Anglo-French cultural transmission: the case of John Locke and the Huguenots*

Abstract

This article purports to open windows onto the world of cultural transmission by offering a case study on the Huguenots who worked on the translation of Locke's texts and ideas into French at the turn of the eighteenth century. After arguing that there was, at that time, a threefold cultural necessity to translate English books into French, the article shows how Locke's translators rose to the challenge. It argues that through their bricolage, they were responsible for colouring and shaping Locke's texts and ideas, and concludes that they played a fundamental but overlooked role in setting the tone and orientation of the Enlightenment debates generated by the discussion of Locke's ideas. This article emphasizes the fact that the Anglo-French cultural transmission of Locke's ideas was a two-way exchange and invites historians to pay more attention to the adaptation of texts and ideas as they pass from one language to another.