Étienne Henri Gilson was born on 13 June 1884 in Paris. A French philosopher and historian of medieval thought, he was a prominent international scholar of the twentieth century. He began teaching at the University of Lille but left soon after to serve in the First World War. In 1921, he taught the History of Medieval Philosophy at the Sorbonne, and in 1932, was appointed Professor of Medieval Philosophy at the Collège de France. He established the Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies at the University of Toronto, retiring in 1968.
Awarded the Croix de Guerre, he studied Russian and St Bonaventure during his two-year imprisonment after the Battle of Verdun. Gilson was a disciple of St Thomas Aquinas, though his understanding of this changed overtime. Notable works include Saint Thomas d’Aquin (1925), Introduction a l’etude de S. Augustin (1929), The Unity of Philosophical Experience (1937), Reason and Revelation in the Middle Ages (1938), God and Philosophy (1941), Being and Some Philosophers (1949), Christian Philosophy in the Middle Ages (1955), Painting and Reality (1957), and Elements of Christian Philosophy (1960).
