Henri Ternaux-Compans (born in Paris in 1807; died there in December 1864) was a French historian.

Biography

After finishing his studies in Paris, he entered the diplomatic service and was secretary of the embassies at

Madrid Madrid ( ; ) is the capital and List of largest cities in Spain, most populous municipality of Spain. It has almost 3.5 million inhabitants and a Madrid metropolitan area, metropolitan area population of approximately 7 million. It i ...

and

Lisbon Lisbon ( ; ) is the capital and largest city of Portugal, with an estimated population of 567,131, as of 2023, within its administrative limits and 3,028,000 within the Lisbon Metropolitan Area, metropolis, as of 2025. Lisbon is mainlan ...

, and

chargé d'affaires A (), plural ''chargés d'affaires'', often shortened to ''chargé'' (French) and sometimes in colloquial English to ''charge-D'', is a diplomat who serves as an embassy's chief of mission in the absence of the ambassador. The term is Frenc ...

Brazil Brazil, officially the Federative Republic of Brazil, is the largest country in South America. It is the world's List of countries and dependencies by area, fifth-largest country by area and the List of countries and dependencies by population ...

, but resigned, and devoted several years to travel through Spain and South America, doing research in the state libraries. Toward the close of

Louis Philippe Louis Philippe I (6 October 1773 – 26 August 1850), nicknamed the Citizen King, was King of the French from 1830 to 1848, the penultimate monarch of France, and the last French monarch to bear the title "King". He abdicated from his throne ...

's reign he was elected a deputy, but he soon returned to his studies.

Works

Ternaux-Compans collected and published a valuable series of works concerning the discovery and early history of South America. They include: * ''Bibliothèque Americaine, ou catalogue des ouvrages relatifs à l'Amérique depuis sa découverte en 1493, jusqu'en l'an 1700'' (Paris, 1836) *''Belle et agréable narration du premier voyage de Nicolas Federmann le jeune, d'Ulm aux Indes de la mer Océane et de ce qui lui est arrivé dans ce pays jusqu'à son retour en Espagne, ecrite brièvement et diverssante à lire'', 1837 * ''Voyages, relations et mémoires originaux pour servir a l'histoire de la découverte de l'Amérique'' (10 vols., 1836-'8; 2d series, 10 vols., 1839–40) * ''Archives des voyages, ou collection d'anciennes relations inédites'' (2 vols., 1840–41) *''Recueil de documents et mémoires originaux sur l'histoire des possessions espagnoles dans l'Amérique à diverses époques de la conquête'', 1840 Texte en ligne
/small> *''De la position des Anglais aux Indes, et de l'expédition contre la Chine'', 1840 Texte en ligne
/small> * ''Essai sur la théogonie Mexicaine'' (1840) * ''Histoire du Mexique par Don Alvaro Tezozomac'' (2 vols., 1849) * ''Essai sur l'ancien Cundinamarca'' (1862) * ''Notice historique sur la Guyane Française'' (1863)

References

External links

* 1807 births 1864 deaths 19th-century French historians Writers from Paris 19th-century French diplomats French male non-fiction writers 19th-century French male writers {{France-historian-stub