FURETIERE, ANTHONY, an eminent French philological writer, was born at Paris in the year 1620. He first studied law, and was a counsellor of parliament; but he abandoned these pursuits, adopted the ecclesiastical profession, and became abbot of Chalivoy and Claines. He now composed various works in prose and verse, by which he greatly distinguished himself and extended his reputation. He was elected a member of the French Academy, the meetings of which learned society he assidu-
ously attended; but having engaged in the compilation of a dictionary of the French language, at a time when his brother academicians collectively were employed in a similar undertaking, his conduct was deemed disrespectful to his colleagues; and a specimen of his work having been published in 1684, he was in the year following expelled the academy. He retaliated by publishing a Factum in his own defence, which, on account of its keen satire and invective, served to render his exclusion from that learned body permanent. He died in the year 1688. His dictionary was published in 1690 in two vols. folio. It was republished with improvements by Basnage de Beauval in 1701, in three vols. It afterwards received a further enlargement, and served as the basis of the Dictionnaire de Trevoux, of which an edition appeared in 1771, in eight vols. folio. Furetère's other works were Five Satires in verse, Gospel Parables in prose, Le Roman Bourgeois, &c. There is also a collection of anecdotes by him entitled Furetiana. (R. R. R.)