La Vie de Jacques-Auguste de Thou. I. Aug. Thuani vita (review)

1610 was something of an annus horribilis for Jacques-Auguste de Thou: he lost his position as Premier Président, and his monumental history, the Historia sui temporis, was placed on the Index. In response to these events, the Vita is written less as an intellectual biography than as a three-fold defence of De Thou’s religious orthodoxy, his juridical probity and his skills as a historian; it is consequently an essential companion to the Histoire whose historical validity it defends. With its privileged perspective on the history of France during the religious wars, and as an interesting example of autobiographical writing, the Vita remains one of the most successful works of De Thou. Anne Teissier-Ensminger’s highly scholarly and laudable edition is of an important and valuable text. The extensive introduction offers an intelligent assessment of how De Thou’s literary, legal and historical skills combine in the Vita, arguing that these are integral to the defensive nature of the project. She highlights the importance of De Thou’s range of literary styles, with pleasing emphasis upon his sense of humour. Her analysis of the various literary techniques and judicial arguments that constitute De Thou’s defence of his religious orthodoxy is similarly astute, and contributes well to her thoughtful and coherent appraisal of his historiography. Careful assessment of the relative authority of the extant manuscripts of De Thou’s text accompanies detailed description of each. The text of this edition relies upon the editio princeps of 1621 in combination with the manuscripts: it is thus the first authoritative edition (and hence translation) to give a clear indication of all the variants and to reveal the successive states of De Thou’s text. The quality of the translation is high: its clear accuracy chiefly privileges fidelity to the original text, to the point of systematically emulating the length of De Thou’s Latin sentences, although the French has been sufficiently structured (or restructured) to preserve fluency. There is sensitivity in the occasional substitution of proper names for Latin pronouns, and some nice touches conspire to make the translation perfectly readable in its own right. Some interesting literary commentary emerges from the compendious footnotes, which predominantly elucidate historical figures and events, providing full bibliographical references and incidentally indicating the impressive extent of archival research that has gone into this volume. It seems churlish to cavil at any aspect of this excellent edition; there is, however, a superficial but serious criticism to be levelled at the distinctly convoluted written style of the introduction. The succession of lengthy sentences, densely woven with parentheses and sub-clauses, left this reader feeling, at times, frankly confused. This is a real shame, as it obscures the detailed manuscript analysis and subtle arguments that are among the volume’s strong points, and risks acting as a deterrent in an introduction that repays attentive reading, even if it is hard work. This should not detract from the quality of the extensive and painstaking scholarship that has gone into this welcome and accessible edition of a significant and enjoyable text.