ROUOON-MACQUART, roo-geni ma-kar, Les, a series of 20 novels by Emile Zola, relat ing the history of a family under the Second Empire and published in 1871-93. The novels were intended to form a scientific study of heredity as well as a photograph of French social life. The series begins with 'La for tune des Rougons' (1871), and this was fol lowed by (La curie' (Rush for the Spoil: 1872); a study of the financial world of Paris at the time Haussmann laid out the boulevards) ; conquete de Plassane (1874) ;
this last story Pascal Rougon collects all the data relating to his family and sums up their history.