Henri Valois
Encyclopedia
Henri Valois or in classical circles, Henricus Valesius, was a philologist and a student of classical and ecclesiastical historians. He is the elder brother to Adrien Valois (1607–1692).
Belonging to a family of Norman
gentry settled near Bayeux
and Liseux, Valois studied under the Jesuits
, first at Verdun and then at the Collège de Clermont at Paris, where he studied rhetoric under Denis Pétau
. He studied law at Bourges
(1622–24) and returned to Paris, where, to please his father, he practised law against his inclination for seven years. When he regained his liberty he plunged into classical studies, which he had never entirely abandoned.
Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc
had purchased a manuscript in Cyprus
containing the work of Constantine Porphyrogenitus on virtue and vice. Valois took from it numerous previously unedited fragments of earlier historians, which he published in 1634: Polybii
, Diodori Siculi
, Nicolai Damasceni
, Dionysii Halicarnassii
, Appian
i, Alexandri
, Dionis et Ioannis antiocheni
excerpta. In 1636 he edited Ammiani Marcellini
rerum gestarum libri XVIII, with abundant notes which illumined all the history of that period and its institutions, together with the compilation of an Origo Constantini and a chronicle fragment of ca. 527, which bears his name, Anonymus Valesianus
. He succeeded in recognizing the rhythm of the phrases in the establishment of the text, at the same time making no display of his discovery.
In 1650 the assembly of the French clergy
commissioned him to publish the ecclesiastical historians, after Mons. Charles de Montchal, archbishop of Toulouse, was compelled to resign the task. In 1659 he issued Eusebius of Caesarea
's Ecclesiastical History
, and biography and panegyric of Constantine, as well as Constantine's discourse in the assembly: Eusebii ecclesiastica historia, et vita imperatoris Constantini, graece et latine. The text was accompanied by a new Latin translation, scholarly notes, four dissertations on Donatism, Anastasius
, the Septuagint, and the Roman Martyrology
. In 1668 he published Socrates of Constantinople and Sozomen
with three books of observations on the history of Saint Athanasius, on that of Paul, Bishop of Constantinople, and the sixth canon of Nicaea (against Lamouy). In 1673 he completed his book with Theodoret
, Evagrius
, and the excerpts from Philostorgius
and Theodorus Lector
: Socratis, Sozomeni, Theodoreti et Evagrii Historia ecclesiastica.
At first he had only the slender means left him by his father, but later pensions from President Jean-Antoine de Mesmes
of the parlement of Paris, the clergy of France, Cardinal Mazarin, and Louis XIV provided him with the necessary leisure and the assistance of a secretary, for his sight was never good, and as early as 1637 he ceased to have the use of his right eye. In 1664, when he was nearly blind, he married the young Marguerite Chesneau and had by her four sons and three daughters.
He did important work, and though the manuscripts at his disposal were not always the best, his tact and the certainty of his criticism was admirable. His temperate and sanely learned notes are excellent documents of the French learning of the seventeenth century. Valois was associated with the greatest scholars of his time, with whom however he always maintained his liberty of judgment. He wrote the funeral eulogies of Jacques Sirmond
, Pierre Depuy, and Denis Pétau
. He also wrote several occasional Latin poems, but to posterity he is the learned and exact editor of the Greek ecclesiastical historians.
Belonging to a family of Norman
Normandy
Normandy is a geographical region corresponding to the former Duchy of Normandy. It is in France.The continental territory covers 30,627 km² and forms the preponderant part of Normandy and roughly 5% of the territory of France. It is divided for administrative purposes into two régions:...
gentry settled near Bayeux
Bayeux
Bayeux is a commune in the Calvados department in Normandy in northwestern France.Bayeux is the home of the Bayeux Tapestry, which depicts the events leading up to the Norman conquest of England.-Administration:Bayeux is a sub-prefecture of Calvados...
and Liseux, Valois studied under the Jesuits
Society of Jesus
The Society of Jesus is a Catholic male religious order that follows the teachings of the Catholic Church. The members are called Jesuits, and are also known colloquially as "God's Army" and as "The Company," these being references to founder Ignatius of Loyola's military background and a...
, first at Verdun and then at the Collège de Clermont at Paris, where he studied rhetoric under Denis Pétau
Denis Pétau
Denis Pétau , also known as Dionysius Petavius, was a French Jesuit theologian.-Life:Pétau was born at Orléans where he had his initial education; he then attended the University of Paris, where he successfully defended his theses for the degree of Master of Arts, not in Latin, but in Greek...
. He studied law at Bourges
Bourges
Bourges is a city in central France on the Yèvre river. It is the capital of the department of Cher and also was the capital of the former province of Berry.-History:...
(1622–24) and returned to Paris, where, to please his father, he practised law against his inclination for seven years. When he regained his liberty he plunged into classical studies, which he had never entirely abandoned.
Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc
Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc
Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc was a French astronomer, antiquary and savant who maintained a wide correspondence with scientists and was a successful organizer of scientific inquiry...
had purchased a manuscript in Cyprus
Cyprus
Cyprus , officially the Republic of Cyprus , is a Eurasian island country, member of the European Union, in the Eastern Mediterranean, east of Greece, south of Turkey, west of Syria and north of Egypt. It is the third largest island in the Mediterranean Sea.The earliest known human activity on the...
containing the work of Constantine Porphyrogenitus on virtue and vice. Valois took from it numerous previously unedited fragments of earlier historians, which he published in 1634: Polybii
Polybius
Polybius , Greek ) was a Greek historian of the Hellenistic Period noted for his work, The Histories, which covered the period of 220–146 BC in detail. The work describes in part the rise of the Roman Republic and its gradual domination over Greece...
, Diodori Siculi
Diodorus Siculus
Diodorus Siculus was a Greek historian who flourished between 60 and 30 BC. According to Diodorus' own work, he was born at Agyrium in Sicily . With one exception, antiquity affords no further information about Diodorus' life and doings beyond what is to be found in his own work, Bibliotheca...
, Nicolai Damasceni
Nicolaus of Damascus
Nicolaus of Damascus was a Greek historian and philosopher who lived during the Augustan age of the Roman Empire. His name is derived from that of his birthplace, Damascus. He was born around 64 BC....
, Dionysii Halicarnassii
Dionysius of Halicarnassus
Dionysius of Halicarnassus was a Greek historian and teacher of rhetoric, who flourished during the reign of Caesar Augustus. His literary style was Attistic — imitating Classical Attic Greek in its prime.-Life:...
, Appian
Appian
Appian of Alexandria was a Roman historian of Greek ethnicity who flourished during the reigns of Trajan, Hadrian, and Antoninus Pius.He was born ca. 95 in Alexandria. He tells us that, after having filled the chief offices in the province of Egypt, he went to Rome ca. 120, where he practised as...
i, Alexandri
Alexander Polyhistor
Lucius Cornelius Alexander Polyhistor was a Greek scholar who was enslaved by the Romans during the Mithridatic War and taken to Rome as a tutor. After his release, he continued to live in Italy as a Roman citizen...
, Dionis et Ioannis antiocheni
John of Antioch
John of Antioch was Patriarch of Antioch and led a group of moderate Eastern bishops during the Nestorian controversy. He is sometimes confused with John Chrysostom, who is occasionally also referred to as John of Antioch. John gave active support to his friend Nestorius in the latter's dispute...
excerpta. In 1636 he edited Ammiani Marcellini
Ammianus Marcellinus
Ammianus Marcellinus was a fourth-century Roman historian. He wrote the penultimate major historical account surviving from Antiquity...
rerum gestarum libri XVIII, with abundant notes which illumined all the history of that period and its institutions, together with the compilation of an Origo Constantini and a chronicle fragment of ca. 527, which bears his name, Anonymus Valesianus
Anonymus Valesianus
Anonym[o]us Valesianus is the conventional title of a compilation of two fragmentary vulgar Latin chronicles, named for its 17th-century editor, Henri Valois, or Henricus Valesius , who published the text for the first time in 1636, together with his first printed edition of the Res Gestae of...
. He succeeded in recognizing the rhythm of the phrases in the establishment of the text, at the same time making no display of his discovery.
In 1650 the assembly of the French clergy
Assembly of the French clergy
The Assembly of the French Clergy was in its origins a representative meeting of the Catholic clergy of France, held every five years, for the purpose of apportioning the financial burdens laid upon the clergy of the French Catholic Church by the kings of France...
commissioned him to publish the ecclesiastical historians, after Mons. Charles de Montchal, archbishop of Toulouse, was compelled to resign the task. In 1659 he issued Eusebius of Caesarea
Eusebius of Caesarea
Eusebius of Caesarea also called Eusebius Pamphili, was a Roman historian, exegete and Christian polemicist. He became the Bishop of Caesarea in Palestine about the year 314. Together with Pamphilus, he was a scholar of the Biblical canon...
's Ecclesiastical History
Church History (Eusebius)
The Church History of Eusebius, the bishop of Caesarea was a 4th-century pioneer work giving a chronological account of the development of Early Christianity from the 1st century to the 4th century. It was written in Koine Greek, and survives also in Latin, Syriac and Armenian manuscripts...
, and biography and panegyric of Constantine, as well as Constantine's discourse in the assembly: Eusebii ecclesiastica historia, et vita imperatoris Constantini, graece et latine. The text was accompanied by a new Latin translation, scholarly notes, four dissertations on Donatism, Anastasius
Anastasius
Anastasius is derived from the Greek ἀνάστασις meaning "resurrection". Its female form is Anastasia.-Byzantine emperors:*Anastasius I – Byzantine emperor 491–518*Anastasios II – Byzantine emperor 713–715...
, the Septuagint, and the Roman Martyrology
Roman Martyrology
The Roman Martyrology is the official martyrology of the Roman Rite of the Roman Catholic Church. It provides an extensive but not exhaustive list of the saints recognized by the Church.-History:...
. In 1668 he published Socrates of Constantinople and Sozomen
Sozomen
Salminius Hermias Sozomenus was a historian of the Christian church.-Family and Home:He was born around 400 in Bethelia, a small town near Gaza, into a wealthy Christian family of Palestine....
with three books of observations on the history of Saint Athanasius, on that of Paul, Bishop of Constantinople, and the sixth canon of Nicaea (against Lamouy). In 1673 he completed his book with Theodoret
Theodoret
Theodoret of Cyrus or Cyrrhus was an influential author, theologian, and Christian bishop of Cyrrhus, Syria . He played a pivotal role in many early Byzantine church controversies that led to various ecumenical acts and schisms...
, Evagrius
Evagrius
Evagrius or Euagrius may refer to:*Evagrius of Constantinople , bishop of Constantinople *Evagrius of Antioch, bishop of Antioch *Evagrius Ponticus , Christian mystic...
, and the excerpts from Philostorgius
Philostorgius
Philostorgius was an Anomoean Church historian of the 4th and 5th centuries. Anomoeanism questioned the Trinitarian account of the relationship between God the Father and Christ and was considered a heresy by the Orthodox Church, which adopted the term "homoousia" in the Nicene Creed. Very little...
and Theodorus Lector
Theodorus Lector
Theodorus Lector was a lector, or reader, at the Hagia Sophia in Constantinople during the early sixth century. He wrote two works of history; one is a collection of sources which relates events beginning in 313, during Constantine's early reign, down to 439, in the reign Theodosius II...
: Socratis, Sozomeni, Theodoreti et Evagrii Historia ecclesiastica.
At first he had only the slender means left him by his father, but later pensions from President Jean-Antoine de Mesmes
Jean-Antoine de Mesmes
Jean-Antoine de Mesmes was a Parisian magistrate and member of the Académie française.He was the son of Jean-Jacques de Mesmes, himself a member of the Académie française from 1676 to 1688....
of the parlement of Paris, the clergy of France, Cardinal Mazarin, and Louis XIV provided him with the necessary leisure and the assistance of a secretary, for his sight was never good, and as early as 1637 he ceased to have the use of his right eye. In 1664, when he was nearly blind, he married the young Marguerite Chesneau and had by her four sons and three daughters.
He did important work, and though the manuscripts at his disposal were not always the best, his tact and the certainty of his criticism was admirable. His temperate and sanely learned notes are excellent documents of the French learning of the seventeenth century. Valois was associated with the greatest scholars of his time, with whom however he always maintained his liberty of judgment. He wrote the funeral eulogies of Jacques Sirmond
Jacques Sirmond
Jacques Sirmond was a French scholar and Jesuit.Simond was born at Riom, Auvergne. He was educated at the Jesuit College of Billom; having been a novice at Verdun and then at Pont-Mousson, he entered into the order on the 26 July 1576...
, Pierre Depuy, and Denis Pétau
Denis Pétau
Denis Pétau , also known as Dionysius Petavius, was a French Jesuit theologian.-Life:Pétau was born at Orléans where he had his initial education; he then attended the University of Paris, where he successfully defended his theses for the degree of Master of Arts, not in Latin, but in Greek...
. He also wrote several occasional Latin poems, but to posterity he is the learned and exact editor of the Greek ecclesiastical historians.