Charles Pietri

Charles Pietri (18 April 1932 – 7 August 1991) was a 20th-century French historian.

A former pupil at the Lycée Thiers (fr), Charles Pietri entered the École normale supérieure in 1952 and obtained his agrégation d'histoire. He spent some times at the École française de Rome. In 1961, he was research attached at the CNRS. An assistant at the Sorbonne from 1963 to 1966, he then became an assistant professor at the University of Lille, then a lecturer at Paris-Nanterre. Charles Pietri dedicated his doctoral thesis, published in 1976, to the study of the Roma Christiana from 311-440. In 1975, he succeeded Henri-Irénée Marrou and held the chair of history of Christianity at the University Paris-Sorbonne. From 1983 to 1991 he was director of the École de Rome. On 17 November 1989 he was elected a corresponding member of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles Lettres.

With his wife Luce Pietri, Jean-Marie Mayeur, André Vauchez and Marc Venard, he was at the initiative of a monumental Histoire du christianisme des origines à nos jours, published from 1992 to 2001 at Éditions Desclée de Brouwer (fr) and meant to replace the Histoire de l’Église by Augustin Fliche. He also directed, with Luce Pietri, the second volume of the Prosopographie chrétienne du bas-empire (2000), endeavour started by Jean-Rémy Palanque and Henri-Irénée Marrou.

He was also the author of:

• Le Monde latin antique et la Bible, with Jacques Fontaine, vol. II of the series "Bible de tous les temps", 1985,
• Christiana respublica : éléments d'une enquête sur le christianisme antique, series of the École Française de Rome, 1997.

Charles Pietri was chevalier of the Légion d'honneur, holder of the Ordre des Palmes Académiques, officier of the Ordre national des lettres, officier of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic, and commander of the Order of St Gregory the Great and member of the Pontifical Academy of Archaeology.