Barthélemi D', a celebrated French Orientalist, was born at Paris in 1625. At a very early age he gave himself up to the study of the Eastern tongues; and, to perfect his acquaintance with them, travelled into Italy, where he enjoyed the friendship of the cardinals Barberini and Grimaldi. On returning to Paris he obtained, through the munificence of Fouquet, a pension, of which he was afterwards deprived on the fall of that minister. He was compensated, however, with the office of Oriental interpreter to the king. After some years he again visited Italy, and was received with especial honour by Frederick II. of Tuscany, who presented him with a large number of valuable Oriental MSS., and tried to attach him to his court. D'Herbelot, however, returned to France at the urgent solicitation of Colbert, who, on the death of Pierre Auvergne, made him Syrian professor in the Collège-Royal. D'Herbelot died, after a short illness, at Paris, December 8, 1695.

The great work by which D'Herbelot's fame is still preserved is his Bibliothèque Orientale, Paris, 1697. This work, which was published two years after the author's death by Galland, occupied D'Herbelot during the greater part of his life. It is based on the immense Arabic dictionary of Hadji Khalifa, of which, in fact, it is an abridged translation; but it also comprises the substance of a vast number of other Turkish and Arabic Encyclopaedias. The erudition it displays is boundless; but the field embraced is far too vast for the labours of a single man, and many errors have consequently crept into the work. With all his learning D'Herbelot seems to have been deficient in critical sagacity. He died, too, before seeing his work through the press, and there is consequently a want of minute accuracy in many of its details, and of harmony between the various parts of the work. Besides the Bibliothèque Orientale, D'Herbelot wrote several works, such as an Anthology, and an Arabic, Persian, and Turkish Lexicon, none of which, however, have been published. The Bibliothèque has been twice reprinted, first at Maestricht, fol., 1776; and again at the Hague, in 4 vols. 4to, 1777-99. The latter of these two editions is enriched with the contributions of Schultens and Reiske. A German translation of it appeared at Halle, in 4 vols. 8vo, 1785-90; and an abridgement by Déessarts, at Paris, in 1782.