Marie-Jean Condorcet

David Williams (University of Sheffield)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.5.2.04: French Writing and Culture: Eighteenth-Century and the Enlightenment, 1700-1800.
Vol. editors: Edward Forman (University of Bristol), Jenny Mander (University of Cambridge), Síofra Pierse (University College Dublin), Tim Unwin (University of Bristol), David Williams (University of Sheffield)

Dates

Born 17 Sep 1743
Died 28 Mar 1794
Activity 1765-1794

Places

Born in France
Active in France

Activities

Primary

Economist
Educationalist
Mathematician
Philosopher
Politician
Reformer

Resources

Condorcet's Works

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Marie-Jean-Antoine-Nicolas Caritat de Condorcet made important contributions to the science of mathematical calculus and became associated with the

philosophes

whose development of Enlightenment ideas in France contributed so much to the French Revolution and to later European ideas of justice and civil rights. He was particularly influential in the early years of the Revolution, although he was to be arrested and murdered in the course of the terror. His

Esquisse d'un tableau historique des progrès de l'esprit humain [Sketch for a Historical Picture of the Progress of the Human Mind]

(1794) became one of the most influential expressions of the Enlightenment belief in human progress.

The Marquis de Condorcet was born in Ribemont in Picardy into a land-owning aristocratic family whose

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2128 words

Citation: Williams, David. "Marie-Jean Condorcet". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 26 April 2001 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=980, accessed 27 November 2024.]

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