Part 3

DU CANGE, CHARLES DU FRESNE, SIEUR (1610-1688), one of the lay members of the great 17th century group of French critics and scholars who laid the foundations of modern historical criticism, was born at Amiens on the 18th of December 1610. At an early age his father sent him to the Jesuits' college at Amiens, where he greatly distinguished himself. Having completed the usual course at this seminary, he applied himself to the study of law at Orleans, and afterwards went to Paris, where in 1631 he was received as an advocate before the parliament. Meeting with very slight success in his profession, he returned to his native city, and in July 1638 married Catherine Dubois, daughter of a royal official, the treasurer in Amiens; and in 1647 he purchased the office of treasurer from his father-in-law, but its duties did not interfere with the literary and historical work to which he had devoted himself since returning to Amiens. Forced to leave his native city in 1668 in consequence of a plague, he settled in Paris, where he resided until his death on the 23rd of October 1688. In the archives of Paris Du Cange was able to consult charters, diplomas, manuscripts and a multitude of printed documents, which were not to be met with elsewhere. His industry was exemplary and unremitting, and the number of his literary works would be incredible, if the originals, all in his own handwriting, were not still extant. He was distinguished above nearly all the writers of his time by his linguistic acquirements, his accurate and varied knowledge, and his critical sagacity. Of his numerous works the most important are the _Glossarium ad scriptores mediae et infimae latinitatis_ (Paris, 1678), and the _Glossarium ad scriptores mediae et infimae graecitatis_ (Lyons, 1688), which are indispensable aids to the student of the history and literature of the middle ages. To the three original volumes of the Latin _Glossarium_, three supplementary volumes were added by the Benedictines of St Maur (Paris, 1733-1736), and a further addition of four volumes (Paris, 1766), by a Benedictine, Pierre Carpentier (1697-1767). There were other editions, and an abridgment with some corrections was brought out by J.C. Adelung (Halle, 1772-1784). The edition in seven volumes edited by G.A.L. Henschel (Paris, 1840-1850) includes these supplements and also further additions by the editor, and this has been improved and published in ten volumes by Leopold Favre (Niort, 1883-1887). An edition of the Greek _Glossarium_ was published at Breslau in 1889.

Du Cange took considerable interest in the history of the later empire, and wrote _Historia Byzantina duplici commentario illustrato_ (Paris, 1680), and an introduction to his edition and translation into modern French of Geoffrey de Villehardouin's _Histoire de l'empire de Constantinople sous les empereurs francais_ (Paris, 1657). He also brought out editions of the Byzantine historians, John Cinnamus and John Zonaras, as _Joannis Cinnami historiarum de rebus gestis a Joanne et Manuele Comnenis_ (Paris, 1670) and _Joannis Zonarae Annales ab exordio mundi ad mortem Alexii Comneni_ (Paris, 1686). He edited Jean de Joinville's _Histoire de St Louis, roi de France_ (Paris, 1668), and his other works which may be mentioned are _Traite historique du chef de St Jean Baptiste_ (Paris, 1666); _Lettre du Sieur N., conseiller du roi_ (Paris, 1682); _Cyrilli, Philoxeni, aliorumque veterum glossaria_, and _Memoire sur le projet d'un nouveau recueil des historiens de France, avec le plan general de ce recueil_, which has been inserted by Jacques Lelong in his _Bibliotheque historique de la France_ (Paris, 1768-1778). His last work, _Chronicon Paschale a mundo condito ad Heraclii imperatoris annum vigesimum_ (Paris, 1689), was passing through the press when Du Cange died, and consequently it was edited by Etienne Baluze, and published with an _eloge_ of the author prefixed.

His autograph manuscripts and his large and valuable library passed to his eldest son, Philippe du Fresne, who died unmarried in 1692. They then came to his second son, Francois du Fresne, who sold the collection, the greater part of the manuscripts being purchased by the abbe du Champs. The abbe handed them over to a bookseller named Mariette, who resold part of them to Baron Hohendorf. The remaining part was acquired by a member of the family of Hozier, the French genealogists. The French government, however, aware of the importance of all the writings of Du Cange, succeeded, after much trouble, in collecting the greater portion of the manuscripts, which were preserved in the imperial library at Paris. Some of these were subsequently published, and the manuscripts are now found in various libraries. The works of Du Cange published after his death are: an edition of the Byzantine historian, Nicephorus Gregoras (Paris, 1702); _De imperatorum Constantinopolitanorum seu inferioris aevi vel imperii uti vocant numismatibus dissertatio_ (Rome, 1755); _Histoire de l'etat de la ville d'Amiens et de ses comtes_ (Amiens, 1840); and a valuable work _Des principautes d'outre-mer_, published by E.G. Rey as _Les Familles d'outre-mer_ (Paris, 1869).

See H. Hardouin, _Essai sur la vie et sur les ouvrages de Ducange_ (Amiens, 1849); and L.J. Feugere, in the _Journal de l'instruction publique_ (Paris, 1852).

DUCANGE, VICTOR HENRI JOSEPH BRAHAIN (1783-1833), French novelist and dramatist, was born on the 24th of November 1783 at the Hague, where his father was secretary to the French embassy. Dismissed from the civil service at the Restoration, Victor Ducange became one of the favourite authors of the liberal party, and owed some part of his popularity to the fact that he was fined and imprisoned more than once for his outspokenness. He was six months in prison for an article in his journal _Le Diable rose, ou le petit courrier de Lucifer_ (1822); for _Valentine_ (1821), in which the royalist excesses in the south of France were pilloried, he was again imprisoned; and after the publication of _Helene ou l'amour et la guerre_ (1823), he took refuge for some time in Belgium. Ducange wrote numerous plays and melodramas, among which the most successful were _Marco Loricot, ou le petit Chouan de 1830_ (1836), and _Trente ans, ou la vie d'un joueur_ (1827), in which Frederick Lemaitre found one of his best parts. Many of his books were prohibited, ostensibly for their coarseness, but perhaps rather for their political tendencies. He died in Paris on the 15th of October 1833.

DUCAS, DUKAS or DOUKAS, the name of a Byzantine family which supplied several rulers to the Eastern Empire. The family first came into prominence during the 9th century, but was ruined when Constantine Ducas, a son of the general Andronicus Ducas, lost his life in his effort to obtain the imperial crown in 913. Towards the end of the 10th century there appeared another family of Ducas, which was perhaps connected with the earlier family through the female line and was destined to attain to greater fortune. A member of this family became emperor as Constantine X. in 1059, and Constantine's son Michael VII. ruled, nominally in conjunction with his younger brothers, Andronicus and Constantine, from 1071 to 1078. Michael left a son, Constantine, and, says Gibbon, "a daughter of the house of Ducas illustrated the blood, and confirmed the succession, of the Comnenian dynasty." The family was also allied by marriage with other great Byzantine houses, and after losing the imperial dignity its members continued to take an

## active part in public affairs. In 1204 Alexius Ducas, called Mourzoufle,

deposed the emperor Isaac Angelus and his son Alexius, and vainly tried to defend Constantinople against the attacks of the Latin crusaders. Nearly a century and a half later one Michael Ducas took a leading part in the civil war between the emperors John V. Palaeologus and John VI. Cantacuzenus, and Michael's grandson was the historian Ducas (see below). Many of the petty sovereigns who arose after the destruction of the Eastern Empire sought to gain prestige by adding the famous name of Ducas to their own.

DUCAS (15th cent.), Byzantine historian, flourished under Constantine XIII. (XI.) Dragases, the last emperor of the East, about 1450. The dates of his birth and death are unknown. He was the grandson of Michael Ducas (see above). After the fall of Constantinople, he was employed in various diplomatic missions by Dorino and Domenico Gateluzzi, princes of Lesbos, where he had taken refuge. He was successful in securing a semi-independence for Lesbos until 1462, when it was taken and annexed to Turkey by Sultan Mahommed II. It is known that Ducas survived this event, but there is no record of his subsequent life. He was the author of a history of the period 1341-1462; his work thus continues that of Gregoras and Cantacuzene, and supplements Phrantzes and Chalcondyles. There is a preliminary chapter of chronology from Adam to John Palaeologus I. Although barbarous in style, the history of Ducas is both judicious and trustworthy, and it is the most valuable source for the closing years of the Greek empire. The account of the capture of Constantinople is of special importance. Ducas was a strong supporter of the union of the Greek and Latin churches, and is very bitter against those who rejected even the idea of appealing to the West for assistance against the Turks.

The history, preserved (without a title) in a single Paris MS., was first edited by I. Bullialdus (Bulliaud) (Paris, 1649); later editions are in the Bonn _Corpus scriptorum Hist. Byz._, by I. Bekker (1834) and Migne, _Patrologia Graeca_, clvii. The Bonn edition contains a 15th century Italian translation by an unknown author, found by Leopold Ranke in one of the libraries of Venice, and sent by him to Bekker.

DUCASSE, PIERRE EMMANUEL ALBERT, BARON (1813-1893), French historian, was born at Bourges on the 16th of November 1813. In 1849 he became aide-de-camp to Prince Jerome Bonaparte, ex-king of Westphalia, then governor of the Invalides, on whose commission he wrote _Memoires pour servir a l'histoire de la campagne de 1812 en Russie_ (1852). Subsequently he published _Memoires du roi Joseph_ (1853-1855), and, as a sequel, _Histoire des negociations diplomatiques relatives aux traites de Morfontaine, de Luneville et d'Amiens_, together with the unpublished correspondence of the emperor Napoleon I. with Cardinal Fesch (1855-1856). From papers in the possession of the imperial family he compiled _Memoires du prince Eugene_ (1858-1860) and _Refutation des memoires du duc de Raguse_ (1857), part of which was inserted by authority at the end of volume ix. of the _Memoires_. He was attache to Jerome's son, Prince Napoleon, during the Crimean War, and wrote a _Precis historique des operations militaires en Orient, de mars 1854 a octobre 1855_ (1857), which was completed many years later by a volume entitled _La Crimee et Sebastopol de 1853 a 1856, documents intimes et inedits_, followed by the complete list of the French officers killed or wounded in that war (1892). He was also employed by Prince Napoleon on the _Correspondance_ of Napoleon I., and afterwards published certain letters, purposely omitted there, in the _Revue historique_. These documents, subsequently collected in _Les Rois freres de Napoleon_ (1883), as well as the _Journal de la reine Catherine de Westphalie_ (1893), were edited with little care and are not entirely trustworthy, but their publication threw much light on Napoleon I. and his entourage. His _Souvenirs d'un officier du 2^e Zouaves_, and _Les Dessous du coup d'etat_ (1891), contain many piquant anecdotes, but at times degenerate into mere tittle-tattle. Ducasse was the author of some slight novels, and from the practice of this form of literature he acquired that levity which appears even in his most serious historical publications.

DUCAT, the name of a coin, generally of gold, and of varying value, formerly in use in many European countries. It was first struck by Roger II. of Sicily as duke of Apulia, and bore an inscription "_Sit tibi, Christe, datus, quem tu regis, iste ducatus_" (Lord, thou rulest this duchy, to thee be it dedicated); hence, it is said, the name. Between 1280 and 1284 Venice also struck a gold coin, known first as the ducat, afterwards as the zecchino or sequin, the ducat becoming merely a money of account. The ducat was also current in Holland, Austria, the Netherlands, Spain and Denmark (see NUMISMATICS). A gold coin termed a ducat was current in Hanover during the reigns of George I. and George III. A pattern gold coin was also struck by the English mint in 1887 for a proposed decimal coinage. On the reverse was the inscription "one ducat" within an oak wreath; above "one hundred pence," and below the date between two small roses. There is a gold coin termed a ducat in the Austria-Hungary currency, of the value of nine shillings and fourpence.

DU CHAILLU, PAUL BELLONI (1835-1903), traveller and anthropologist, was born either at Paris or at New Orleans (accounts conflict) on the 31st of July 1835. In his youth he accompanied his father, an African trader in the employment of a Parisian firm, to the west coast of Africa. Here, at a station on the Gabun, the boy received some education from missionaries, and acquired an interest in and knowledge of the country, its natural history, and its natives, which guided him to his subsequent career. In 1852 he exhibited this knowledge in the New York press, and was sent in 1855 by the Academy of Natural Sciences at Philadelphia on an African expedition. From 1855 to 1859 he regularly explored the regions of West Africa in the neighbourhood of the equator, gaining considerable knowledge of the delta of the Ogowe river and the estuary of the Gabun. During his travels he saw numbers of the great anthropoid apes called the gorilla (possibly the great ape described by Carthaginian navigators), then known to scientists only by a few skeletons. A subsequent expedition, from 1863 to 1865, enabled him to confirm the accounts given by the ancients of a pygmy people inhabiting the African forests. Narratives of both expeditions were published, in 1861 and 1867 respectively, under the titles _Explorations and Adventures in Equatorial Africa, with Accounts of the Manners and Customs of the People, and of the Chace of the Gorilla, Crocodile, and other Animals_; and _A Journey to Ashango-land, and further penetration into Equatorial Africa_. The first work excited much controversy on the score of its veracity, but subsequent investigation proved the correctness of du Chaillu's statements as to the facts of natural history; though possibly some of the adventures he described as happening to himself were reproductions of the hunting stories of natives (see _Proc. Zool. Soc._ vol. i., 1905, p. 66). The map accompanying _Ashango-land_ was of unique value, but the explorer's photographs and collections were lost when he was forced to flee from the hostility of the natives. After some years' residence in America, during which he wrote several books for the young founded upon his African adventures, du Chaillu turned his attention to northern Europe, and published in 1881 _The Land of the Midnight Sun_, in 1889 _The Viking Age_, and in 1900 _The Land of the Long Night_. He died at St Petersburg on the 29th of April 1903.

DUCHENNE, GUILLAUME BENJAMIN AMAND (1806-1875), French physician, was born on the 17th of September 1806 at Boulogne, the son of a sea-captain. He was educated at Douai, and then studied medicine in Paris until the year 1831, when he returned to his native town to practise his profession. Two years later he first tried the effect of electro-puncture of the muscles on a patient under his care, and from this time on devoted himself more and more to the medical applications of electricity, thereby laying the foundation of the modern science of electro-therapeutics. In 1842 he removed to Paris for the sake of its wider clinical opportunities, and there he worked until his death over thirty years later. His greatest work, _L'Electrisation localisee_ (1855), passed through three editions during his lifetime, though by many his _Physiologie des mouvements_ (1867) is considered his masterpiece. He published over fifty volumes containing his researches on muscular and nervous diseases, and on the applications of electricity both for diagnostic purposes and for treatment. His name is especially connected with the first description of locomotor ataxy, progressive muscular atrophy, pseudo-hypertrophic paralysis, glosso-labio laryngeal paralysis and other nervous troubles. He died in Paris on the 17th of September 1875.

For a detailed life see _Archives generales de medicine_ (December 1875), and for a complete list of his works the 3rd edition of _L'Electrisation localisee_ (1872).

DU CHESNE [Latinized DUCHENIUS, QUERNEUS, or QUERCETANUS], ANDRE (1584-1640), French geographer and historian, generally styled the father of French history, was born at Ile-Bouchard, in the province of Touraine, in May 1584. He was educated at Loudun and afterwards at Paris. From his earliest years he devoted himself to historical and geographical research, and his first work, _Egregiarum seu selectarum lectionum et antiquitatum liber_, published in his eighteenth year, displayed great erudition. He enjoyed the patronage of Cardinal Richelieu, a native of the same district with himself, through whose influence he was appointed historiographer and geographer to the king. He died in 1640, in consequence of having been run over by a carriage when on his way from Paris to his country house at Verriere. Du Chesne's works were very numerous and varied, and in addition to what he published, he left behind him more than 100 folio volumes of manuscript extracts now preserved in the Bibliotheque Nationale (L. Delisle, _Le Cabinet des manuscrits de la bibliotheque imperiale_, t. L, 333-334). Several of his larger works were continued by his only son Francois du Chesne (1616-1693), who succeeded him in the office of historiographer to the king. The principal works of Andre du Chesne are--_Les Antiquites et recherches de la grandeur et majeste des rois de France_ (Paris, 1609), _Les Antiquites et recherches des villes, chateaux, &c., de toute la France_ (Paris, 1609), _Histoire d'Angleterre, d'Ecosse, et d'Irelande_ (Paris, 1614), _Histoire des Papes jusqu'a Paul V_ (Paris, 1619), _Histoire des rois, ducs, et comtes de Bourgogne_ (1619-1628, 2 vols. fol.), _Historiae Normanorum scriptores antiqui_ (1619, fol., now the only source for some of the texts), and his _Historiae Francorum scriptores_ (5 vols. fol., 1636-1649). This last was intended to comprise 24 volumes, and to contain all the narrative sources for French history in the middle ages; only two volumes were published by the author, his son Francois published three more, and the work remained unfinished. Besides these du Chesne published a great number of genealogical histories of illustrious families, of which the best is that of the house of Montmorency. His _Histoire des cardinaux francais_ (2 vols. fol. 1660-1666) and _Histoire des chanceliers et gardes des sceaux de France_ (1630) were published by his son Francois. Andre also published a translation of the _Satires_ of Juvenal, and editions of the works of Alcuin, Abelard, Alain Chartier and Etienne Pasquier.

DUCHESNE, LOUIS MARIE OLIVIER (1843- ), French scholar and ecclesiastic, was born at Saint Servan in Brittany on the 13th of September 1843. Two scientific missions--to Mount Athos in 1874 and to Asia Minor in 1876--appeared at first to incline him towards the study of the ancient history of the Christian churches of the East. Afterwards, however, it was the Western church which absorbed almost his whole attention. In 1877 he received the degree of _docteur es lettres_ with two remarkable theses, a dissertation _De Macario magnete_, and an _Etude sur le Liber pontificalis_, in which he explained with unerring critical acumen the origin of that celebrated chronicle, determined the different editions and their interrelation, and stated precisely the value of his evidence. Immediately afterwards he was appointed professor at the Catholic Institute in Paris, and for eight years presented the example and model, then rare in France, of a priest teaching church history according to the rules of scientific criticism. His course, bold even to the point of rashness in the eyes of the traditionalist exegetists, was at length suspended. In November 1885 he was appointed lecturer at the Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes. In 1886 he published volume i. of his learned edition of the _Liber pontificalis_ (completed in 1892 by volume ii.), in which he resumed and completed the results he had attained in his French thesis. In 1888 he was elected member of the Academie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, and was afterwards appointed director of the French school of archaeology at Rome. Much light is thrown upon the Christian origins, especially those of France, by his _Origines du culte chretien, etude sur la liturgie latine avant Charlemagne_ (1889; Eng. trans. by M.L. McClure, _Christian Worship: its Origin and Evolution_, London, 1902, 2nd ed. 1904); _Memoire sur l'origine des dioceses episcopaux dans l'ancienne Gaule_ (1890), the preliminary sketch of a more detailed work, _Fastes episcopaux dans l'ancienne Gaule_ (vol. i. _Les provinces du sud-est_, 1894, and vol. ii. _L'Aquitaine et les Lyonnaises_, 1899); and _Catalogues episcopaux de la province de Tours_ (1898). When a proposal was set on foot to bring about a reconciliation between the Roman Church and the Christian Churches of the East, the Abbe Duchesne endeavoured to show that the union of those churches was possible under the Roman supremacy, because unity did not necessarily entail uniformity. His _Autonomies ecclesiastiques; eglises separees_ (1897), in which he speaks of the origin of the Anglican Church, but treats especially of the origin of the Greek Churches of the East, was received with scant favour in certain narrow circles of the pontifical court. In 1906 he began to publish, under the title of _Histoire ancienne de l'eglise_, a course of lectures which he had already delivered upon the early ages of the Church, and of which a few manuscript copies were circulated. The second volume appeared in 1908. In these lectures Duchesne touches cleverly upon the most delicate problems, and, without any elaborate display of erudition, presents conclusions of which account must be taken. His incisive style, his fearless and often ruthless criticism, and his wide and penetrating erudition, make him a redoubtable adversary in the field of polemic. The _Bulletin critique_, founded by him, for which he wrote numerous articles, has contributed powerfully to spread the principles of the historical method among the French clergy.