Auguste Jean-Marie Pavie (May 31, 1847 - June 7 1925) was a French civil Servan, explorer and diplomat active in Southeast Asia. As resident minister in Bankok, he was instrumental in French successes of 'gunboat diplomacy' in the Franco-Siamese war, which established French authority in the Mekong river valley and resulted in the French Protectorate over Laos. (He would become Minister of the colony , and eventually the first Governor-General of Laos.) Over the course of the 1880s and 1890s, Pavie undertook four survey missions embracing over 250,000 square miles in the highlands North and East of the Mekong, traveling on foot, by elephant and by raft with a team of as many as 40 assistants. The four Missions covered 1) Cambodia and Southern Siam; 2) Northeastern Laos and the exploration of the Black river as far as Hanoi; 3) the Mekong river from Saigon to Luang Prabang; and 4),from 1894 to 1895, the Laotian borderings with China and Burma. In addition to his governmental and cartographic work, Pavie was active in the 1889 establishment of and institution for the education of future colonial administrators, the École coloniale More by this mapmaker...

Pierre Paul Cupet (June 1, 1859 - 1907) was a French cartographer, photographer, and military officer. Cupet was born in Sermaize-les-Bains, Marne, the son of a local gendarme. At 18, with a thirst for adventure, he entered the École Spéciale Militaire de Saint-Cyr, where he exhibited aptitude at surveying and cartography. He left Saint-Cyr as lieutenant and was immediately sent with the Zouaves (light infantry) to Algeria. Afterwards, now a Captain of the 3rd Zouaves, he was sent to French Indochina where he participated in the Tonkin Campaign (1884 - 1885). From July 1887, he was part of the Franco-Siamese Commission organized to settle border between French Indochina and its neighbors. He became a close confident of Auguste Jean-Marie Pavie (May 31, 1847 - June 7, 1925) and participated in several of the 'Missions Pavie', where he was responsible for cartography. He was also a hobbyist photographer, and recorded friends, locals, and sights from his journeys. He returned to France to become battalion commander in the 56th Zouaves and then lieutenant colonel in 158th Zouaves. Was made an office of the Légion d'Honneur in 1905. He died in Montmeyran, in the Drôme, in 1907. Learn More...

Auguste-Marie-Philippe Nicolon (July 6, 1864 - January 10, 1896) was a French Foreign Legionnaire active for much of his career in French Indochina. He was born in Vaucluse, Avignon, France. He joined the French Foreign service on March 27, 1874, initially for a 5-year term. He studied at the École Spéciale Militaire de Saint-Cyr through October 1, 1878. Graduating 10th in his class, he joined the 40th French Infantry. Nicolon is associated with the second 'Mission Pavie' (1888 - 1889) in Laos, of which he was third in command after Auguste Jean-Marie Pavie 1847 - 1925) himself and Pierre Paul Cupet (1859 - 1907). The exploratory mission left him in poor health, and he left Indochina for Paris in 1889, writing to Pavie: 'I must depart if I do not wish to leave here the little of me that remains - my bones and skin. Repeatedly troubled by fever, I am, as M. Massie says, at the end of my tether.' Immediately upon his return, on October 8, 1889, he was made a Chevalier de Legion d'Honneur. He spent 2 years recuperating in Paris, during which he married in 1891. Shortly thereafter he was sent to Senegal, Tunisia, and Algeria with the 2nd regiment of the French Foreign Legion. He witnessed and survived the 1894 massacre of Eugène Bonnier's (1856 - 1894) column by Tuareg warriors near Timbuktu. Afterwards he served briefly in Sudan before returning to France, where he died in January of 1896. Learn More...

Bureau Topographique des Troupes de l'Indo-chine (fl. c. 1886 - 1900) was founded in 1886 in Hanoi. Its first major project was a 1:2000000 map of the entirety of Indochina, for which they drew on source maps created by the Service Hydrographique de la Marine and those created by an expeditionary corps sent throughout the region. Before establishing its own printing facilities in Indochina in 1890, the Bureau Topographique transferred their work back to Paris to be printed by the Service Géographique de l'Armée. In 1890 the Bureau Topographique also began to increase its cartographic output. The Bureau Topographique sent army officers on triangulation and topographic missions in unexplored areas of Indochina throughout the 1890s, some of which proved fatal for the participants. It is unclear when the Bureau Topographique shut down, but no examples of their work postdate 1900. Learn More...

Jean Baptiste Marius Augustin Challamel (March 18, 1818 - October 20, 1894) was a French historian, editor, and publisher active in Paris in the mid to late 19th century. Challamel is best known as a historian. Even so, although prolific, his personal work more often falls into pop-history and has little originality or merit. More significantly, Challamel also founded Challamel et Cie., a publishing house at 5 Rue Jacob. From this location, Challamel published extensively for French colonial interests in Africa, Asia, Indochina, and Polynesia. His work includes some of the most significant works documenting late 19th century French scientific discoveries, navigation, cartography, and scholarship. He held the contract for official French colonial office printings, including for the Bureau Topographique and the Service Geographique. Although Challamel died in 1894, his firm continued to operate until the 1920s. His heirs, operating under the same name, moved tore 17 Rue Jacob and renamed their firm Librairie Maritime et Coloniale, Augustin Challamel, Editeur. Learn More...