03/18/2026
Jacques Revel, one of the great historians of the past few decades, passed away on March 13, 2026. He was 83.
Revel was a specialist of France’s Ancien Régime, but his erudition knew no temporal bounds. He wrote brilliantly about micro-history and also about history scaled in various ways, its aperture both narrow and wide. He knew more than almost anyone about the political uses of history and about historiography in general, not just of his native France, but also of the United States, Germany, and Italy. He contributed major essays to Pierre Nora’s monumental Lieux de Mémoire (translated as Realms of Memory), a study of how the French have enshrined their history and memory in geographical places, buildings, institutions, religion, school curricula, and many other things.
Beyond his own books and articles, Revel was a great facilitator of other scholars’ work. As president of France’s prestigious, multidisciplinary Ecole des hautes études en sciences sociales (1995-2004), he nurtured the research and publications of historians, sociologists, anthropologists, and philosophers, among
others. In doing so, he built handsomely on what his predecessors, among them François Furet, had done to communicate knowledge to generations of students in what the French call the “human sciences.”
Revel was a great traveler familiar with many countries and cultures, but he had a particular interest in the United States, even a fondness for the US, warts and all. He spent a lot of time here, and at NYU we took advantage of his fascination with New York City.
The founders of the Institute of French Studies, Tom Bishop, Michel Beaujour, and Nick Wahl, invited him to teach at the IFS early on, and he became a great friend and steadfast supporter of our work. He also forged tight connections to the NYU history department and as a Distinguished Global Visiting Professor taught graduate courses for us every spring for a decade.
He was just as committed to our students as to his own. Evan Spritzer, who earned a PhD in history and French Studies in 2015, wrote, Revel’s “class changed me. The beauty of his verb, the depth of his scholarship, and his role as avatar of Pierre Nora’s memory/history project have stayed with me since 2009.” It profoundly shaped Evan’s scholarship and teaching, not just because of Jacques’ intellectual example, but because he “was always warm and encouraging.”
Many of us at NYU were privileged to work with Jacques Revel, and we will miss him profoundly.
-Ed Berenson,
Director
