissertation was published in 12 volumes from 1955 to 1960 and 1960, he received his Doctorat d'Etat (corresponding to a habilitation ) in Braudel. 1956 to 1959 he was a member of the CNRS, 1960 Maitre de conferences in Caen and 1962 professor. In 1966, he founded the Centre de recherche d' histoire quantitative. In 1970 he became professor at the Sorbonne.

Politically, he was conservative and was the Gaullists close since his youth. He had from the beginning of the 1980s, a column in Le Figaro and had until 2005 a weekly broadcast on radio courtesy (Les Mardis de la mémoire ). He was originally Catholic, but converted to Protestantism in 1954 and was a lay preacher. He was active in the Société de l' Histoire du Français Protestantisme. In his book, The white plague and other works, he argues that Europe and France would experience a decline due to low birth rates. This reflected his findings from the early Spanish colonial history South America, which established his reputation. While he accepted initially, the downturn of trade with South America in the early 17th century would be caused by trade with China, he came to study in the Pacific trade to the conclusion that demographic factors were responsible ( in just half a century, the population of South America from 80 to dropped 10 million, largely due to diseases that einschleppten Europeans ). Then he turned increasingly to the study of the influence of demographic factors on civilizations.

His great work Seville et l' Atlantique ( his habilitation ) lit up the trade of Spain with its colonies in South America from the quantitative point of view the Annales school (of the 12 volumes were two of the statistical interpretation devoted to one of the Geography and eight contained tables with data).

Chaunu put the 1960 continues with the study of the Pacific trade of Spain. In addition to his books and research on early Spanish colonial history, he is best known for La Civilisation de l'Europe classique 1966, the first work of the Annales school that a overall historical synthesis tried and economic, geographic and demographic aspects, religious, cultural - history of Science and einbezog. He also wrote books about historical methodology (including Histoire, science sociale) and French history.

In Caen, he founded the Atlas historique de Normandie, the Annales de Normandie and the Cahiers of the Annales de Normandie.

He was a member of the Académie des sciences morales et politiques and the Institut de France since 1982. He was commander of the Legion of Honour.

Among his six children, the cartoonist Emmanuel Chaunu 's (* 1966).

Works

German editions:

• European Culture in the Age of the Baroque, Munich: Droemer / Knaur, 1968, Fischer Paperback, 1989 ( translator Alfred P. Zeller, original La Civilisation de l'Europe classique )
• The Prevented future, Stuttgart: Seewald, 1981
• The roots of freedom, Munich: Universitas, 1982
• Living with History, Frankfurt am Main: S. Fischer, 1989
• Man, Zurich: Thesis -Verl, 1996.

French Books:

• Eugène Sue et la seconde republique, 1948
• Histoire de l' Amérique Latine, Paris, PUF, "Que sais - je? ", 1949, new edition 2009.
• Séville et l' Atlantique (1504-1650), Paris, SEVPEN, 12 volumes, 1955-1960. ( Prix de Loubat, 1962)
• Les et le Pacifique the Philippines Ibériques, Paris, SEVPEN, 2 volumes, 1960-1966.
• L' Amérique et les Amériques à nos jours de la préhistoire, Paris, Armand Colin, 1964.
• La Civilisation de l'Europe classique, Paris, Arthaud, 1966.
• L'Expansion européenne du XIIIe et XVe siècles, Paris, PUF, 1969. ( English translation of European expansion in the later Middle Ages, Amsterdam, North Holland Publishing. )
• Conquête et exploitation of the nouveaux mondes, Paris, PUF, 1969.
• La Civilisation de l' Europe des Lumières, Paris, Arthaud, 1971.
• L' Espagne de Charles Quint, Paris, SEDES, 2 volumes, 1973.
• Démographie historique et système de civilization, Rome, EFR, 1974.
• Histoire, science sociale, Paris, SEDES, 1974.
• Le Temps des Reformes, Paris, Fayard, 1975.
• De l' histoire à la prospective, Paris, Robert Laffont, 1975.
• Les Amériques, XVIe et XVIIIe siècles, Paris, Armand Colin, 1976.
• With Georges Suffert: La peste blanche, Paris, Gallimard, 1976.
• Séville et l' Amérique et aux XVIe XVIIe siècles, Paris, Flammarion, 1977.
• La Mort à Paris, XVIe et XVIIe siècles, Paris, Fayard, 1978.
• Histoire quantitative, serial histoire, Paris, Armand Colin, 1978.
• Le sursis, Paris, Robert Laffont, 1978
• La France Ridee, Paris, Pluriel, 1979
• Un futur sans avenir, Histoire et population, Calmann - Lévy, 1979
• History and imagination. La transition, Paris, PUF, 1980.
• Église, culture et société. Réforme et Contre- Réforme (1517-1620), Paris, SEDES, 1980.
• Histoire et decadence, Paris, Perrin, 1981. ( Received the Grand Prix Gobert 1982)
• La France, Paris, Robert Laffont, 1982.
• Pour l' histoire, Paris, Perrin, 1984.
• L' Aventure de la Réforme. Le monde de Jean Calvin, Paris, Desclée de Brouwer, 1986 ( translated into English )
• Apology par l' histoire, Paris, Œil, 1988.
• Le Grand Déclassement, Paris, Robert Laffont, 1989.
• 3 millions d' années, 80 milliards de destins, Paris, Robert Laffont, 1990
• Reflets et miroir de l' histoire, Economica, Paris, 1990
• With Ernest Labrousse: Histoire économique et sociale de la France. Tome 1, 1450-1660, PUF, " Quadrige ", 1993.
• Colomb ou la logique de l' imprévisible, Paris, F. Bourin, 1993.
• Baptême de Clovis, baptême de la France (in collaboration), Paris, Balland, 1996.
• With others: Le basculement religieux de Paris au XVIIIe siècle, Paris, Fayard, 1998.
• Michèle Escamilla: Charles Quint, Paris, Fayard, 2000.
• Jacques Renard: La femme et Dieu, Paris, Fayard, 2001
• With Huguette Chaunu, Jacques Renard: Essai de prospective démographique, Paris, Fayard, 2003
• In curés aux entrepreneurs: la Vendée au XXe siècle, Centre de Recherches Historiques Vendéen, 2004.
• With Escaunde Renaud, Jean Tulard, Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie, Jean sevillia, Jean-Christian Petitfils Le livre noir de la Révolution française, Cerf, 2008

Essays:

• Roger Arnaldez La philosophie et l' histoire, in Jean -François Mattéi, Le Discours Philosophique, Encyclopédie Philosophique universal, Volume 4, Paris, PUF, 1998
• Bresil et l' Atlantique au 17e siècle, Annales 16, 1961, 1176-1207
• Pour une de l' espace Géopolitique américain, Yearbook of history, economy and government of Latin America, Volume 1, Cologne 1964, 3-26