Background
Jacques Amyot was born on the 30th of October, 1513 in Melun, near Paris, France.
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1572
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1890
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Jacques Amyot was born on the 30th of October, 1513 in Melun, near Paris, France.
Amyot was educated at the University of Paris and at Bourges.
Jacques Amyot became a professor of Latin and Greek at the University of Bourges and translated Heliodorus’ Aethiopica. For this King Francis, I gave him the abbey of Bellozane and commissioned him to complete his translation of Plutarch’s Lives, on which he had been engaged for some time. He went to Rome to study the Vatican text of Plutarch’s Bioi paralleloi (Parallel Lives). On his return to France, he was appointed tutor to the sons of Henry II. Both favored him on accession, making him grand almoner and, in 1570, bishop of Auxerre, where he spent the rest of his life. Amyot translated seven books of the Bibliotheca Historica of Diodorus Siculus in 1554, the Daphnis and Chloé of Longus in 1559, and the Moralia of Plutarch in 1572, as well as the Lives.
Jacques Amyot’s Vies was an important contribution to the development of Renaissance humanism in France and England, and Plutarch was an ideal choice because he presented the moral hero as an individual rather than in abstract, didactic terms. Charles IX appointed him Grand Almoner in 1560, accorded him many honors, naming him bishop of Auxerre in 1570.
Jacques Amyot was a devout and conscientious churchman, and had the courage to stand by his principles.
