About the Encyclopedia

“This is a work that cannot be completed except by a society of men of letters and skilled workmen, each working separately on his own part, but all bound together solely by their zeal for the best interests of the human race and a feeling of mutual good will.”
—Diderot

First published over the course of more than twenty years (1751-1777), the 28 folio volumes of the Encyclopédie include 17 volumes of text with more than 70,000 articles on subjects ranging from asparagus to zodiac. The remaining 11 volumes contain beautifully engraved plates filled with carefully drawn figures that constitute a visual analogue to the written articles, linked to them through cross-references. The Encyclopédie was the major achievement of the French Enlightenment whose aim, in Diderot's words, was to "change the common way of thinking" through the diffusion of knowledge and the development of critical modes of thought.

Denis Diderot was the main editor of the Encyclopédie, but it was a collaborative project, the work of a "society of men of letters," as its title page declared, and of a consortium of printer-booksellers. Jean Le Rond d’Alembert (1717-1783) was hired along with Diderot by the printers, whose modest ambition was to translate Ephraim Chambers’ two-volume English Cyclopedia, the 4th edition of which was published in 1741. By the time the last volume of Diderot and d’Alembert’s Encyclopédie was published, more than 140 people had contributed to its 32 volumes of articles and plates.

Much has been written about the Encyclopédie. Below are links to some resources in English that are easily accessible online.