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Hippolyte HélyotTOR (January 1660 – 5 January 1716) was aFranciscanfriar andpriest of theFranciscan Third Order Regular and a major scholar ofchurch history, focusing on the history of the religious Orders.

Hélyot was born atParis in January 1660, supposedly of English ancestry, andchristenedPierre at his birth. After spending his youth in study, he entered, in his twenty-fourth year, thefriary of theThird Order Regular of St. Francis, founded inPicpus – now part of Paris – by his uncle, Jérôme Hélyot, acanon regular of theOrder of the Holy Sepulcher. There he took the religious name under which he gained his reputation as a historian.

Two journeys toRome on business of the Order afforded him the opportunity of traveling over most ofItaly; and after his final return he saw much of France, while acting as secretary to variousprovincial superiors of his Order. Both in Italy and France he was engaged in collecting materials for his great work, which occupied him for about twenty-five years. It was titledL'Histoire des ordres monastiques, religieux et militaires, et des congregations séculières de l'un et de l'autre sexe, qui ont été établis jusqu'à présent (The History of the Religious and Military Monastic Orders, and of the Secular Congregations of both Sexes, which have been established up to the Present Day).L'Histoire was published in eight volumes between 1714 and 1719. Jean-Baptiste Coignard of Paris printed the first two volumes for Joseph Derbais of Douay; Coignard published the remaining six volumes under his own name.

Hélyot died on 5 January 1716, before the fifth volume appeared, but his friend and colleague, Friar Maximilien Bullot, T.O.R., completed the fifth volume and authored the remaining three volumes. Hélyot's other noteworthy work isLe Chrétien mourant (1695).

HisHistory is a work of first importance, being the great repository of information regarding the general history of thereligious orders up to the end of the 17th century. Hélyot gave detailed information about the foundation – and, where appropriate, the decline – of the various groups. It is profusely illustrated by largeplates exhibiting thereligious habits of the various Orders, and in the edition of 1792 the plates are colored. It was translated intoItalian (1737) and intoGerman (1753). The material was arranged in analphabeticaldictionary form by M. L. Badiche, for inclusion inMigne'sEncyclopédie théologique, under the title "Dictionnaire des ordres religieux" (5 vols., 1858).

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Helyot, Pierre".Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 13 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 256.
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• 1660 births
• 1716 deaths
• 18th-century French historians
• 17th-century French Roman Catholic priests
• 18th-century French Roman Catholic priests
• Third Order Regular Franciscans
• Writers from Paris
• French people of English descent
• Historians of monasticism
• French male writers
• 17th-century French historians

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