Home > Jacques Boucher de Crèvecœur de Perthes

Born at Rethel, in the Ardennes, he was the eldest son of Jules Armand Guillaume Boucher de Crèvecœur, botanist and customs officer, and of Etienne-Jeanne-Marie de Perthes (whose surname he was authorized by royal decree in 1818 to assume in addition to his father's). In 1802 he entered government employ as an officer of customs. His duties kept him for six years in Italy, but upon his returning in 1811 he found rapid promotion at home, and finally was appointed, in March 1825, to succeed his father as director of the douaneDouanes were a system of taxation through custom duties in France in King Louis XIV's reign. Douane is also the French word for customs, in the sense of a border check. See also Police in France. at AbbevilleThis article refers to the city in France. For other places see here. Abbeville is a city in the Picardie region in the north of France. Location Abbeville is located on the Somme River, 12 m. from its mouth in the English Channel, and 28 m. nothwest of A, where he remained for the rest of his life.

His leisure time was chiefly devoted to the study of what was afterwards called the Stone AgeThe Stone Age is that ancient time period during which, humans created tools from stone (for lack of better technology). Wood, bones and other materials would also be used, but stone (in particular flint) was shaped for use as cutting tools and weapons. and antediluvianThe antediluvian period was the period that preceded the Great Flood of Noah as related in the Book of Genesis in the Hebrew Bible. It was an important feature in versions of natural history that were formerly much more widely accepted. The primary source man, as he expressed it. About the year 1830 he had found, in the gravels of the Somme valley, flints which in. his opinion bore evidence of human handiwork; but not until many years afterwards did he make public the important discovery of a worked flint implement with remains of elephantThis page is about the animal, see elephant (disambiguation) for more meanings. Loxodonta Loxodonta cyclotis Loxodonta africana Elephas Elephas maximus Proboscidea is an order including only one family, Elephantidae or the elephants with 3 species: the Sa and rhinocerosCeratotherium simum Dicerorhinus sumatrensis Diceros bicornis Rhinoceros unicornis ''R. sondaicus A rhinoceros is any of five surviving species of odd-toed ungulate in the family Rhinocerotidae . All five are native to Africa or Asia. Rhinoceros is also o in the gravels of Menchecourt . This was in 1846Events January 5 The United States House of Representatives votes to stop sharing the Oregon Territory with the United Kingdom February 5 The Oregon Spectator becomes the first newspaper on the Pacific coast of the United States. February 10 Many Mormons.

In 1847Events January 4 Samuel Colt sells his first revolver pistol to the United States government. January 13 The Treaty of Cahuenga ends the Mexican-American War in California. January 16 John C. Fremont is appointed Governor of the new California Territory. he commenced the issue of his monumental three volume work, Antiquitis celtiques et antediluviennes, a work in which he was the first to establish the existence of man in the Pleistocene or early Quaternary period. His views met with little approval, partly because he had previously propounded theories regarding the antiquity of man without facts to support them, partly because the figures in his book were badly executed and they included drawings of flints which showed no clear sign of workmanship.

In 1855 Dr Jean Paul Rigollot of Amiens strongly advocated the authenticity of the flint implements; but it was not until 1858 that Hugh Falconer saw the collection at Abbeville and induced Sir Joseph Prestwich in the following year to visit the locality. Prestwich then definitely agreed that the flint implements were the work of man, and that they occurred in undisturbed ground in association with remains of extinct mammalia. In 1863 his discovery of a human jaw, together with worked flints, in a gravel-pit at Moulin-Quignon near Abbeville seemed to vindicate Boucher de Perthes entirely; but doubt was thrown on the antiquity of the human remains (owing to the possibility of interment), though not on the good faith of the discoverer, who was the same year made an officer of the Légion d'honneur. However, the 'Moulin-Quigon jaw' was a hoax, planted by one of Boucher de Perthes' workers in response to an offer of a reward of 200 Francs for findings of human remains.

Boucher de Perthes displayed activity in many other directions. For more than thirty years he filled the presidential chair of the Société d'Emulation at Abbeville, to the publications of which he contributed articles on a wide range of subjects. He was the author of several tragedies, two books of fiction, several works of travel, and a number of books on economic and philanthropic questions.

This article incorporates text from the public domain 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica. 1911 Britannica