Background
Charles Depéret was born on June 25, 1854 in Perpignan, France.
Stèle on the La Doua campus in Villeurbanne in honor of Charles Depéret.
The University of Lyon.
A plaque with Depéret's name.
geologist paleontologist scientist
Charles Depéret was born on June 25, 1854 in Perpignan, France.
At the end of his studies Depéret submitted a thesis on the Tertiary geology of his native province of Roussillon (1885).
Depéret started his career as a military doctor from 1877 to 1888.
He was appointed professor at the Faculté des Sciences of Lyons (1889) and subsequently served as its capable and influential dean, reappointed again and again, for thirty-three years. In 1893 he published, with F. Delafond, a monograph on the Tertiary geology of the Bresse region (between Lyons and Dijon), a work that quickly became a classic. His research on the Tertiary period, especially in the Rhone Valley (where he profited by Fontannes’s studies) and in Spain, was accompanied by paleontological studies and often gave rise to detailed geological maps. His Les transformations du monde animal (1907), translated into English and German and often reprinted in French, clearly and accurately explains the great problems of paleontology.
Turning to Quaternary geology, until then very obscure, Depéret began in 1906 to present clear and theoretically valid syntheses for the entire world that were based on the theory of eustacy expounded by Eduard Suess and L. de Lamothe. In order to satisfy this theory he conceived of supposed geologic stages called Tyrrhenian and Milazzian and brought about acceptance in France of the notion of alluvial Quaternary terraces of relatively constant altitude (at 20, 30, 60, and 100 meters).
After his death it was gradually realized that his paleontological studies were often too hasty; carried away by his theories, which were built upon questionable hypotheses, he had neglected or modified facts inconsistent with those theories. Nevertheless, Depéret did succeed in training loyal disciples and, as a passionate fossil seeker, gathered invaluable paleontological collections for his Lyons laboratory.
Extremely powerful on the administrative level, Depéret had a sense of authority as firm as it was courteous.