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Samo est un aventurier du VIIe siècle. Peu connu en France, il est pourtant célébré dans les pays slaves comme héros fondateur. Il est même comparé à Vercingétorix. Qui est Samo ? Dans quel archives, peut-on le trouver ? En tout cas, sa vie rocambolesque a des choses à nous dire sur les rapports est-ouest, une problématique intéressante dans le contexte actuel.

Macé de La Fa est un clerc des portes de la ville de Tours au XVe siècle. Hormis de contrôler l'ouverture et la fermeture, il a la charge de surveiller les ouvriers, d'accompagner les notables dans les voyages officiels. Il a un rôle bien plus stratégique qu'on ne le pense. En suivant ses traces dans les archives, on peut mieux comprendre comment fonctionne une ville au Moyen-Age, de la prise de décision à l'application.

Qui est vraiment Jacques Auriol ? Un simple artisan de Ganges au XIVe siècle ? Un homme d'affaire prêt à tout ? Les nouvelles méthodes d'analyse réseau, appliquées à l'histoire, permettent de révéler un autre visage de Jacques Auriol et d'expliquer son irrésistible ascension sociale.

Dans la reliure d'un imprimé de la Bibliothèque nationale de France, les papiers de Colin de Lormoye ont été mis au jour. Dans ce document exceptionnel, ce couturier parisien y dévoile son métier, ses méthodes de travail, ses clients, en résumé le regard d'un artisan XVe siècle sur sa propre activité.

Pourquoi Maria Porcella, nourrice ayant vécu au XIIe siècle, apparaît dans le cartulaire des Guilhem de Montpellier ? Didier Panfili, enseignant-chercheur au LAMOP, nous révèle qu'elle est au coeur d'un procès retentissant.

Dans la bibliothèque de l'abbaye de Saint Gall, si on se penche dans les marges du manuscrit "L'histoire contre les païens" d'Orose, on peut découvrir des mots et des croquis géographiques. Qui est l'auteur de ces discrètes observations ? Il s'agit Ekkehard IV, moine du XIe siècle, qui a actualisé au fil de sa lecture, des noms de ville, des représentations de l'oekoumène. Finalement, les savoirs géographiques ne sont pas figés au Moyen-Age comme on pourrait le penser.

Jean Bridoullet était un maître de forge de l'usine à fer de Glinet (Haute Normandie). À travers une fouille archéologique et des documents anciens, le portrait de Jean Bridoullet se dessine. Danielle Arribet -Deroin met au jour également une révolution technologique très importante : la fabrication de fer dans des hauts fourneaux grâce au procédé indirect.

Comment un comte de l'empire se transforme en ermite, parvient à défricher la forêt et à ramener la paix entre l'empereur et le duc de Bohême ? C'est là toute l'histoire de cet aristocrate qui a vécu à la frontière de la Bavière aux alentours de l'an 1000 et qui s'est affirmé dans ses multiples fonctions comme un véritable meneur d'hommes.

Cristoforo Buondelmonti, voyageur florentin humaniste, précurseur de l'archéologie, visita les îles grecques de la mer Egée et de la mer Ionienne au début du XVe siècle. Il est l'auteur du Livre des îles de l'Archipel, une description géographique illustrée de cartes, inaugurant un nouveau genre littéraire, l'isolario, ou insulaire, appelé à un grand succès au XVIe siècle. En situant autant que possible les ruines et les vestiges antiques, ces cartes témoignent des intérêts des humanistes du…

En 1492, Jacqueline dite aussi Jaques est au coeur d'un imbroglio judiciaire: 3 maris, 3 procès et un meurtre plus tard, elle écrit au pape pour obtenir pardon.

Lorenz von Leuzenbrunn est espion pour le compte de la ville impériale de Nuremberg aux alentours de 1500. Dans ce cadre, il rapporte à la ville, par des messages écrits à l'encre sympathique ce qu'il voit et entend à propos des entreprises nobiliaires et princières susceptibles d'affecter, directement ou indirectement, la ville. La vie de Lorenz documente ainsi une activité de renseignement mal connue.

Simon, juif vivant à Arles au XIIIe siècle est victime de harcèlement de la part des autorités royales. Mais il n'en reste pas là et se présente devant les enquêteurs envoyés par Louis IX pour qu'ils réparent cette injustice.

Thomas Hoccleve était un scribe et poète qui a vécu à Londres au tournant des XIVe et XVe siècles. Il nous a laissé une poésie à la fois très personnelle et très politique, en anglais, ainsi que l'un des rares témoignages de la condition de scribe à cette époque.

Entre 1396 et 1401, le monde feutré des collèges parisiens est secoué par une affaire mettant aux prises les boursiers du collège d'Autun et leur ancien proviseur. Tout commence par le renvoi du proviseur Mathieu de Mondières par le maître du collège. L'affaire est portée devant le Parlement et donne lieu à la rédaction d'une source exceptionnelle : un rouleau de plaidoirie, long de dix mètres, qui rassemble les arguments du maître et de ses alliés au sein du collège. Pour justifier le renvoi…

Venu du Piémont pour s'installer à Aix-en-Provence, vers 1440, Barthélemy Guerci est avant tout un nom qui apparaît au détour de divers contrats notariés et de comptes. Assemblées, ces mentions éparses permettent de restituer des bribes de la biographie d'un homme ordinaire. Tantôt maçon, meunier, charretier, fontainier ou aubergiste, le Barthélemy Guerci que nous pouvons saisir se présente comme un immigré parmi d'autres, développant des stratégies de survie qui voient les réussites et les…

The Catalan Atlas is a collection of illuminated charts bound together like a book. Intended for the King of France, it gave him a picture of the entire known world in his time. Geographical, political and economic details are intermingled with ancient legends and the "wonders” of distant Asia on these portolan maps. These are based on medieval tales, like the Books of Marvels of the World based on Marco Polo's travels. A map kept at the French national library BnF (Bibliothèque nationale…

This beautifully designed portolan atlas made in Venice is generally ascribed to Battista Agnese and dated to the 1540s. It charts the entire world then explored by Europeans with Europe, Asia, Africa, and much of the Americas, as well as the routes of the great Portuguese and Spanish explorers. Battista Agnese's atlas is a celebration of the European explorations of the world as viewed from Venice. A map kept at the French national library BnF (Bibliothèque nationale de France),…

This gilded ceremonial nautical chart which was drawn in 1622 in the manner of a painting is the work of Hessel Gerritsz, who was the chief hydrographer of the Dutch East India Company from 1617 to 1632. This is the first depiction of the Pacific Ocean in its whole as it was then sailed through by Dutch ships. The author of this portolan included portraits of the Pacific discoverers, Balboa, Magellan and Le Maire. He thus paid tribute to the navigators while asserting Holland's claim to…

The Miller Atlas, named after its former owner, is a collection of nautical charts completed in 1519. Commissioned by the King of Portugal Manuel I, it is a masterpiece of Portuguese cartography resulting from the collaboration of several cartographers and artists: Lopo Homem, Pedro Reinel, Jorge Reinel and the illuminator Antonio de Holanda. It was intended to show the power and expanse of the Portuguese Empire, which extended from Brazil to Indonesia. This portolan opens onto a world map…

This map was drawn up by the Genoese Nicolas Caverio circa 1505 and shows all the Portuguese ports of call along the route to the Indies. It provided one of the oldest mappings of the east coast of Africa. The Indian Ocean which had been explored as early as 1498 by Vasco de Gama was gradually taking its modern form. This famous portolan is also a record of European explorations in Central America and Brazil at the turn of the 16th century. A map kept at the French national library BnF …

This ornamental nautical chart, also called portolan, dated 1662, was produced by François Ollive's workshop in Marseilles. Enclosed in a trompe l'oeil frame and illustrated with numerous coats of arms, city views, naval battle scenes, sea monsters and sirens, it was not intended for use at sea, but to serve as a ceremonial document for wealthy merchants. Numerous ornaments on the southern shores of the Mediterranean highlighted the geopolitical and commercial importance of this region for…

First of all, this map shows the extent of the knowledge Norman cartographers had gained about America, especially in Acadia and Brazil. A juxtaposition of French and Spanish coats of arms seems to express a joint domination over the fabulous riches of the New Worlds. This portolan is less a navigational tool than a political document. A map kept at the French national library BnF (Bibliothèque nationale de France), Maps and Plans Department, shelf mark number GE SH ARCH-6 View this…

The author of this 1699 nautical chart, John Thornton, served with two English trading companies. The Island of Sumatra, the Straits of Malacca and the Sunda which are shown here were strategic passages to Southeast Asia and the Spice Islands. The style of this portolan, its harmony of colours and careful handwriting are the essential characteristics of the works of this English cartographer. A map kept at the French national library BnF (Bibliothèque nationale de France), Maps and Plans…

Dated from the late13th century, the so-called "Pisana Carta” is considered to be the oldest nautical chart that has ever come down to us. It mainly covers the Mediterranean Sea, of which the Spanish and French coasts and the large islands are represented with some degree of accuracy. This map is part of the charts called "portolans” and it comprises their main attributes: harbour and port names inscribed perpendicular to the coastline, wind lines indicating compass directions and distance…

This portolan map of the Mediterranean and Black Sea was drawn on a single velum leaf. The date, 1447, and the signature of the artist, Gabriel de Vallseca, are located on the neck of the animal which provided its skin. Vallseca was a representative of the Catalan cartographic school that produced many ornamental nautical charts from the 14th century onwards. The area depicted is closed around the Mediterranean. The coastline is finely drawn from Gibraltar to Syria, and nine cities from the…

This 15th century anonymous nautical chart could not be accurately dated. Charles de La Roncière ascribed it to Christopher Columbus in 1924. This portolan is divided into two parts by a line enhanced with gold and which represent two distinct spaces. The right-hand side is a nautical chart of the Mediterranean and includes Portuguese discoveries in Africa extending as far as the Gulf of Guinea, and also speculative territories in the North Atlantic Ocean. A small world map is depicted on the…

This nautical planisphere was made in 1573 by Domingos Teixeira, a member of a prominent lineage of Portuguese cartographers. It represents the extent of European knowledge after a century and a half of exploratory voyages. Only Oceania and the confines of Asia and America remained unknown. This portolan bore a strong geopolitical significance because it depicts the meridian and anti-meridian defined by the Treaty of Tordesillas in 1494 which drew a demarcation line between the areas of…

This nautical chart of the Indian Ocean covers the entire expanse of the Dutch East India Company's operations from the Cape of Good Hope to Japan. It was engraved on copper and printed on vellum in Amsterdam by Pieter Goos (1616-1675) in 1660, then republished in 1700 by Johannes Van Keulen. This portolan depicted the state of Dutch knowledge about the Indian Ocean and the southwest Pacific in 1644 after the exploratory sailing of the Dutchman Abel Tasman along the coast of Australia. A unique…

The author of this atlas was a former ship captain and produced a large number of atlases and maps in Venice and Rome in the second half of the 15th century. These maps show the Mediterranean Sea and the Black Sea, and also the coasts and islands of the Atlantic Ocean from England to the shores of Africa which the Portuguese had recently explored. A map kept at the French national library BnF (Bibliothèque nationale de France), Maps and Plans Department, shelf mark number GE DD-1988…

What do we know about the Indian Ocean? It was not the result of an extraordinary discovery but rather of successive explorations and exchanges between the civilizations of the West and the East. Historians trace the history of its representation through the study of nautical charts from Antiquity to the 18th century. They thus show us that the narrative of its fabrication is strongly linked to its representation and that the maps have thus contributed to giving this ocean its meaning and…

La série « La science au box-office » s'inspire des codes des bandes annonces hollywoodiennes pour vous faire partager les plus étonnantes études, découvertes et innovations scientifiques de notre époque. Dans « La maison aux images », les murs et plafonds richement illustrés de maisons du Moyen-Âge nous replongent dans un monde lointain et mystérieux où religion, fantasmes et superstitions étaient solidement ancrés dans la vie quotidienne.

World War I marked the entry of the 20th century into mass slaughter. To preserve the memory of all the soldiers who died for France, war memorials were erected throughout the country at the beginning of the 1920s. Endowed with multiple forms and meanings, they are a precious testimony to post-war mentalities. Several historians have highlighted the various meanings of these monuments in response to the need for mourning for families and the need to commemorate the French Republic's victory…

This is an excerpt from the film "Rendez-vous aux monuments aux morts" (congregation at the war memorials) explaining the post-war need to erect memorials to commemorate and pay tribute to the dead.

This is an excerpt from the film "Rendez-vous aux monuments aux morts" (congregation at the war memorials) explaining the different types of memorials erected.

Throughout the north-western Mediterranean coastland, at the end of the Middle Ages, princes, prelates, nobility and great merchants ordered large decorations for their residences, the painted ceilings of which were a key element. Particular attention was paid to the trims, planks slid between the joists to hide the unaesthetic empty space between them. Monique Bourin and Pierre-Olivier Dittmar, historians as well as heritage curators, archaeologists and restorers, show us the meaning and…

In recent years, in Languedoc-Roussillon, painted ceilings have been regularly rediscovered in old medieval houses. These paintings, dating from the late Middle Ages, are mainly found in buildings belonging to the ecclesiastical or aristocratic elite, and rich merchants. Historians Monique Bourin and Pierre-Olivier Dittmar unveil the meaning and social function of these images in the medieval home world. For the sponsor, these images, as close depictions of the values and interests in everyday…

Researchers trace the history of the CNRS Villejuif campus units while identifying the site's highlights according to three main periods. 1930-1960: Creation of the Villejuif Cancer Institute, bringing together research laboratories and a hospital in order to bring medical research and clinical applications closer together. Integration of this Institute in the CNRS in 1948 and development of an electronic microscopy laboratory. 1960-1980: Separation of the Institute into two entities,…