Jean-Louis Taberd (1794–1840)[2] was a French missionary of the Paris Foreign Missions Society, and titular bishop of Isauropolis, in partibus infidelium.[3]

Taberd's 1838 map of Cochin China (or "Cocincina"), interior ̣(Đàng Trong) and exterior (Đàng Ngoài) in higher resolution with colors. Highest resolution map (3500 × 6111).
The 1838 Dictionarium Anamitico-Latinum.
A page of Jean-Louis Taberd's 1838 Vietnamese-Latin dictionary (Dictionarium Anamitico-Latinum), based on the manuscript dictionary of Pigneau de Béhaine.[1]
Map of the Vietnamese Empire, in Taberd's 1838 Dictionarium Latino-Annamiticum.

Career

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Born in Saint-Étienne, Jean-Louis Taberd was ordained priest in Lyon in 1817. He joined the Paris Foreign Missions Society in 1820, and was appointed to become a missionary in Cochinchina,[a] modern Vietnam. In 1827 he was appointed Vicar Apostolic of Cochinchina, and Bishop of the titular see of Isauropolis in 1830.[2][3] With the persecutions of the Emperor of Vietnam Minh Mạng, Mgr Taberd was forced to escape the country.

Jean-Louis Taberd first went to Penang and then Calcutta, where, with the help of Lord Auckland and the Asiatic Society he was able to publish his own Latin-Vietnamese dictionary in 1838.[3] He improved upon the previous works of Alexandre de Rhodes and Pigneau de Béhaine, whose 1773 Vietnamese-Latin dictionary he had been handed in manuscript form.[5] He also published Pigneau's dictionary in 1838 under the name Dictionarium Anamitico-Latinum.[1]

In his work The Geography of Cochin China, Taberd reports the Paracel Islands (today a hotly disputed island territory in Southeast Asia) as having been conquered and claimed by Emperor Gia Long in 1816.[6]

Legacy

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In the late 19th century, the renowned Catholic college Institut Taberd was founded in Saigon by the Brothers of the Christian Schools and, since 1943, to educate a Vietnamese elite.[7][8]

Works

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Notes

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  1. ^ Jean-Louis Taberd was likely among the first to explain the meaning of "Cochin China" in his 1837 scientific article; see quotation in Notes on Vietnam History.[4]

Citations

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  1. ^ a b Manteigne[who?], p.67
  2. ^ a b Catholic hierarchy
  3. ^ a b c The Asiatic Journal and Monthly Register, p.195
  4. ^ Vu Quoc Loc 2023a.
  5. ^ Wörterbücher: Ein Internationales Handbuch Zur Lexikographie by Franz Josef Hausmann, p.2584 [1]
  6. ^ Sovereignty Over the Paracel and Spratly Islands by Monique Chemillier-Gendreau p.180 [2]
  7. ^ JSTOR: The Vietnamese Elite of French Cochinchina, 1943, RB Smith - 1972 [3]
  8. ^ JSTOR: Conflict in the Classroom: A Case Study from Vietnam, 1918-38 GP Kelly - 1987 [4]

References

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  • Vu Quoc Loc (2023a), Notes on Vietnam History, Internet Archive, retrieved 27 Jun 2023, CC BY-SA 4.0.