Égide de Boeck was born on 13 November 1875 in Oppuurs, Belgium. He was a priest, religious and linguist in the then Belgian Congo. He died on 20 December 1944.
De Boeck grew up in Flanders. His father was a primary school teacher, his mother a very devout woman. He had several younger brothers and sisters: Alphonse, a priest in Belgium, Marlo, Achilles and Jules, both missionaries in Scheut, a sister who worked as a nun in the Philippines and a brother who married.[1]
After secondary school in Malines, he entered the novitiate of the missionaries of Scheut in 1894. He was ordained a priest on July 1, 1900 and was sent to New Antwerp (now Makanza) in the Congo on September 1 of the same year. From 1913 to 1916 he was Apostolic Prefect of Kasaï Supérieur.
On 8 May 1921 he was ordained Bishop and Titular Bishop of Azotus. Already on 4 January 1921 he took up the office of Apostolic Vicar of New Antwerp, which he held until 27 January 1936. On that day he was appointed Apostolic Vicar of Lisala as a result of the reorganization of the Congolese dioceses, which he remained until his death.[2]
As the son of a teacher, the school system was important to de Boeck. From the very beginning, he was committed to improving education in the Belgian Congo. On his travels, he always paid special attention to schools and introduced school inspectors. He discovered that there were many variants of Bangala spoken in the region. He gathered all available information and unified it into a standard language, the Lingala. This work resulted in a translation of the New Testament and a grammar and dictionary.[3] His linguistic work was always a means to an end, especially for the school.
Sometimes criticism is voiced that de Boeck introduced Lingala everywhere and displaced the local languages. This may be partially true, since the limited possibilities of the missionaries did not allow them to write textbooks for over 200 languages. On the other hand, de Boeck always advocated that the local languages should be cultivated alongside the Lingala and that, for example, religious instruction should explicitly not be held at Lingala. For Lingombe, Ebudja and Gbaka he had corresponding teaching materials created.[1]
The Égide-de-Bœck cultural centres in Mongala, Équateur and Southern Ubangi are named after de Boeck.