Origin of the Societe des Americanistes, Paris

Pascal Riviale (1991) produced a two volume dissertation summarizing the work of French scholars involved in anthropology, ethnography, and archaeology in Peru from the beginning of Peruvian independence in 1821 up until World War 1. From the commentary, it is clear that not only does this volume trace individual scholars, and institu­tions involved in archaeologically-related research, but it develops a number of general intellectual themes as well. Riviale has recently (1996) extracted a portion of his dissertation relating to the events leading up to the founding of the Society of Americanists, Paris, in 1895. Because he is focusing in this case on the origin of a specific organiza­tion, he concentrates on exegesis of the institutional antecedents from 1821 onward.