Charles Higounet (13 January 1911 – 8 April 1988, aged 77) was a French

historian A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the stu ...

medievalist The asterisk ( ), from Late Latin , from Ancient Greek , ''asteriskos'', "little star", is a typographical symbol. It is so called because it resembles a conventional image of a heraldic star. Computer scientists and mathematicians often voc ...

, specialising in

bastide Bastides are fortified new towns built in medieval Languedoc, Gascony, Aquitaine, England and Wales during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, although some authorities count Mont-de-Marsan and Montauban, which was founded in 1144, as the fi ...

s and the Middle Ages in the southwest of France.

Biography

Charles Higounet was a French medievalist who taught in

Bordeaux Bordeaux ( , ; Gascon oc, Bordèu ; eu, Bordele; it, Bordò; es, Burdeos) is a port city on the river Garonne in the Gironde department, Southwestern France. It is the capital of the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region, as well as the prefecture o ...

III university from 1946 to 1979, where a research center was named after him. He used to be a specialist of

bastides Bastides are fortified new towns built in medieval Languedoc, Gascony, Aquitaine, England and Wales during the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, although some authorities count Mont-de-Marsan and Montauban, which was founded in 1144, as the fir ...

(a new and specific form of city in the middle age) and the history of south-west France, and he was especially noticed after his history of

, for which he won the historical prize,

Grand prix Gobert The grand prix Gobert is one of the prizes of the French Academy. It has been awarded every year in the field of History since 1834. It was instituted by the Foundation created by the estate of Baron Gobert Napoleon (1807–1833), son of general J ...

, in 1973. He also led a team that worked on a historical atlas for French cities. He also wrote a volume of the "

Que sais-je ? "Que sais-je?" (QSJ) (; Literally: "What do I know?", ) is an editorial collection published by the Presses universitaires de France (PUF). The aim of the series is to provide the lay reader with an accessible introduction to a field of study wr ...

" (famous French collection of thousands of shorts reference essays, summarising the state of the knowledge on various subjects) on various forms of writing. The book has been re-edited more than ten times.

Published works

* ''Les Allemands en Europe centrale et orientale au Moyen âge'' 1989 Aubier, * ''Atlas historique des villes de France'', 1982 - * ''Le Comté de Comminges'', 1949 * ''Défrichements et villeneuves du Bassin parisien'', 1990 Editions du Centre national de la recherche scientifique, , 384 P * ''L'Écriture'', 1976 * ''La Gascogne au XIVe et XVe siècles'', 1969 * ''Grand cartulaire de La Sauve-Majeure'', 1996, Fédération historique du Sud-Ouest, * ''Histoire de Bordeaux...'', dir, 1962 Editions Privat, , 418 p * ''Histoire de l'Aquitaine'', dir, 1976 * ''Paysages et villages neufs du Moyen âge'', 1975 * ''Recherches sur l'histoire de l'occupation du sol du Périgord'', 1978, Editions du Centre national de la recherche scientifique, * ''Recueil des actes de l'Abbaye cistercienne de Bonnefont en Comminges'', publ. by Charles Samaran,... and Charles Higounet,.1970, Collection de documents inédits sur l'histoire de France. Série in 8, * ''La Seigneurie et le vignoble de Château-Latour'', 1974 * ''Villes, sociétés et économies médiévales, recueil d'articles'', 1992 * ''L'écriture'', Que Sais-je, Presses universitaires de France, , 2003.

Articles

* "''Les anciennes bastides du Sud-Ouest de la France''", L’Information Historique, 1946, ps. 28-35. * "''Bastides et frontières''", Le Moyen Age, 1948, t. LIV. * "''Les bastides du Sud-Ouest''", Le Moyen Age, 1948. * "''La frange orientale des bastides''", Annales du Midi, Tolosa, Privat, 1948–1949, t. LXI, ps. 359-367. * "''Villeneuves et bastides désertées''", Villages désertés et histoire économique (XI-XVIIIe siècle), Les hommes et la terre-IX- Ecole pratique des Hautes Etudes, Paris, S.E.V.P.E.N., 1965, ps. 253-265. * "''Nouvelle approche sur les bastides du Sud-Ouest aquitain''", Revue Urbanisme, Paris, 1967, n°101, ps. 32-35. * "''Les villeneuves du Piémont et les bastides de Gascogne (XIIe-XIVe siècles)",'' Compte-Rendus de l'Acad. des Inscr. et Belles Lettres, Paris, 1970, ps. 130-139. * "''Paysages et Villages neufs du Moyen Age''", recueil d'articles, Bordeaux, 1975, 492 p. * "''Les bastides en question'' ", Revue Urbanisme, Paris, n°173-174, Paris, 1979, p. 6-10. * "''La place dans les bastides médiévales''", Plazas et sociabilité en Europe et Amérique latine, Publications de la Case de Velasquez, sér. Recherches en Sciences Sociales, Paris, fasc. VI, 1982, p. 119 * "''Villes, sociétés et économies médiévales''" / Recueil d'articles de Charles Higounet, Talence, Institut d'histoire, Université de Bordeaux III, Fédération historique du Sud-Ouest, 1992. * and many others... {{DEFAULTSORT:Higounet, Charles 1911 births 1988 deaths French medievalists 20th-century French historians French male non-fiction writers Historical geographers 20th-century French male writers