Emmanuel Le Roy Ladurie is a professor at the Collège de France and a member of the Académie des Sciences Morales et Politiques. He is the author of numerous books, including Montaillou: The Promised Land of Error; The Mind and Method of the Historian; and The Beggar and the Professor, the latter published by the University of Chicago Press.

Jean-François Fitou is the deputy prefect of Langon, France.

Arthur Goldhammer is an award-winning translator who has translated books by Georges Duby, Jacques Le Goff, and Jean Starobinski.