Page 250 - Encyclopedia Of World History Vol IV

raynal, abbé guillaume 1551

Grimal, N. (1992). A history of ancient Egypt. Oxford, UK: Blackwell Raynal was joined in his enterprise by various Enlight-
Publishers. enment figures, the most important being the co-editor of
Quirke, S. (1990). Who were the pharaohs? A history of their names with
a list of cartouches. London: British Museum. the Encyclopedia, Denis Diderot. Diderot’s more radical
vision was increasingly prominent in the History editions
of 1774 and 1781 and was especially prominent in the
attacks on slavery and political oppression. Raynal also
relied on numerous printed sources and the reports of
Raynal, Abbé colonial administrators, traders, and persons of learning
with whom he had contact. Raynal himself traveled only
Guillaume through his writings.

(1713–1796) Although the History was interspersed with anecdotes
French historian and digressions, its organization reflected the direction
announced in the title. Beginning with the East Indies,
he Abbé Guillaume Raynal was the primary author Raynal described not only the Portuguese, Dutch, Eng-
Tof Philosophical and Political History of the Euro- lish, and French expansion in Asia, but also the lesser
pean Settlements and Commerce in the Two Indies. This roles of Russia, Prussia, and Sweden. China and India
book, known as “the History,” was a multivolume explo- were given extensive treatments, and then the focus
ration of European expansion in the East and West shifted to the West Indies and descriptions of the Span-
Indies, as Asia and the Americas were then designated. ish and Portuguese conquests and colonization in the
One of the most popular and influential works of the New World. In the following books Raynal and his col-
eighteenth century, this collaborative venture appeared in laborators examined French and British colonization in
three major editions and many printings between 1770 the Antilles and then in North America. Slavery and the
and 1781. Like Denis Diderot’s Encyclopedia, it was a slave trade were central to this discussion.The last book
laboratory of Enlightenment ideas and concerns with an of the second and third editions constituted an overview
agenda of opposing tyranny and ignorance.The Enlight- of the moral and philosophical underpinnings that char-
enment was a philosophic movement of the eighteenth acterized much of the History. Such topics as religion,
century marked by a rejection of traditional social, reli- morality, tariffs, public credit, population, commerce,
gious, and political ideas and an emphasis on ration- and agriculture were followed by a final theme, “Reflec-
alism. However, the History was more thematic in tion on the benefit and harm which the discovery of the
comparing the experiences of European nations in the New World has done to Europe.”
pursuit of global commerce both in Asia and the New The Jesuit-trained Abbé Raynal (an abbé is a member
World. Raynal focused on the methods by which of the French secular clergy) embraced progressive
colonies and trading stations were established, the Enlightenment ideals, even though the editions of the
impact of colonialism on the indigenous cultures, and History and several of his minor works betrayed many
the effects of imperialism on European countries. Beyond shifts and inconsistencies in his positions. He shared the
his comparative and global perspectives, what also con- popular ideology of the French economists known as
nected him to twentieth-century approaches to world his- “Physiocrats” in advocating free trade, the elimination of
tory was his inclusive concern with elements of both commercial monopolies, and the advantages of free labor
material and nonmaterial culture. He was just as fasci- over slavery. Indeed, although Raynal came to represent
nated by the products of commerce and the geographi- a gradual approach to emancipation, contemporaries
cal conditions of commercial intercourse as he was by viewed the History as an oracle of the antislavery move-
the principles of colonialism. ment. A foe of the extremes of political absolutism and