Numa Denis Fustel de Coulanges, (born March 18, 1830, Paris, France-died Sept. 12, 1889, Massy), French historian, the originator of the scientific approach to the study of history in France. After studying at the École Normale Supérieure, he was sent to the French school at Athens in 1853 and directed some excavations at Chios. From 1860 to 1870 he was professor of history at the faculty of letters at the University of Strasbourg, where he had a brilliant career as a teacher. His subsequent appointments included a lectureship at the École Normale Supérieure in February 1870, a professorship at the University of Paris faculty of letters in 1875, the chair of medieval history at the Sorbonne in 1878, and the directorship of the École Normale in 1880.
"A candidate for the first modern sociologist of religion." -- Heritage Review"Political theory was effectively completed by Coulanges and de Jouvenel. [...] Coulanges so exhaustively explains Rome in particular, that its astonishing he isn't compared to Newton." -- C. A. Bond"Fustel de Coulanges [...] takes religious beliefs to be the fundamental reality in a civilization, and then he tries to show how all the other aspects of that civilization follow from its religion. In The Ancient City, this method is applied to the classical civilization of Greece and Rome, and it produces fascinating results." -- Bonald, Throne and Altar
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