Pierre Couperie (1930-2010) was a French historian who spent much of his career as a research engineer at the Centre for Historical Research of the École des hautes études en sciences sociales, working on the economic and social history of Paris. A pioneer of the scholarly study of comics, he curated the landmark 1967 exhibition Bande dessinée et figuration narrative at the Musée des Arts Décoratifs and co-wrote its companion volume. An erudite collector and historian of science fiction, he extended his curiosity to the history of science and astronomy, as reflected in La Lune (1969), co-written with Claude Moliterni. His method combined documentary rigour, a taste for iconography and a concern for precise chronology.