Chronology of l'Encyclopédie

[Adapted from L'Encyclopédie, Jeanne Charpentier and Michel Charpentier, eds. (Paris: Éditions Bordas, 1967), pp. 3-10.]

*Follow the hyperlinks to works that are available through the ARTFL Project.

• 1670 Publication of Moreri's Grand dictionnaire historique.
  
  
• 1675 Colbert asks the Académie des Sciences to compile a technical dictionary. The first volume of the Description des arts et métiers is not published until 1761.
  
  
• 1694 First edition of the Dictionnaire de l'Académie française.
  
  
• 1697 Bayle publishes his Dictionnaire historique et critique.
  
  
• 1704 Publication in London of John Harris's Lexicon technologicam or an Universal Dictionary of the arts and sciences.
  
  First edition of the so-called Dictionnaire de Trévoux (Dictionnaire universel français et latin contenant la signification et la définition tant des mots [...] que des termes propres de chaque état et de chaque profession [...] l'explication de tout ce que renferment les sciences et les arts) by the Jesuits.
  
  
• 1718 Second edition of the Dictionnaire de l'Académie française.
  
  
• 1728 Publication in London of EPHRAIM CHAMBERS's Cyclopaedia or an Universal Dictionary of arts and sciences.
  
  
• 1732 Fontenelle issues a revised edition of Thomas CORNEILLE'S Dictionnaire des arts et des sciences (1694).
  
  
• 1740 Third edition of the Dictionnaire de l'Académie française.
  
  
• 1743 Fifth edition of the Dictionnaire de Trévoux.
  
  
• 1744 Johann Jakob Brucker finishes his Historia critica philosophiae.

• 1745 (February). The publisher LE BRETON make an agreement with the German Sellins and the Englishman Mills to translate Chambers's Cyclopaedia into French.

  (26 March). Le Breton obtains a privilege for a four-volume edition of a Dictionnaire universel des arts et des sciences.
  
  (August). Disagreement between Le Breton and his two collaborators

  (18 October). Le Breton signs a contract for the publication of a French encyclopaedia with three Parisian colleagues, Briasson, Durand et David, who has been working since 1744 on a French edition of Robert James's Dictionnaire de médecine, translated by Diderot.
  
  

• 1746 (21 January). The Chancelor d'Aguesseau renews the privilege of the Encyclopédie ou Dictionnaire universel des arts et des sciences, traduit des Dictionnaires anglais Chambers et de Harris, avec des additions.

  (27 June). The abbé DE GUA DE MALVES, member of the Académie des sciences is given editorial responsibility for the work. He will be assisted by DIDEROT and d'ALEMBERT who will retranslate certain articles.
  
  (7 July). The Parlement condemns the Pensées philosophiques, an anonymous work by Diderot.
  
  

• 1747 (16 October). Diderot and d'Alembert replace l'abbé de Malves as editors of the Encyclopédie.
  
  
• 1748 (30 April). A new privilege acknowledges changes in the general conception of the work; it is now entitled Encyclopédie, ou Dictionnaire universel des sciences, arts et métiers, traduit [...] avec des augmentations.
  
  (October). Montesquieu publishes <l'Esprit des lois in Geneva.

  Diderot begins technical research in Parisian workshops.
  
  

• 1749 (June). Diderot hires an artist, Goussier,to rework and complete the images purchased from engravers and other merchants.

  (24 July). Diderot is arrested and imprisoned at Vincennes as author of the Lettre sur les aveugles à l'usage de ceux qui voient. After a month, he is permitted to see his friends, d'Alembert and Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and his publishers, who fear that his absence will hurt the Encyclopédie.

  (3 November). Diderot is liberated and immediately begins work again.

• 1750 (November). 8.000 copies of the definitive Prospectus are issued; 10 in-folio volumes including 2 volumes of plates are anticipated. Subscription costs: 60 livres deposit, 36 livres to be paid on delivery of the first volume, announced for June 1751; 24 livres for each additional volume to be delivered every six months, 40 livres for the eighth volume with the two volumes of plates; total 372 livres.
  
  
• 1751 (January). In the Journal de Trévoux, the Jesuit Berthier criticizes the imitation of Francis Bacon's tree of knowledge in the Prospectus.

• 1751 (February). The Lettre au R. P. Berthier, Diderot's stingingly ironic response to Berthier. In order to take further advantage of the publicity, the article "Art" is issued with the letter. Lively discussion follows, generating interest in the work and attracting additional subscribers (more than 1,000 by April).
  
  (28 June). Publication of the first volume; 2.050 copies printed with the Discours préliminaire written by d'Alembert.

  (October). Violent attacks in the Journal de Trévoux ; the Jesuits accuse the authors of the Encyclopédie of criticizing their teaching methods, denigrating kings and saints, preaching freedom of speech and plagiarizing the Dictionnaire de Trévoux. The archibishop of Mirepoix, Boyer, warns the King against the dangerous tendencies of the Encyclopédie; Malesherbes, the new director of the book trade, is required to name three censors who will look over the articles.

  (18 November). L'abbé DE PRADES, a friend of Diderot's and collaborator on the Encyclopédie, successfully defends his theological thesis at the Sorbonne, Quel est celui sur la force duquel Dieu a répandu le souffle de la vie? But the Jesuits quickly detect heretical propositions in the work.

  (December). Voltaire, in the conclusion of the Siècle de Louis XIV, praises the Encyclopédie.

• 1752 (January). Several days after the publication of the second volume of the Encyclopédie, the abbé de Prades's thesis is censored by the Sorbonne, which cites him for promoting sensualism and natural religion. The archbishop of Paris, CHRISTOPHE DE BEAUMONT, issues a decree; the Parlement condemns it to be burned.
  
  (February). A pamphlet written by the Jesuit Geoffroy, Les Réflexions d'un franciscain, avec une lettre préliminaire adressée à M. [Diderot], auteur en partie du Dictionnaire philosophique, reveals the relations between the abbé de Prades and the abbés Yvon, Pestré, Mallet, who are collaborating on the Encyclopédie. At the same time, the Jesuits denounce the ariticle Certitude, signed by the abbé de Prades, as heretical.

  (7 February). A decree by the royal council orders the suppression of the first two volumes of the Encyclopédie. Shortly thereafter, Prades, Pestré et Yvon go into exile.
  
  

• 1752 (May). Thanks to the efforts of Malesherbes--who seems to have hidden Diderot's papers in his own father's house to protect them from seizure--and Madame de Pompadour, the government discreetly authorizes Diderot and d'Alembert to resume their work.

  (November). La Querelle des bouffons, pitting proponents of traditional French opera against the supporters of Italian opera buffa, begins to claim public attention.

• 1753 Publication of volume III of the Encyclopédie, printed in 3,100 copies, with an Avertissement des éditeurs written by d'Alembert.
  
  
• 1754 (February). New printing of the first three volumes, bringing the total number of copies to 4,200.

  (November). Volume IV of the Encyclopédie preceded by d'Alembert's Avertissment. The undertaking has taken on national importance. In the article Droit de copie, planned for volume V, the bookseller David writes that the work "appartient à la France". D'Alembert is elected to the Académie Française.
  
  

• 1755 (November). Volume V, preceded by the Éloge de Montesquieu by d'Alembert.
  
  
• 1756 (May). Volume VI of the Encyclopédie preceded by another Avertissment written by d'Alembert.
  
  (August). D'Alembert visits Voltaire at les Délices near Geneva. They discuss the article Genève.
  
  
• 1757 (5 January). DAMIENS attempts to assassinate Louis XV.
  
  (21 April). Edict by the Parlement prescribes the death penalty or service in the galleys for authors and publishers of tendencious and clandestine works.

  (30 June). Fréron accuses the author of Le Fils naturel, Diderot, of plagiarism. Attacks against the Encyclopédie appear in the le Mercure de France: "Premier Mémoire sur les Cacouacs" (les Encyclopedists), "Avis utile et nouveau Mémoire pour servir à l'histoire des Cacouacs" by Moreau, royal historiographer, who portrays the Encyclopedic party as an powerful clan organized for the purpose of attacking morality, religion and government (Jacques Proust, Diderot et l'Encyclopédie, p. 109); Other critiques appear in Fréron's Année littéraire , la Gazette littéraire, la Gazette de France, les Mémoires de Trévoux and les Nouvelles ecclésiastiques, the Jansenist periodical.
  
  (November). Volume VII of the Encyclopédie preceded by the Éloge de M. de Marsais written by d'Alembert. The article Genève, signed by d'Alembert, draws protest from Genevan pastors, who are insulted by his praise for their Socinianism, and from the devout faction in France which detects a deistic profession of faith.

• 1758 (January). Discouraged by the opposition the work has encountered and feeling that he is underpaid (letter to Voltaire, 20 January 1758), d'Alembert decides to abandon the enterprise.

  (March). The publishers compose a Mémoire sur les motifs de la suspension de l'Encyclopédie, in which they plead with d'Alembert to retain his position. He accepts reluctanly.

  (July). HELVÉTIUS, friend of the Encyclopedists, publishes his treatise De l'Esprit in which he elaborates a materialist philosophy.

  (August). The privilege for De l'Esprit is withdrawn.
  
  (September). Publication of the first two volumes of the Préjugés légitimes contre l'Encyclopédie; Abraham Chaumeix seeks to refute both the Encyclopédie and De l'Esprit.
  
  (November). The archbishop of Paris condemns De l'Esprit.
  
  

• 1759 (23 January). The Parlement examines eight subversive works, including De l'Esprit and the Encyclopédie. Violent declaration against their impiety and licence.

  (6 February). De l'Esprit is condemned to be burned. The Encyclopédie escapes this sentence, but it will be subject to a "revision committee" comprising theologians, lawyers and scholars, all Jansenists.

  (8 March). The royal council withdraws the privilege of 1746; the distribution and reprinting of the Encyclopédie are forbidden. The decree seems to mean the end of the undertaking, and d'Alembert quits definitively. However, in a sense, the proclamation saved the Encyclopédie by removing it from the legal control of its enemies (Jacques Proust, I'Encyclopédie, p. 65).
  
  (21 July). A new decree orders the publishers to reimburse subscribers for the unpublished volumes. But no subscribers request this money.

  The publishers make contact with foreign editors and propose that the printing of the work either be completed abroad or continue in France with the tolerance of the government. Malesherbes rejects the first solution and doesn't respond to the second. The Encyclopedists take this as implicit permission.
  
  Despite the condamnation of the work by the Pope Clément XIII: Encyclial "Ut Primum" (3 September), Diderot and the publishers propose compensating subscribers with delivery of the plates to appear one volume per year beginning in 1760.

  (8 September). New privilege accorded for a Recueil de mille planches gravées en taille douce sur les sciences, les arts libéraux et mécaniques, les explications des figures en quatre volumes in folio. Diderot is thus able to continue his work.

  (November). Adversaries of l'Encyclopédie attack from a new front. Fréron publishes the denunciation of a former bookseller employee: the plates, whose printing was being prepared, were purportedly stolen from Réaumur just before his death. L'Académie des Sciences--of which Réaumur had been secretary-for-life--investigates and ultimately absolves Diderot of this accusation.
  
  

• 1760 (March). LeFranc de Pompignan gives an acceptance speech at l'Académie Française which violently criticizes both l'Encyclopédie and the philosophical spirit. Voltaire replies in a succession of pamphlets--the quand, the pour, the que, the qui, the quoi, the oui the non, the car, the ah! ah!--and, in an effort to avenge Diderot, decides to present his canditature to l'Académie Française. Diderot, however, declines the offer.
  
  (May). Palissot's Philosophes opens at la Comédie-Française, a play which plagiarizes les Femmes savantes and abuses Diderot, Helvétius, Grimm, Madame Geoffrin and especially Rousseau, who is portrayed as an animal walking on all fours. L'abbé Morellet retorts with an incisive brochure, Vision de Charles Palissot, which will consequently warrant his imprisonment.
  
  
• 1761 While his Père de Famille is received with success, Diderot finishes the explanatory text to accompany the Encyclopédie's plates.
  
  
• 1762 The first volume of plates appears in January. The future of the Encyclopédie will be ensured by, of all people, the Jansenists: In response to the bankruptcy of the Jesuit La Valette, the Jansenist Parliament closes all the Jesuit secondary schools, and then, on the 6th of August, condemns "les bulles, brefs, constitutions, et autres règlements de la Société se disant de Jésus". The members of the Jesuit order are expelled from France and with them disappear the most passionate adversaries of l'Encyclopédie. Consequently, Diderot can now decline the offer of Catherine II to finish his Dictionnaire in Saint Petersburg.
  
  Fourth Edition of the Dictionnaire de l'Académie française.
  
  
• 1763 Volumes II and III of the plates are published. L'Encyclopédie loses its protector Malesherbes, who is fortunately replaced as director of the Librairie by Sartine, a friend of Diderot.
  
  
• 1764 (November). Searching for information in one of the printed, but not yet published volumes, Diderot realizes that in order to avoid the problems of censorship, the bookseller Le Breton had falsified for at least 2 years several of his articles as well as articles by Saint-Lambert, Turgot, d'Holbach, and Jaucourt. The philosophe knows it would be impossible to reprint everything and, pressed by his friends, he consents to see his work through to the end.
  
  
• 1765 (August). Diderot writes an Avertissement that will serve as a preface to Volume VIII. The completion of his work does little, however, to assuage his bitterness: "Notre ouvrage serait fini sans une nouvelle bêtise de l'imprimeur qui avait oublié dans un coin une partie du manuscrit. J'en ai, je crois, pour le reste de la semaine, après laquelle je m'écrierai: Terre! Terre!" (Letter to Sophie Volland, August 8 1765).
  
  (December). The death of the dauphin weakens the devout party, and the booksellers seize the opportunity to offer the remainder of l'Encyclopédie to the general public.
  
  
• 1766 (January). Publication of Volume IV of the plates and of the ten remaining Encyclopédie Volumes. The title, modified in a prudent stratagem, leads one to believe that the work has been printed abroad: Encyclopédie ou Dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers, par une Société de gens de lettres. Mis en ordre par M. ***. A Neufchatel, chez Samuel Fauche et Compagnie, libraires et imprimeurs, 1765.
  
  
• 1766 (28 February). Torture and execution of the chevalier de La Barre.

  (23 April). 8 day imprisonment in the Bastille of the bookseller Le Breton, guilty of having dispatched to Versailles, without authorization, several copies of the Encyclopédie's final volumes. This incident does not, however, prevent Diderot from completing the last plate volumes.
  
  

• 1767-1772 Publication of volumes V through XI of the plates.
  
  

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