Intellectual and scientific effects: the Scientific Institute

05Intellectual and scientific effects: the Scientific Institute

Its foundation

• Napoleon set up beside the General Diwan the Scientific Institute (Institut d'Égypte), modelled on the French Institute in Paris of which Napoleon himself was a member.
• Its mission: advancing sciences and knowledge in Egypt, studying and publishing questions of nature, industry and history, and giving scientific advice to the government.
• So it linked politics with science.

Its composition

• Napoleon chose a group of scholars and senior commanders and officers with a share in learning.
• It consisted of four sections, each with twelve members: mathematics, physics, political economy, and letters and arts.

Its achievements

• Founding an Arabic press and a French press.
• Issuing newspapers and journals — one literary, another scientific and economic — and an Arabic journal to publish administrative orders and decisions.