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L OPOLD VICTOR DELISLE (1826– )

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Originally appearing in Volume V07, Page 964 of the 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica.
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L OPOLD

VICTOR DELISLE (1826– )  , French bibliophile and historian, was born at Valognes (
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Manche) on the 24th of
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October 1826 . At the Ecole
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des Chartes, where his career was remarkably brilliant, his valedictory thesis was an Essai sur
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les revenus publics en Normandie au XIIe siecle (1849), and it was to the
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history of his native province that he devoted his early
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works . Of these the Etudes sur la condition de la dasse agricole et Petal de l'agriculture en Normandie au moyen age (1851), condensing an enormous mass of facts
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drawn from the
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local archives, was reprinted in 1905 without change, and remains authoritative . In November 1852 he entered the
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manuscript department of the Bibliotheque Imperiale (Nationale), of which in 1874 he became the official head in succession to Jules Taschereau . He was already known as the compiler of several invaluable inventories of its
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manuscripts . When the French government decided on printing a general catalogue of the printed books in the Bibliotheque, Delisle became responsible for this
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great undertaking and took an active
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part in the
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work; in the preface to the first
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volume (1897) he gave a detailed history of the library and its management . Under his administration the library was enriched with numerous gifts, legacies and acquisitions, notably by the
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purchase of a part of the Ashburnham
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MSS . Delisle proved that the bulk of the MSS. of French origin which Lord Ashburnham had bought in France, particularly those bought from the
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book-seller Barrois, had been purloined by Count Libri, inspector-general of
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libraries under King Louis Philippe, and he procured the repurchase of the MSS. for the library, afterwards preparing a catalogue of them entitled Catalogue des MSS. des fonds Libri et Barrois (1888), the preface of which gives the history of the whole transaction . He was elected member of the
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Academic des Inscriptions et Belles Lettres in 1859, and became a member of the staff of the Recueil des historiens de la France, collaborating in vols. xxii . (1865) and
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xxiii . (1876) and editing vol.
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xxiv . (1904), which is valuable for the social history of France in the 13th century .

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jubilee of his fifty years' association with the Bibliotheque Nationale was celebrated on the 8th of March 1903 . After his retirement (
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February 21, 1905) he brought out in two volumes a catalogue and description of the printed books and MSS. in the Musee Conde at
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Chantilly,
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left by the duc d'Aumale to the French Institute . He produced many valuable official reports and catalogues and a great number of
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memoirs and mono-graphs on points connected with palaeography and the study of history and archaeology (see his Melanges de paleographie et debibliographie (188o) with
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atlas; and his articles in the Album paleographique (1887) . Of his purely
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historical works
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special mention must be made of his Memoire sur les actes d'Innocent
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Ill (1857), and his Memoire sur les operations financieres des Tern pliers (1889), a collection of documents of the highest value for economic history . The
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thirty-second volume of the Histoire litteraire de la France, which was partly his work, is ;:if great importance for the study of 13th and 14th century Latin chronicles . Delisle was undoubtedly the most learned man in
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Europe with regard to the
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middle ages; and his knowledge of diplomatics, palaeography and printing was profound . His output of work, in catalogues, &c., was enormous, and his services to the Bibliotheque Nationale in this respect cannot be overestimated . His wife, a daughter of
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Eugene Burnouf, was for many years his collaborator . The Bibliographie des travaux de L.Delisle (1902), by Paul Lacombe, may be consulted for a full list of his numerous works .

End of Article: L OPOLD VICTOR DELISLE (1826– )
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