Clermont-Ganneau, Charles Simon (1846-1923)

French archaeologist and Orientalist. In 1870 he discovered the stele of Mesha, a stone bearing the oldest inscription known at that time attributed to Semitic peoples, regarded as politically dynamic, who were forced to leave their pastoral region because of climatic change.

During his career, he exposed a number of archaeological frauds, including the Shapira forgeries of Hebrew texts offered to the British Museum, London, the Moabite potteries in the Imperial Museum, Berlin, and the tiara of Saitarpharnes in the Louvre, Paris. He described his detective work in Les Fraudes archéologiques/Archaeological Frauds 1885.

He conducted archaeological expeditions with the British to Palestine 1874, and with the French to Syria and the Red Sea, before becoming director of the Ecole des Langues Orientales.

As a diplomat, his service included appointments as consul general 1896 and minister plenipotentiary 1906.