Funded projects
Collecting: the EFEO as a cultural conduit for South, Southeast and East Asia (IHMC-EFEO project)
Although the institutional and social history of the École française d’Extrême-Orient (EFEO), as well as the early development of its library, have been well documented, an object-based approach has received far less attention. EFEO scholars have long engaged in identifying, collecting, assembling, preserving, and publishing research materials connected to their fields of study. These activities have played a central role in the formation of the institution’s collections.
This exploratory project focuses on three collections currently held at the EFEO. The research team—composed of Alain Arrault, Valérie Gillet, Katia Juhel, and Sovannara Mey (EFEO), and Léa Saint-Raymond (IHMC)—will examine the scientific, artistic, human, and commercial dynamics that shaped their constitution.
The first is a collection of Chinese rubbings, partly produced and assembled by scholars including Édouard Chavannes and Paul Pelliot. The second consists of Tibetan statuettes, associated primarily with Jacques Bacot and Paul Pelliot. The third is a collection of palm-leaf manuscripts assembled in India under the direction of Jean Filliozat and N. R. Bhat, now preserved at the EFEO Centre in Pondicherry.
While it may not be possible to reconstruct these processes in their entirety, the project seeks to identify their traces through the archives of the scholar-collectors and related correspondence.
