Albert Vandal

Born in Paris on July 7, 1853, Albert Vandal became known as a French historian and writer with a special gift for diplomatic history. Early in his career he served in the Council of State, while continuing to study history and law.

He wrote on a wide range of subjects, including Scandinavia, eighteenth-century France, and the Eastern Question, but his reputation rests especially on his major studies of Napoleon and Tsar Alexander I. His multivolume Napoléon et Alexandre Ier won the Académie française's Grand Prix Gobert, a sign of how highly his historical work was regarded.

Vandal later taught diplomatic history at the École des Sciences Politiques and was elected to the Académie française in 1896. He died in Paris on August 30, 1910, leaving behind a body of writing admired for its scholarship, clarity, and strong sense of European political drama.