Editing Gustave Boissonade

{{Short description|French legal scholar}}
{{inline|date=August 2024}}
{{unreferenced|date=August 2024}}
{{Infobox person
|name        = Gustave Émile Boissonade 
|image       = Boissonade.jpg
|alt         =
|caption     = Gustave Emile Boissonade 
|birth_date  = {{Birth date|df=y|1825|6|7}}
|birth_place = [[Vincennes]], [[France]]
|death_date  = {{Death date and age|df=y|1910|6|27|1825|6|7}}
|death_place = [[Antibes]], [[France]]
|nationality = French
|other_names = 
|known_for   = 
|occupation  = legal scholar, educator
}} 
[[File:Bust of Boissonade.jpg|thumb|180px|Bust of Boissonade on the campus of [[Hosei University]]]]

'''Gustave Émile Boissonade de Fontarabie''' (7 June 1825 – 27 June 1910) was a French [[legal scholar]], responsible for drafting much of [[Japan]]'s [[civil code]] during the [[Meiji Era]], and honored as one of the founders of modern Japan's legal system.

==Biography==
Boissonade was born in [[Vincennes]] in 1825 to the famous scholar [[Jean François Boissonade de Fontarabie]]. He was a brilliant law student, and received his [[doctorate of law]] with honours from the [[University of Paris]] in 1853. He was in charge of law courses at Paris University until 1864, and was assistant law professor at the [[University of Grenoble]] until 1867.

In 1873 he was invited to lecture on constitutional and criminal law to some Japanese visitors to [[Paris]], and received an invitation to work in Japan by the Japanese [[Ministry of Justice (Japan)|Ministry of Justice]] as one of several [[o-yatoi gaikokujin|foreign legal scholars]] needed to assist with the drafting of Japan's legal codes and in the renegotiation of the [[unequal treaties]].

Boissonade remained in Japan for more than 21 years, from 1873 to 1895, and worked as an instructor in the Law School of the Ministry of Justice. He worked closely with [[Ume Kenjirō]] and [[Hozumi Nobushige]] in drafting much of Japan's [[criminal law|criminal]] and [[Private law|civil law]]. He was also an expert in [[international law]], and was legal advisor to the government in the [[Taiwan Expedition of 1874]]. He was named a consultant to the ''[[Genrōin]]'' in 1875.

He also opposed [[Inoue Kaoru]]'s 1887 proposal to allow non-Japanese [[judge]]s, and cautioned against too rapid movement towards revision of the [[unequal treaties]].

He was awarded the [[Order of the Rising Sun]] (2nd degree) in 1876 and was thus one of the few foreigners so honored at that time. Today, he is honored as one of the founders of [[Hosei University]]. The "Boissonade Tower", the Ichigaya campus of Hosei University halfway between [[Ichigaya Station|Ichigaya]] and [[Iidabashi Station|Iidabashi]] stations in central Tokyo, a 26-story building completed in 2000, was named after him.

He returned to France in 1895 and lived in [[Antibes]], where his tomb is located.

==See also==
* [[Franco-Japanese relations]]

==External links==
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20050214045550/http://www.hosei.ac.jp/gendai_hou/ Hosei University Boissonade Institute of Modern Law and Politics]
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20051125070513/http://www.hosei.jp/gaiyo/boa.html Boissonade tower], [http://www.eonet.ne.jp/~building-pc/tokyo/tokyo-122hosei.htm large picture]
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20041208212809/http://www.cc.matsuyama-u.ac.jp/~tamura/boasonado.htm in Japanese], [https://web.archive.org/web/20041211141128/http://www.cc.matsuyama-u.ac.jp/~tamura/boasona2.htm]
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20061030184501/http://www.antibes-juanlespins.com/eng/news/juillet/2006/histoire.html Biographical article]

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Boissonade, Gustave Emile}}
[[Category:Foreign advisors to the government in Meiji-era Japan]]
[[Category:French expatriates in Japan]]
[[Category:19th-century French jurists]]
[[Category:Foreign educators in Japan]]
[[Category:1825 births]]
[[Category:1910 deaths]]
[[Category:Recipients of the Order of the Rising Sun]]
[[Category:University of Paris alumni]]
[[Category:Academic staff of the University of Paris]]
[[Category:Academic staff of Grenoble Alpes University]]