Montfaucon, Bernard de - Catholic Encyclopedia, Vol. VIII, p. 821

Machine translation of the 1948–1954 Italian original. The original text is authoritative.

MONTFAUCON, BERNARD de. — Born on 16 January 1655 in southern France, of noble family, he served as a soldier in Turenne’s campaign in 1672; in 1675 he became a Benedictine novice at Toulouse; from 1687 he was in the

GRÆCA,

SIVE

DE ORTU ET PROGRESSU
LITERARUM GRÆCARUM,

De variis omnium fenderum Scriptorum Graeca generibus i itemque
de Abbreviationibus & de Notis variarum Anium
at Dicuplanum.

Addit: Figuris & Literatibus ad filos exscriptorum Indicum.

Opera & Radio D. BERNARD DE MONTFAUCON, Sacculosis
& Monachii Benedictini & Congregazione Suelli Musici.

LUDOVICIUS GERMU, sub legna S. Thomas Aquinatus.
Vatican JOANNIS BOUDOT, sub legna Salus natus. Vici Iudici.
Ex CAROLINI ROSVITEL, sub legna Arbores Palma.

M. DCC. VIII.
CUM PRIVILEGIO REGIE.

S. Thomas Aquinatus, sub legna S. Thomas Aquinatus.
Vatican JOANNIS BOUDOT, sub legna Salus natus. Vici Iudici.
Ex CAROLINI ROSVITEL, sub legna Arbores Palma.

(photograph, Catholic Encyclopedia)

MONTFAUCON, BERNARD de — Frontispiece of the Palaeographia
Graeca, Paris 1708, with an autographed dedication (crossed out) by M.
to Clement XI. Copy in the Vatican Library.

the monastery of St-Germain-des-Prés in Paris, the centre
of the studies of the Congregation of S. Mauro, where
he died on 21 December 1741, buried beside his great
fellow religious Mabillon.

He published: Analecta graeca sive varia opuscula graeca
hactenus edita (Paris 1688); La verité de l'histoire de Judith
(there 1690); Athanasii opera omnia (2 tomes in 3 volumes,
in-fol., there 1698; concerning this edition V. H. G. Opitz, Unter-
suchungen zur Überlieferung der Schriften des Athanasius,
Berlin 1935, pp. 2 ff., 143, n. 1). To broaden his
knowledge of Greek manuscripts, M. went to Italy
(1698–1701), also assuming in 1699 the office of
procurator general of the Congregation of S. Mauro
in Rome. In this capacity he wrote under another name an
apologia for the edition of the works of S. Augustine,
published by the Maurists: Vindiciae editionis, Augustini a Benedectinis ador-
natae (Rome 1699). The journey in Italy gave M.’s studies
a new orientation: palaeography and archaeology were
added to his patristic studies (v. the Diarium italicum
sive monumentorum veterum, bibliothecarum, museorum
etc. notitiae singulares in itinerario italico collectae [Paris
1702]). In 1708 he published the Palaeographia graeca,
sive de ortu et progressu litterarum graecarum, a masterpiece
that laid the foundations for the new science of palaeography
(v. Gardthausen, Griechische Palaeographie, II,
2nd ed., Leipzig 1911, p. 5 ff). The principles developed in the
Palaeographia graeca were applied by M. in his
Bibliotheca Coisliniana olim Segueriana, sive manuscripto-
rum omnium Graecorum, quae in ea continentur accurata
descriptio (Paris 1715). Also belonging to the field of his
library studies is his Bibliotheca bibliothecarum
manuscriptorum nova (2 vols., in-fol., there 1739). Unpublished
texts were issued by him in the Collectio nova patrum et scriptorum

graecorum (2 vols., there 1706). Important was his edi-
tion of Origen’s Hexapla (Hexaplorum quae supersunt,
2 vols., in-fol., there 1713). From 1718 to 1738 his
edition of the works of S. Giovanni Crisostomo appeared
(13 vols.). Concerning this edition V. Chr. Baur, St Chrysos-
tome (Louvain 1907, pp. 83–88). M.’s archaeological interests
are revealed in his enormous publication: L’anti-
quité expliquée et représentée en figures (10 vols., in-fol.,
Paris 1719; 2nd ed., there 1722, and 5 supplementary
vols., there 1724) and in the Monuments de la monarchie
française (5 vols., in-fol., there 1729–33).

BIBL.: H. Leclercq, s. V. in DACL, XI, cols. 2608–72 and id., Monuments de la monarchie française, ibid. cols. 2739–48; M. Valéry, Correspondence inédite de Mabillon et M. avec l'Italie, 3 vols., Paris 1846 (letters by M.); U. Capitaine, Correspondance de B. de M. avec le G. de Crasier, Liège 1885; H. Omont, La Palaeographie grecque de M. et le p. Hardouin, estr. de Revue des études grecques, Paris 1890; E. de Broglie, La société de St-Ger- main-des-Prés au XVIIIe siècle: B. de M. et les Bernardins, 2 vols., there 1891 (in the appendix, an autobiography of M.); H. Omont, B. de M. et ses premières années, in Annales du midi, 4 (1892), p. 84 ff.; I.-B. Vanel, Les Bénédictins de St-Maur à St-Ger- main-des-Prés, 1630, Nérologie, Paris 1896, p. 199; Ph. Ta- mizey de Larroque, Bénédictins méridionaux, Bordeaux 1896; U. Berlière, Nouveau supplément à l'histoire littéraire de la Con- grégation de St-Maur, I–III, Paris 1909–Maredsous 1931 ff. Erik Peterson