-insert research squee here-

[MmeBahorel]

Marianne at one point found the Code Universitaire from 1835 on Google Books, and I've been using it ever since for most research on the collèges royaux and the professional faculties alongside Girardin's 1842 text De l'instruction publique en France: ouvrage utile à familles. For the benefit of everyone who doesn't read French, I've finally pulled out all the relevant bits on the law faculty here. Fee structure, course structure, requirements for matriculation, requirements for each of the four degree levels (well, three degrees plus certificate program). And some speculation on how in the hell Marius managed to graduate.

This should answer a lot of questions, though the huge gap is that I have still not found anything about book costs. As in, surely one has to buy several useful books, and I have no idea how many or how much they cost. Those necessities are not set by national law/regulation. But it should be a very, very useful starting point. (warning: the article came out to about 6 pages in 12 pt font when I was writing it. It is all the relevant information.)

[YoungStudentMarius]

Thank you. Thank you very, very much. I've always wondered about that...

Really, I don't know what this fandom would do without you.

[Acaila]

Fascinating reading
Thank you so much for that, it must have been a lot of work!

[Gervais]

Late here, but that is awesome.

Anyway, I found an article on the history of Syphilis. It doesn't go into detail about the early 19th century, and I'm sure someone's found more in-depth sources, but I thought it was pretty cool.

[between4walls]

Plinytheyounger over on tumblr, has dug up Victor Hugo's memoirs on gutenburg. Mostly sketches/brief accounts up to 1851, plus excerpts from his diaries of the Franco-Prussian war and aftermath.

[Rebus]

Omg, this -

"Yesterday, February 22, I went to the Chamber of Peers. The weather was fine and very cold, in spite of the noonday sun. In the Rue de Tournon I met a man in the custody of two soldiers. The man was fair, pale, thin, haggard; about thirty years old; he wore coarse linen trousers; his bare and lacerated feet were visible in his sabots, and blood-stained bandages round his ankles took the place of stockings; his short blouse was soiled with mud in the back, which indicated that he habitually slept on the ground; his head was bare, his hair dishevelled. Under his arm was a loaf. The people who surrounded him said that he had stolen the loaf, and it was for this that he had been arrested.
When they reached the gendarmerie barracks one of the soldiers entered, and the man stayed at the door guarded by the other soldier.
A carriage was standing at the door of the barracks. It was decorated with a coat of arms; on the lanterns was a ducal coronet; two grey horses were harnessed to it; behind it were two lackeys. The windows were raised, but the interior, upholstered in yellow damask, was visible. The gaze of the man fixed upon this carriage, attracted mine. In the carriage was a woman in a pink bonnet and costume of black velvet, fresh, white, beautiful, dazzling, who was laughing and playing with a charming child of sixteen months, buried in ribbons, lace and furs.
This woman did not see the terrible man who was gazing at her.
I became pensive.
This man was no longer a man for me; he was the spectre of misery, the brusque, deformed, lugubrious apparition in full daylight, in full sunlight, of a revolution that is still plunged in darkness, but which is approaching. In former times the poor jostled the rich, this spectre encountered the rich man in all his glory; but they did not look at each other, they passed on. This condition of things could thus last for some time. The moment this man perceives that this woman exists, while this woman does not see that this man is there, the catastrophe is inevitable.
"

[Acaila]

Wow, even with the knowledge that so much of Les Mis was based on real things, to find the source of something as integral as that is...well, quite fascinating really!

[Rebus]

I found this book called Rosen für Apoll (Roses for Apollo) at a used book kiosk for free, and I'm so excited! It's a history of ancient Greece from the very beginnings to the death of Alexander the Great, and it has wonderful art references (perfect for Grantaire rants) and plenty of satire and references to other things, and it's basically just going to be a goldmine, I think, for writing rambly, more intricate Grantaire stuff. Even the first few pages are fantastic.

[SpiritOfDawn]

Oh my god you're reading Fernau?
One of the most hilarious history writers... intentionally biased, often, but brilliant in his rambligns.

For those of you who are not too weak of stomach when it comes to American History, I would recommend "Halleluja" by him as well - but I'm warning you. he's no fan of the US.

[deHavilland]

Tumblr recently brought up the fact that Blondeau is mentioned twice in Les Mis; once as the asshole who struck Bossuet from the ledger and then of course, once before when Tholomyes' friends Listolier and Fameuil explain him to Fantine as one of their professors.

But that's not cool, so forget that business. What's cool is that Jean Baptiste Antoine Hyacinthe Blondeau, law professor in Paris from 1808 to 1830 (when he was made dean, and then would have continued with the school after that, eventually dying in 1854) wrote a couple books.

Institutes De L'Empereur Justinien, Volume 1
Institutes De L'Empereur Justinien, Volume 2
and Essais Sur Quelques Points de Legislation Ou de Jurisprudence

Wow. It's like reading the same textbooks as Bahorel, Bossuet, Courfeyrac, Marius and (probably) Enjolras! Except not Bahorel! Because he probably never read them.

And also not because they were all published after they'd been shot and killed.

[Rebus]

Oh my god you're reading Fernau?
One of the most hilarious history writers... intentionally biased, often, but brilliant in his rambligns.

For those of you who are not too weak of stomach when it comes to American History, I would recommend "Halleluja" by him as well - but I'm warning you. he's no fan of the US.

Yes, I am! He's wickedly biased, but he's so clever and he has a lovely style. Witty and interesting. I'll have to look into Halleluja.

[YoungStudentMarius]

Tumblr recently brought up the fact that Blondeau is mentioned twice in Les Mis; once as the asshole who struck Bossuet from the ledger and then of course, once before when Tholomyes' friends Listolier and Fameuil explain him to Fantine as one of their professors.

But that's not cool, so forget that business. What's cool is that Jean Baptiste Antoine Hyacinthe Blondeau, law professor in Paris from 1808 to 1830 (when he was made dean, and then would have continued with the school after that, eventually dying in 1854) wrote a couple books.

Institutes De L'Empereur Justinien, Volume 1
Institutes De L'Empereur Justinien, Volume 2
and Essais Sur Quelques Points de Legislation Ou de Jurisprudence

Wow. It's like reading the same textbooks as Bahorel, Bossuet, Courfeyrac, Marius and (probably) Enjolras! Except not Bahorel! Because he probably never read them.

And also not because they were all published after they'd been shot and killed.

That's really interesting; I knew he existed, but not that he'd written anything (though I guess it goes hand-in-hand, sort of), so thank you very much!
If this is a topic for another place, please say so, but I randomly clicked on a section to see how much I could understand, and this caught my eye, discussing the power of a father over his children:

En conséquence, vous avez sous votre puissance non seulement l'enfant qui naît de vous et de votre épouse, mais encore celui qui naît de votre fils et de son épouse , c'est-à-dire votre petit-fils et votre petite-fille, et votre arrière-petit- fils et votre arrière-petitc-fille, et ainsi des autres (qui descendent de vous par mâle.O ; en effet, les enfants qui naissent de votre fille ne sont pas sous votre puissance , mais bien sous celle de leur père.

And a (bad) translation:

Consequently, you have under your power not only the child who was born to you and your spouse, but also that which was born of your son and his wife; that is to say your grandson and your granddaughter, and your great-grandson and great-granddaughter, and therefore others (who descended to you from a male; indeed, the children who are born of your daughter are not in your power, but in that of their father.

I don't know how different everything would have been a good 25 years earlier, but that's really interesting to look at for Marius, because he was related to Gillenormand through his mother, and therefore really should have been left with the Pontmercys. I'd never thought of his (potential) children's relationship with Gillenormand in any depth, either, but that's an interesting avenue to explore also, then. And of course, (though again, still early), it makes it even worse for Fantine, legally, though I know she had no family to speak of, if the children belonged to the father and he abandoned them. Anyway, yeah. Something that could be interesting. Provided I didn't get it all wrong in translation or context or everything, that is.

[deHavilland]

See, Marius, this is why we need you around.

The way you have it translated is right: according to Blondeau, children begotten by your daughter are the responsibility (to put it nicely) of their father and paternal line. You bring up an interesting point with Marius, though, but the way I always interpreted it was that Georges Pontmercy was sort of a last of the line kind of individual. The Napoleonic Code provides guardianship to the maternal grandfather in the event that a paternal grandfather is no longer living.

Where a guardian has not been chosen for a minor by his father or mother who died last, the guardianship belongs of right to his paternal grandfather; and in default of such to his maternal grandfather, and so ascending, in such manner as that the paternal ancestor shall, in all cases, be preferred to the maternal ancestor in the same degree.

I would just assume that Georges' father is no longer alive, and so guardianship would have fallen to Gillenormand. There's a number of legal reasons that could account for why Marius lives with Gillenormand, but the Napoleonic Code also makes provision for a father to assign guardianship to (basically) whoever they want, while still living. If Georges agreed to make Gillenormand Marius' legal guardian, then it wouldn't matter which side of the family he was on.

[YoungStudentMarius]

That's really interesting, and it makes sense for certain. Georges probably didn't have anyone else (which makes it worse, of course). I can only imagine what the transfer would have been like, though, trying to think about it all working legally, now.

The Napoleonic Code provides guardianship to the maternal grandfather in the event that a paternal grandfather is no longer living.

Where a guardian has not been chosen for a minor by his father or mother who died last, the guardianship belongs of right to his paternal grandfather; and in default of such to his maternal grandfather, and so ascending, in such manner as that the paternal ancestor shall, in all cases, be preferred to the maternal ancestor in the same degree.

Which suddenly makes this a beautiful, beautiful piece of symbolism, because in so many ways, it really is the death of Georges Pontmercy, and what appears to be his line.

[Aurelia Combeferre]

Interesting how that would work out not just on paper but even when dealing with matters such as inheritance and the social standing of Marius' children in bourgeois society. I can just imagine some of the ramifications.