Pierre Amédée Jaubert

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Pierre Amédée Emilien Probe Jaubert (June 3, 1779 – January 28, 1847) was a French diplomat, academic, Orientalist, translator, politician, and traveler.

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Born in Aix-en-Provence, Jaubert was one of the most distinguished pupils of Silvestre de Sacy, whose funeral Discours he pronounced in 1838. Jaubert acted as interpreter to Napoleon Bonaparte during the Egyptian Campaign of 1798-1799, and on his return to Paris held various posts under government. In 1802 he accompanied Horace Sébastiani de La Porta on his Eastern mission, and in 1804 he was present in the Ottoman Empire, assisting Sébastiani in Istanbul.

In 1805, he was dispatched to Qajar Persia, to arrange an alliance with Shah Fat′h Ali, but, on the way there, he was seized and imprisoned in a dry cistern for four months by the Pasha of Doğubeyazıt. Jaubert was allowed to go after the pasha died; he successfully accomplished his mission, and rejoined Napoleon in the Duchy of Warsaw (1807). On the eve of Napoleon's downfall, he was appointed charge d'affaires at Constantinople.

The Bourbon Restoration ended his diplomatic career, but in 1818 he undertook a journey with government aid to Tibet, whence he succeeded in introducing into France 400 Kashmir goats. Jaubert spent the rest of his life in study, in writing and in teaching. He became professor of Persian in the College de France, and director of the École des langues orientales, and in 1830 was elected member of the Academie des Inscriptions. In 1841 he was made a Peer of France and member of the Conseil d'État. He died in Paris.

Besides articles in the Journal Asiatique, he published Voyage en Armenie et en Perse (1821; the edition of 1860 has a notice of Jaubert, by M. Sdillot) and Elements de la grammaire turque (1823-1834).

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