- ANR ACRONAVARRE Project (Royal Acts of Navarre in the 15th-16th centuries)
- “Filigranes pour tous”
- Calendars from Europe and Asia
- Parisians and Writings from the Middle Ages to the 20th Century
- The Mazarin Online Library
- Enriching the “Miroir des Classiques”
- “Esprit des Livres” Supplementary Database
- Biblissima EquipEx
- Hastec LabEx
- CAP LabEx
- ENHE LabEx
Research programmes

The Jean-Mabillon Centre (EA 3624, Ecole Nationale des Chartes) was one of the winners of the recent call for projects under the PSL Research University’s “Science of Data, Data of Science” Strategic Interdisciplinary Research Initiative (IRIS).
The IRHT and the INRIA, as well as several French heritage conservation institutions (National Archives, Departmental Archives of the Alpes-Maritimes and the Rhône, the Municipal Archives of Toulouse, the Municipal Library of Toulouse), are working together on this project.
Calendars from Europe and Asia
The Project
While the astronomical and mathematical aspect of the calendars of the great civilisations is relatively well known, the handwritten or printed calendar, used daily in order to “grasp time” has been little studied, whether in Europe or in Asia. The goal of this project is to compare, examine and disseminate the calendar cycles produced in Europe, in Ancient Greece or Rome and in the Middle Ages, with the calendars found in the tombs and grottos of China between the 3rd century BCE and the 10th century CE, or those produced in Japan from the 8th to the 15th century and later those from Southern and Southeast Asia.
The project included three meetings: two one-day workshops in May and October 2016 and an international conference in 2017.
Research directors: Alain Arrault (École Française d’Extrême-Orient), Olivier Guyotjeannin (École Nationale des Chartes –Jean-Mabillon Centre) and Perrine Mane (Centre de Recherches Historiques – CNRS-EHESS).
Parisians and Writings from the Middle Ages to the 20th Century
Presentation
This research project on writing in Paris, from the middle of the 13th century to the 20th century, was imagined during the research team’s previous four-year contract.
Designed to fit together with an investigation into pragmatic writings, the fabrication and uses of the written act (which is consistent with the former and continual interests of the Jean-Mabillon Centre in palaeography, diplomatics or archival work), this project is also at the confluence of recent historiography with an ongoing investigation.
To speak of a city, and Paris especially, with its political role, its economic, cultural and demographic weight, is also to allude to the world of books, university practices as well as scriptural and archival work in the many instances when power was exercised: the project will concentrate its efforts on literacy, pragmatic writing and contact with writing, based on three research concentrations:
- Literacy
- The market for acts
- The functions and uses of writing
This project will also prioritise the constitution of a corpus as well as its utilisation. It will result in various events and publications, from thematic workshops to the creation of albums or a collaborative exhibit.
Events already organised
- workshop « Writing at Saint-Germain-des-Prés (13th century to the middle of the 19th century) » (Paris, 11 December 2012)
- Study day on “Death and Writing in Paris from the Middle Ages to the Great War” (Paris, December 9, 2014)
Centre Jean-Mabillon Projects
The Mazarin Online Library

This project consists, under the scientific direction of Olivier Poncet and Yann Sordet, director of the Mazarin Library, in the online publication of the catalogue record sources from the Mazarin Library (1602-1661), the most important personal collection of the first Classical age. The focus of the project is the inventory of the library, drawn up in 1661 in the weeks following the death of Mazarin, with approximately 27,000 printed books and a little more than 2,000 manuscripts), whose publication will be done via TEI.
The project corresponds to several complementary ambitions:
- the online circulation of the inventory of a large historical collection in order to develop the analysis of its formation, economics, uses, cultural and political impacts; as such, Mazarin’s role in European diplomacy, the sheer volume of this library and the way in which it shaped the documentary ideology of the modern era, means that the disclosure of the project’s data will make investigations in several domains possible: history of political documentation, library collectables and practices, the transmission of cultural texts, knowledge and models in modern Europe
- the precise identification of the books and manuscripts owned by Mazarin, (acquisition circumstances, uses, management of the library’s space, transmission, current localisation)
- creating a model reproducing the former library, which will be articulated with the current reporting tools for manuscripts or ancient prints.
The project’s historical and documentary scope is focused on the personal library of Mazarin (from 1643, date of its constitution, to 1668, date of the exchange made with the royal library seven years after the death of Mazarin).
Enriching the “Miroir des Classiques”
![Traduction française anonyme du Codex de Justinien, ms. Giessen, Universitätsbibliothek, 945 [Paris, 1250-1275], fol. Traduction française anonyme du Codex de Justinien, ms. Giessen, Universitätsbibliothek, 945 [Paris, 1250-1275], fol.](https://www.chartes.psl.eu/sites/default/files/styles/www_large/public/atoms/images/photo_6.jpg?itok=mPTHtZzd)
The “Miroir des Classiques,” promoted by the Ecole Nationale des Chartes under the scientific direction of Frédéric Duval, is a directory of Classical Latin documents translated into French and Occitan during the Middle Ages. Under the title of each translated work, the different translations are presented in their chronological order, along with their eventual modifications. Each translation comes with a rapid description and a precise analysis of the manuscripts and editions (early printed books and publications from the 16th century) in which they are contained.
A new component, developed under the framework of Biblissima, will focus on the French translations of the Corpus juris civilis.
“Esprit des Livres” Supplementary Database

The “Esprit des Livres,” promoted by the Ecole des Chartes under the scientific direction of Annie Charon, is a directory of sales catalogues, prior to the 19th century, conserved in Parisian libraries. The notes grant a significant role to the biography of the possessor and to the specifics of the copy: handwritten notes, cost, names of the purchasers.
Under the framework of Biblissima, a parallel database will be created that is dedicated to the manuscripts described in the sales catalogues prior to the 19th century.
These three projects were the subject of a joint presentation during a conference organised on Friday 23 January 2015.
Biblissima EquipEx

Biblissima — Bibliotheca bibliothecarum novissima — is an observatory of written heritage from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance, created thanks to the Investments in the Future Equipment of Excellence program.
It studies documents written in the main languages of Medieval and Renaissance European culture (Arabic, French, Greek, Hebrew, Latin, etc.) and contributes to a better understanding of the circulation of texts, the development of libraries and the transmission of knowledge in Europe from the 8th to the 18th centuries.
In addition to its function at the service of research, Biblissima also participates in circulating knowledge about the written heritage of the Middle Ages and Renaissance to a larger audience.
Hastec LabEx

Presentation
The HASTEC (Histoire et anthropologie des savoirs, des techniques et des croyances) Laboratory of Excellence proposes to address new fields of knowledge where science, spirituality, techniques of thought and action, social and political configurations will be studied alongside new formats of knowledge and new digital technologies.
Its scientific activity, through its multiple connections, will be spread out over seven collaborative projects.
- Competencies and knowledge
- Scientific knowledge, religious knowledge, social knowledge
- Techniques of (make) believe
- Intellectual and spiritual techniques
- Commentary (COMMENT-R)
- Science cultures and knowledge technologies
- Digital learned cultures
Financing for doctoral students and post-doctoral students is among the priorities of Hastec LabEx in terms of research support.
Consult the call for proposals
List of the members of the Jean-Mabillon Centre who are also members of the LabEx
https://labexhastec-psl.ephe.fr/files/centre-jean-mabillon_membres-2017.pdf
Events organised recently by the Jean-Mabillon Centre with the support of LabEx
- Workshop on the small school network in Normandy, 28 April 2014
- 7th Congress of Medieval Latin organised in Lyon, 10-13 September 2014
Post-doc researchers housed within the Jean-Mabillon Centre with the support of LabEx
Andrea Costa
Isabelle Bretthauer
Graziella Pastore
CAP LabEx

The “Création, Arts et Patrimoines” Laboratory of Excellence (acronym “CAP”) studies art, creation and heritage and uses them as points of reference in order to understand and guide the transformations of contemporary society, related to the globalisation of economic life and the means of communication, as well as cultures. It mobilises diverse scientific expertise in the fields of aesthetic theory and the philosophy of art, the history of art, architecture, patrimony, music, poetry, cultural anthropology, the sociology of art, the history of techniques as well as communication and information, design, conservation and restoration techniques.
Post-doc researchers hosted at the Jean-Mabillon Centre with the support of LabEx:
ENHE LabEx
The main purpose of the EHNE project (Écrire une Nouvelle Histoire de l'Europe) is to shed light on the crisis that we are currently experiencing in Europe, by rebuilding a new historiography of Europe that is addressed to the scientific world as well as the academic world, citizens and politicians.
Its goal is to place the French historical school within Europe’s history and international relationships at the heart of the most essential historiographical and contemporary debates. The eight-year project brings together the most notable expertise existing in France on these questions and articulates them through powerful European and international networks.
Seven research concentrations were defined in order to reach this objective:
- Europe as a product of material civilisation: Europe in flux
- Europe in a political epistemology (Research laboratory in 19th-century history)
- European humanism or the construction of a Europe “for itself,” between affirmation and identity crises
- Europe, Europeans and the World
- War-torn Europe and the traces of war
- European gender and identities
- National traditions, circulations and identities in European art
Events recently organised by the Jean-Mabillon Centre with the support of LabEx
- International colloquium “1314, a Europe in Crisis? Perspectives on the European political situation after the death of Philippe le Bel” (2-4 October 2014)