ANTOINE AUGUSTIN

See also:

• ANTOINE AUGUSTIN CALMET (1672–1757)

CALMET (1672–1757)  , French Benedictine, was born at Mesnil-la-Horgne on the 26th of February 1672 . At the age of seventeen he joined the Benedictine order, and in 1698 was appointed to teach theology and philosophy at the abbey of Moyen-Moutier . He was successively prior at Lay, abbot at Nancy and of Senones in Lorraine . He died in Paris on the 25th of October 1757 . The erudition of Calmet's exegetical writings won him a reputation that was not confined to the Roman Catholic Church, but they have failed to stand the test of modern scholarship . The most noteworthy are :—Commentaire de la Bible (Paris, 23 vols.,17o7–1716), and Dictionnaire historique, geographique, critique, chronologique et litteral de la Bible (Paris, 2 vols., 1720) . These and numerous other works and editions of the Bible are known only to students, but as a pioneer in a branch of Biblical study which received a wide development in the 19th century, Calmet is worthy of remembrance . As a historical writer he is best known by his Histoire ecclesiastique et civile de la Lorraine (Nancy, 1728), founded on original research and various useful works on Lorraine, of which a full list is given In Vigouroux's Dictionnaire de la Bible . See A . Digot, Notice biographique et littiraire sur Dom Augustin Calmet (Nancy, 186o) .