Louis Leschi
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Epigrapher
Archaeologist
Louis Leschi | |
|---|---|
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| Born | 2 December 1893 |
| Died | 7 January 1954 (aged 60) Algiers |
| Occupations | Historian Epigrapher Archaeologist |
Louis Leschi (2 December 1893 – 7 January 1954) was a French historian, epigrapher and archaeologist, a specialist of ancient North Africa.
The son of academics, Louis Leschi followed himself an exemplary curriculum whose beginnings were interrupted by World War I. After his admission to the École Normale Superieure in 1919, he obtained his agrégation of history in 1922. He then was a member of the École française de Rome from 1922 to 1924. During this period of training, he followed the courses of René Cagnat and Jérôme Carcopino. It was during his stay in the French school in Rome that he was sent to Algeria to Stéphane Gsell and found his vocation of archaeologist specializing in ancient Algeria. He was appointed a professor in high school in Algiers until 1932. He was then also associated to the research conducted by Eugène Albertini and gave classes in 1926 at the Faculty.
When Albertini was appointed to the Collège de France in 1932, Leschi succeeded him at the direction of the Department of Antiquities of North Africa. Leschi also succeeded him and Stéphane Gsell, as a teacher at the Faculty of Algiers, but only as detached high school teacher, his lack of doctoral thesis preventing him to get the chair of the Faculty. Dividing his time between teaching and intense activity in the context of his archaeological responsibilities, Leschi ultimately never supported his thesis. That did not prevent him from becoming a renowned scholar and exert a profound influence on the development of archeology in Algeria. In 1932, he was a member of the board of the Algerian Historical Society of which he became vice president in 1944. In 1942, he was elected a corresponding member of the Academy of Inscriptions and Belles Lettres. He died of illness in 1954 without being able to publish an expected account on ancient Numidia.
