The () (also known in British English as , or in US English as ) were contributors to the , the first encyclopedia with signed contributions from numerous collaborators. The (1751–1772) was edited by Jean Paul de Gua de Malves from 1746 to 1747, co-edited by Denis Diderot and Jean le Rond d'Alembert from 1747 to 1758, and edited by Diderot alone through 1772.John Lough, The Encyclopédie (New York: McKay, 1971), 14-16, 23-24.
History The composition of the 17 volumes of text and 11 volumes of plates of the was the work of at least 139 authors and 66 artists.Frank A. Kafker and Serena Kafker, The Encyclopedists as Individuals: A Biographical Dictionary of the Authors of the Encyclopédie (Oxford: Voltaire Foundation, 1988); Frank A. Kafker and Madeleine Pinault-Sørensen, "", 18-19 (1995), 200-230.
The known contributors to the text of the were not a unified group, neither in ideology nor social class.Frank A. Kafker, The Encyclopedists as a Group: A Collective Biography of the Authors of the Encyclopédie (Oxford: Voltaire Foundation, 1996). Nevertheless, many of the authors belonged to the vaguely defined intellectual group known as the philosophes. As such, they promoted the advancement of science and secular thought and supported the tolerance, rationality, and open-mindedness of the Enlightenment. They were also skilled propagandists who used the to subtly influence public opinion and spread Enlightenment ideas in France both before and after the French Revolution.
Below, some of the contributors are listed in alphabetical order, by the number of articles that they wrote and by the identifying "signature" by which their contributions were identified in the . Some of them are well-known, but others, such as Allard,Kafker and Kafker, Encyclopedists as Individuals, 8. remain a mystery to us. Around half of the articles in the Encyclopédie lack a signature, in some cases because a collaborator wished for anonymity.
Writing a critique of the in 1768, Diderot recognized that the contributors were a diverse lot: "Along with some excellent men, there were some weak, average, and absolutely bad ones. Whence the spotty quality of the work, where we find the draft of a schoolboy next to a masterpiece."Denis Diderot, "", vol. 20 of , ed. J. Assézat and M. Tourneux (Paris: Garnier, 1877), 130.
An incomplete machine-generated list of authors sorted by the number of signed articles can be found on website of ARTFL's digitized edition of the . There are lists by frequency and by letter.
Editors and key contributors
Denis Diderot In the early 1740s, Diderot was working on a French translation of Robert James's A Medicinal Dictionary for the booksellers Antoine-Claude Briasson, Laurent Durand, and Michel-Antoine David. When the latter three became involved with a project for translating Ephraim Chambers' Cyclopaedia (1728) into English, it was only natural that they would turn to Diderot for help. After having worked on the project in other capacities for some time already, Diderot was named co-editor of the , as the greatly expanded translation was now called, on 16 October 1747. As editor, Diderot wrote the prospectus and, with D'Alembert, reviewed others' articles. As a contributor, he wrote thousands of articles, many on the mechanical arts, philosophy, and natural history.
D'Alembert Jean le Rond d'Alembert was already one of Europe's foremost mathematicians when he became the a co-editor of the in 1747. He wrote the Preliminary Discourse, which borrowed material from Diderot's prospectus. In addition, he contributed articles on mathematics, physics, and other topics. Several of his articles were among the most controversial. In his article on Geneva, published in 1757, he praised his own idealized version of Geneva in such a way as to condemn France implicitly, and he claimed that some Genevan pastors no longer believed in the divinity of Jesus Christ.Lough, Encyclopédie, 221-23. For some time already, he had found himself frustrated by attacks against the , and for this and other, undisclosed reasons, he announced his decision to resign as co-editor in early 1758.John Pappas, "", Diderot Studies 4 (1963): 193-95. He continued to write on mathematical subjects for subsequent volumes.
Le chevalier de Jaucourt Louis de Jaucourt was born in Paris into a noble family that practiced Protestantism in secret. He trained as a physician but chose to devote himself to the life of a gentleman-scholar. Before becoming a contributor to the , he had already compiled a multi-volume medical dictionary, but the manuscript was lost in a shipwreck. After the publication of volume 1 of the , Jaucourt contacted the bookseller David and volunteered his services. Over time, the extent of his collaboration dramatically increased, so that, in the end, he wrote about a quarter of the articles in the . His articles were on a great variety of subjects, including religion, politics, medicine, botany, and the fine arts.Kafker and Kafker, Encyclopedists as Individuals, 175-77. Especially after D'Alembert's resignation as co-editor, Jaucourt became a sort of unofficial co-editor. For example, he began introducing biographies in geographical articles in volume 6, thereby contravening Diderot and D'Alembert's initial decision not to include biographies.Marie Leca-Tsiomis, "", in , ed. Gilles Barroux and Francois Pepin (Paris: Société Diderot, 2015), 71-82.
Alphabetical
Antoine-Joseph Dezallier d'Argenville Antoine-Gaspard Boucher d'Argis Arnulphe d'Aumont Jacques-Nicolas Bellin Jacques-François Blondel Claude Bourgelat Jean-François-Henri Collot Étienne Noël Damilaville Louis-Jean-Marie Daubenton Denis Diderot César Chesneau Du Marsais Marc-Antoine Eidous Jean-Baptiste de La Chapelle Guillaume Le Blond André le Breton Georges-Louis Le Sage Antoine Louis Baron d'Holbach Louis de Jaucourt Jacques-Raymond Lucotte Philippe-Antoine Magimel Edmé-François Mallet Paul-Jacques Malouin Jean-François Marmontel Charles de Secondat, Baron de Montesquieu Adrien Quiret de Margency Jean-Baptiste-Pierre le Romain Jean-Jacques Rousseau António Nunes Ribeiro Sanches Pierre Tarin François-Vincent Toussaint Anne Robert Jacques Turgot, Baron de Laune Urbain de Vandenesse Gabriel François Venel Suzanne Verdier Voltaire Claude Yvon
Number of articles
71,818 articles in 17 volumes: 37,870 – XXX (unsigned or undetermined) 17,288 – Louis de Jaucourt 5,394 – Denis Diderot 4,268 – Boucher d'Argis 1,925 – Edmé-François Mallet 1,309 – Jean Le Rond d'Alembert 994 – Jacques-Nicolas Bellin 720 – Guillaume Le Blond 707 – Gabriel François Venel 693 – Louis-Jean-Marie Daubenton 541 – Antoine-Joseph Dezallier d'Argenville 482 – Jacques-François Blondel 449 – Antoine Louis 428 – Marc-Antoine Eidous 414 – Baron d'Holbach 388 – François-Vincent Toussaint 344 – Jean-Jacques Rousseau 337 – Pierre Tarin 227 – Claude Bourgelat 214 – Jean-Baptiste de La Chapelle 199 – Urbain de Vandenesse 192 – Arnulphe d'Aumont 129 – César Chesneau Du Marsais 119 – Cahusac 108 – Le Roy 107 – Landois 91 – Beauzée 78 – Paul-Jacques Malouin 70 – Jean-Baptiste-Pierre le Romain 61 – Louis-Jacques Goussier, also supervisor of the engraved plates 56 – Malouin 45 – Lenglet Du Fresnoy 41 – Daubenton | Diderot 39 – Claude Yvon 39 – Daubenton | Vandenesse 32 – Boucher d'Argis 26 – de La Chapelle | d'Alembert 26 – Voltaire 25 – Diderot | Mallet 23 – Daubenton | Jaucourt 22 – Daubenton, le Subdelegue 21 – Barths 20 – Mallet | Diderot 20 – Formey 20 – Daubenton | Jaucourt 14 – Rousseau | d'Alembert 14 – Beauzee 13 – Watelet 13 – Boucher d'Argis 12 – Douchet et Beauzee 12 – Daubenton | d'Argenville 11 – Diderot | Vandenesse 10 – Jacques-François de Villiers 10 – Marmontel 10 – Forbonnais 9 – Papillon 9 – Mallet | d'Alembert 9 – Daubenton | Daubenton, le Subdelegue 8 – Faiguet 7 – d'Argenville | Diderot 7 – Tarin 7 – Pestr 7 – Jaucourt 7 – Bellin | Bellin 6 – Vandenesse | Diderot 6 – Toussaint | Mallet 6 – Durival 6 – Beauzee et Duchet 5 – d'Aubenton 5 – d'Alembert | Diderot 5 – Yvon | Diderot 5 – Venel | Venel 5 – Menuret 5 – Mallet | Mallet 5 – Diderot | Daubenton 5 – Daubenton | d'Argenville | Vandenesse 5 – Daubenton | Vandenesse | Diderot 5 – C. D. J. | Jaucourt 4 – d'Alembert | Mallet 4 – Romilly 4 – Rallier 4 – Louis | Diderot 4 – Blondel | Diderot
By letter
In the , most of the regular authors are identified by a letter at the end of an article. By contrast, irregular contributors were often identified with their full names.
(A) – Boucher d'Argis (a) – Lenglet Du Fresnoy (B) – Cahusac (b) – Venel (C) – Pestré (c) – Daubenton, le Subdélégué (D) – Goussier (d) – d'Aumont (E) – de La Chapelle (e) – Bourgelat (F) – Dumarsais (f) – de Villiers (G) – Mallet (g) – Barthès (H) – Toussaint (h) – Morellet (I) – Daubenton (K) – d'Argenville (L) – Tarin (M) – Malouin (m) – Ménuret de Chambaud (N) – Vandenesse (O) – d'Alembert (P) – Blondel (Q) – Le Blond (R) – Landois (S) – Rousseau (T) – Le Roy (V) – Eidous (X) – Yvon (Y) – Louis (Z) – Bellin (*) – Diderot (D.J.) – de Jaucourt (—) – d'Holbach (V.D.F.) – Forbonnais (E.R.M.) – Douchet and Beauzée
See also Wikipedians
References