FRANCE - FRANCE Directoire (1795-1799). Médaille d'or, hommage à Jean-Jacques Barthélémy, historien, garde du Cabinet des médailles et écrivain, by P.-S.-B. Duvivier, Frappe spéciale (SP) 1795 (1798), Paris. Av. J. JAC. BARTHELEMY NAT. CASSICI IN PROVINC. 1716, OBIIT PARIS. 1795. Bust draped left; below signature B. DUVIVIER. Rv. Inscriptions in eleven lines: VIRO / REI ANTIQUARÆ / PERITISSIMO, / PHŒN. ET PALMYR. LINGG. / ELEMENTOR. RESTITUTORI, / INSCRIPT. ET GALL. ACADEM. SOCIO, / NUMISM. GAZOPHYL. PRÆSIDI, / ANACHARSEOS PER GRÆC. / ITINER. ENARRATORI / P. S. B. DUVIVIER OFF. MEM. / CÆLAT ET DIC. [In memory of the man of great skill in the knowledge of Antiquity, restorer of the elements of the Phoenician and Palmyrenian languages, member of the Académie des inscriptions and the Académie française, keeper of the Cabinet des médailles, author of the voyage of Anacharsis in Greece. Engraved and presented by Pierre-Simon-Benjamin Duvivier]. Hennin 663 - Nocq 258 - Julius 445; Gold - 51.65 g - 42 mm - 12 h Top Pop: the only graded example! PCGS SP58 (55951776). Special strike with satin-finish relief. Minimal marks on the edge. Small impact on the scroll at 11 o'clock on the reverse. The fields with hairlines have hardly been rubbed. Very rare. Superb. Abbé Jean-Jacques Barthélémy was born in Cassis on 20 January 1716 and died in Paris on 30 April 1795. A clergyman, he was also an archaeologist, man of letters and numismatist. He deciphered the Palmyrene alphabet in 1754 and the Phoenician alphabet in 1758. In 1788 he published his "Voyage du jeune Anacharsis en Grèce", a work illustrated with maps by the geographer Jean-Denis Barbié du Bocage, which earned him election to the Académie française the following year. In 1753, he became Keeper of the Cabinet des Médailles, following in the footsteps of Claude Gros de Boze, until the Revolution. His bust can be seen on the BnF website and a room in the Cabinet des Médailles bears his name. The medal in his honour was presented by Pierre-Simon-Benjamin Duvivier at the Salon of 1798.