History II / The Late Eighteenth Century and the Debate over Modernity
Practice question · Estimate

The Encyclopédie began publication in 1751 and was completed with its final volumes of plates in 1772. Estimate how many years the project ran.

Estimate on a scale from 5 years (5) to 40 years (40).

Hints
  1. Subtract the first year of publication from the last.
  2. 1772 minus 1751.
Show the answer

21 (answers within ±2 count)

Why

21 years: a working lifetime for the editors, sustained across two suppressions, the withdrawal of the royal privilege in 1759, and d’Alembert’s resignation. That the project was finished at all is a fact about the subscription market as much as about the editors’ persistence.

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