LECLERCQ (d'Orlancourt), HENRI.
- Polymath, born at Tournai on 4 Dec. 1869, died in London on 23 March 1945. Naturalised as a French citizen, he entered the Benedictine Order and professed at the abbey of Solesmes, whence he moved in 1896 to the abbey of Farnborough, where he was ordained priest in 1898. In 1924 he transferred to the secular clergy of the archdiocese of Westminster, becoming an oblate of the abbey of St Mary in Paris and chaplain to the Sisters of Zion in London.
He was the Cabrol (v.) in the preparation of the first volumes of the *Monumenta Ecclesiae liturgica*; he published *Les Martyrs. Recueil des pièces authentiques sur les martyrs, depuis les origines jusqu'au XXe siècle* (15 vols., Paris 1903–24); of a historical and archaeological character are *L'Afrique chrétienne* (2 vols., ibid. 1904) and *La Gaule chrétienne* (ibid. 1906), a compendium of other authors now superseded by new studies and fruitful later explorations.
His activity was chiefly devoted to the drafting of articles for the *Dictionnaire d'archéologie chrétienne et de liturgie*, begun in 1903 with the collaboration of a large number of contributors but soon reduced to being compiled solely by L.; his articles, mostly summaries of earlier publications, are often incomplete and lacking, with judgments not always balanced or objective and not a few errors, especially in the description of monuments (cf., e.g., A. Ferrua, *Rivista*, in *Civ. Catt.*, 1938, I, pp. 67–72; 1939, IV, pp. 172–75). Before his death, L. had already completed the drafting of all the articles for vol. XIV, II (1948); the printing is now directed by Prof. E. Marrou of the University of Paris. In 1907 he began the French translation of C. Hefele’s work on the history of councils, based on the 2nd German edition, enriched with critical and bibliographical notes (*Histoire des Conciles*, 19 vols., Paris 1907–49). L. also published: a popular booklet, *St-Benoît sur Loire, les reliques, le monastère, l'église* (4th ed., Paris 1925); *St Jérôme* (Louvain 1927); *L'Ordre bénédictin* (ibid. 1930); *La vie chrétienne primitive* (ibid. 1928); a *Histoire du déclin et de la chute de la Monarchie française*, of which the following volumes appeared: *Histoire de la Régence pendant la minorité de Louis XV* (3 vols., ibid. 1921); *Les journées d'octobre et la fin de l'an 1789* (ibid. 1924); *Vers la fédération* (January–July 1790); *La Fédération* (January–July 1790; Paris 1929); *L'Église constitutionnelle* (July 1790–April 1791; Paris 1934); *La fuite du roi* (April–July 1791; ibid. 1936); *L'œuvre de la Constituante* (July–December 1791; ibid. 1938); a study of Ferdinand Gaillard, *maître-graveur* (Paris 1934); and in English, *A chronicle of social and political events from 1610 to 1914* (Oxford 1937).
