Joshua Hoffet

Josué Hoffet, born Josué-Heilman Hoffet, (5 May 1901 – disappeared 21 April 1945) was a French palaeontologist best remembered for his expeditions to Laos, which discovered the first known remains of dinosaurs in the country, which belonged to what is now known as Tangvayosaurus.

Biography Josué-Heilman Hoffet was born on 5 May 1901 and his brother Frédéric, akin to their father Charles-Frédéric (1860–1928), became a pastor, while Josué Hoffet was sent to be a carpenter's apprentice. He disliked the job and instead decided to pursue a career in the natural sciences (specifically palaeontology and geology) and he earned a graduate degree at the University of Nancy under the mentorship of Paul Fallot.

In order to undertake his thesis, he joined the Geology and Paleontology of Laos in 1927 and he moved to French Indochina with his first wife Marguerite Mathilde Denny; she died in 1929. Hoffet returned to France in 1932, defended his thesis in 1933 and received a prize from the Paris Academy of Sciences. He also married his second wife, Alice Braun (1911–2004), in 1933; the couple had four children: Anne-Line, Marie-Eve, Jean-Fred and Catherine.

In 1936, he became the first to find dinosaur fossils in Laos while mapping the Grès supérieurs Formation at Bas-Laos, Tang Vay in search of hydrocarbons. At the time, he accidentally discovered dinosaur, turtle and crocodyliform fossils.

When the Japanese occupied Laos during the Second World War, Hoffet was mobilised and stationed in Huế, Vietnam. On 21 April 1945, Hoffet went missing in action at the Nui Tho Pass near Hanoi and he was declared dead in absentia in 1947. It is believed that he was killed with a machete shortly after he disappeared; in 1992, a commemorative plaque was installed in the area he likely died.