Fernand Braudel

Fernand Paul Achille Braudel was born on 24 August 1902 and died on 27 November 1985. His scholarship revolved around three massive projects: The Mediterranean, which occupied him from 1923 to 1966; Civilization and Capitalism, from 1955 to 1979; and Identity of France, left unfinished at his death after fifteen years of work. A central figure in the Annales School during the 1950s and 1960s, he pushed historians to track large-scale socioeconomic forces — the slow grind of geography, commerce, population — rather than the deeds of great men. The method stuck.