Jean-Gabriel Dentu
Contributions
- Abrégé de l'histoire d'Angleterre... par Goldsmith,... traduit de l'anglais sur la dernière édition translation publisher
- Marie et Caroline, ou Entretiens d'une institutrice avec ses élèves translation publisher
Knows
- Paul Jérémie Bitaubé cleric poet professor translator writer
- Pierre-Jean-Baptiste Chaussard civil servant freemason journalist jurist pamphleteer poet politician professor translator writer
- Antoine-Gilbert Griffet de Labaume abolitionist bookseller civil servant journalist playwright poet publisher translator writer
- Antoine-Jean-Noël Lallemant civil servant translator writer
- Philippe-Denis Pierres bookseller civil servant publisher writer
Notes
Jean-Gabriel Dentu was born in Paris to an administrative worker. In 1782, at the age of 12, he started working in printer/bookseller Philippe-Denis Pierres' printing shop; later, around the summer of 1794, he moved to the Palais-Royal. He was patented (licensed) as a printer on 1st April 1811, with a patent renewal on 15th October 1816; and as a bookseller on 1st October 1812, with a renewal on 15th March 1817.
Dentu was a royalist and frequently found himself in police altercations under the Empire. He was arrested and imprisoned without trial in May 1815, during the Hundred Days, for publishing a royalist pamphlet written by Florian de Kergorlay, 'Des Lois existantes et du 9 mai 1815', but released upon the return of the Bourbons. In 1818-1819 he cofounded the royalist newspaper 'Le Drapeau blanc' with Alphonse Martainville.
He was the author of several facta (notably, a factum regarding Conrad Malte-Brun's plagiarism trial in 1811) and of a collection of anecdotes titled 'Le Conteur de société...' (1808), and the coauthor of the 'Biographie des députés de la chambre...' (1826). His son Gabriel-André Dentu (1796-1849) took over his work in 1826 and had his printing and bookselling patents by 25th Augusr 1829.
Dentu died in Paris on 18th March 1840 at the age of 70 and was buried in the parish of Saint-Germain-des-Près on 20th March.
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BnF database: 12574339 Victor Champier et G.-Roger Sandoz, 'Le Palais-Royal d’après des documents inédits : 1629-1900', t. 2, Paris: Société de propagation des livres d’art, 1900, p. 186.