LABBE, PHILIPPE. — Jesuit, bibliographer, and theologian, born at Bourges on 10 July 1607, died in Paris on 17 March 1667. He taught rhetoric, philosophy, and moral theology, for most of the time at the Collège de Clermont in Paris. An acute and penetrating mind, wide-ranging literary and ecclesiastical erudition, a tenacious memory, and constant application earned him the esteem accorded to one of the most learned men of his age and the title of “library of libraries.”
He left more than 80 works, the principal one being the conciliar collection in 18 vols.: Sacrosancta Concilia ad regium editionem exacta cum duobus apparatibus, which covers the years 34–1564; vols. I–VIII and XII–XV were already ready for printing before the author’s death, but were not published until 1671–72, under the care of Fr. G. Cossart, who completed vols. IX and X, which had barely been begun, and XI, enlarging it by one volume, and adding two Apparatus: the first (vol. XVII), comprising chronological, geographical, and historical tables; the second (vol. XVIII), comprising the most important doctrinal treatises on councils, including the De conciliis of Cardinal D. Jacobazzi. S. Baluzio added a supplementary volume (Paris 1683);
Niccoleti reprinted the entire collection (23 vols., Venice 1728–34), but with too many typographical errors, which make it difficult to read; Fr. G. Hardouin took it up again, carefully checking the texts and bringing it up to date through 1714; G. D. Mansi recast it in his better-known and more commonly cited collection. For their part, L. and Crossart had introduced into their own work numerous additions of important documents to the edition called “royal,” because it was published by the royal printing house (37 vols., Paris, all dated 1744), and had reproduced better manuscripts or manuscripts that had been read more accurately, with citations of the variants; but they had also taken certain liberties in the use of the texts and had passed over many lacunae in silence.
Other notable works by L. are: De Byzantinae historiae scriptoribus (there 1648); Bibliotheca antijanseniana (there 1654); Nova bibliotheca manuscriptorum librorum (2 vols., there 1657); Patrum, theologorum... bibliotheca (there 1659); De scriptoribus ecclesiasticis (2 vols., there 1660), which takes up and enlarges the homonymous work of Cardinal R. Bellarmino; Conciliorum generalium... historica synopsis (there 1661), which is in effect the introduction to the conciliar collection.