Abel Jean Baptiste Michel Pavet de Courteille (23 June 1821 – 12 December 1889) was a 19th-century French
orientalist, who specialized in the study of
Turkic languages.
Career
Through his mother, Sophie Silvestre (1793-1877), he was
Antoine-Isaac Silvestre de Sacy's grandson. He taught Turkish at the
Collège de France, as extraordinary professor in 1854 and then as holder of an ordinary chair in 1861. In 1873, he succeeded
Emmanuel de Rougé at the
Académie des inscriptions et belles-lettres. He was also a member of the
Société asiatique. He led Turcology to the study of Central Asian languages and was the author of a dictionary of Eastern Turkish and of several editions and translations of texts.
Dictionnaire turk-oriental, destiné principalement à faciliter la lecture des ouvrages de
Babur, d'
Aboul-Gâzi et de
Ali-Shir Nava'i, Paris, Imprimerie impériale, 1870 (562 pages).
(with
Abdolonyme Ubicini) État présent de l'
Ottoman Empire: statistique, gouvernement, administration, finances, armée, communautés non musulmanes, etc., d'après le Salnâmèh (Annuaire impérial) pour l'année 1293 de l'Hégire (1875-76) et les documents officiels les plus récents, Paris, J. Dumaine, 1876.
Editions and translations
Conseils de Nabi Efendi[2] à son fils Aboul Khair, published in Turkish with French translation and notes, Paris, Imprimerie impériale, 1857.
Histoire de la campagne de Mohacz, by Kemal Pacha Zadeh,[3] published for the first time with the French translation and notes, Paris, Imprimerie impériale, 1859.
Miraj Nameh, published after the
Uyghur manuscript, translated and annotated, Paris, E. Leroux, 1882.
Tezkereh-i-Evliâ. Le Mémorial des Saints, translated from the Uighur manuscript of the Bibliothèque nationale, Paris, 1889-90 (2 vol.).
(with
Charles Barbier de Meynard) Al-Masudi. Les Prairies d'or, Arabic text and French translation, Paris, Imprimerie impériale (nationale), 1861-77 (9 volumes;[4] collection of oriental works published by the Société asiatique).
^Nabi Efendi (1642–1712 in
Aleppo), greatest Turkish poet of his time, especially appreciated by the Sultan
Mustafa II, author of a Divan and a collection of letters.