Ludovicus Finson - Nicolas Claude Fabri de Peyresc

Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc (1 December 1580 – 24 June 1637), often known simply as Peiresc, or by the Latin form of his name, Peirescius, was a French

astronomer An astronomer is a scientist in the field of astronomy who focuses on a specific question or field outside the scope of Earth. Astronomers observe astronomical objects, such as stars, planets, natural satellite, moons, comets and galaxy, galax ...

antiquary An antiquarian or antiquary () is an aficionado or student of antiquities or things of the past. More specifically, the term is used for those who study history with particular attention to ancient artefacts, archaeological and historic sit ...

and savant, who maintained a wide correspondence with scientists, and was a successful organizer of scientific inquiry. His research included a determination of the difference in

longitude Longitude (, ) is a geographic coordinate that specifies the east- west position of a point on the surface of the Earth, or another celestial body. It is an angular measurement, usually expressed in degrees and denoted by the Greek lett ...

of various locations in

Europe Europe is a continent located entirely in the Northern Hemisphere and mostly in the Eastern Hemisphere. It is bordered by the Arctic Ocean to the north, the Atlantic Ocean to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and Asia to the east ...

, around the

Mediterranean The Mediterranean Sea ( ) is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the east by the Levant in West Asia, on the north by Anatolia in West Asia and Southern ...

, and in

North Africa North Africa (sometimes Northern Africa) is a region encompassing the northern portion of the African continent. There is no singularly accepted scope for the region. However, it is sometimes defined as stretching from the Atlantic shores of t ...

Early life

Peiresc's father was a higher magistrate and city surgeon in

Provence Provence is a geographical region and historical province of southeastern France, which stretches from the left bank of the lower Rhône to the west to the France–Italy border, Italian border to the east; it is bordered by the Mediterrane ...

from a wealthy noble family, who with his wife fled their home town of

Aix-en-Provence Aix-en-Provence, or simply Aix, is a List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, city and Communes of France, commune in southern France, about north of Marseille. A former capital of Provence, it is the Subprefectures in France, s ...

to avoid the plague raging there, settling in Belgentier in Var. Peiresc was born in Belgentier and educated in Aix-en-Provence and

Avignon Avignon (, , ; or , ; ) is the Prefectures in France, prefecture of the Vaucluse department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region of southeastern France. Located on the left bank of the river Rhône, the Communes of France, commune had a ...

, as well as at the

Jesuit The Society of Jesus (; abbreviation: S.J. or SJ), also known as the Jesuit Order or the Jesuits ( ; ), is a religious order (Catholic), religious order of clerics regular of pontifical right for men in the Catholic Church headquartered in Rom ...

college at Tournon. At

Toulon Toulon (, , ; , , ) is a city in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region of southeastern France. Located on the French Riviera and the historical Provence, it is the prefecture of the Var (department), Var department. The Commune of Toulon h ...

, he first became interested in

astronomy Astronomy is a natural science that studies celestial objects and the phenomena that occur in the cosmos. It uses mathematics, physics, and chemistry in order to explain their origin and their overall evolution. Objects of interest includ ...

. Studying law and becoming interested in archaeology, he travelled to

Italy Italy, officially the Italian Republic, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe, Western Europe. It consists of Italian Peninsula, a peninsula that extends into the Mediterranean Sea, with the Alps on its northern land b ...

Switzerland Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...

and France in 1599, and finally finished his legal studies in 1604 at the

University of Montpellier The University of Montpellier () is a public university, public research university located in Montpellier, in south-east of France. Established in 1220, the University of Montpellier is one of the List of oldest universities in continuous opera ...

. It was also in 1604 that he assumed the name ''Peiresc'' after a domain in

Alpes-de-Haute-Provence Alpes-de-Haute-Provence (sometimes abbreviated as AHP; ; ; ), formerly until 1970 known as Basses-Alpes (, ), is a department in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region of France, bordering Alpes-Maritimes and Italy to the east, Var to the sou ...

(now spelled

Peyresq Peyresq (from ''le pays des pierres'', or ''the land of stones'') is a French village in the commune of Thorame-Haute in France, perched on a rocky outcrop of the Alpes-de-Haute-Provence at 1,528 metres above sea level. History The village first ...

) which he had inherited from his father, although he himself never visited it. After receiving his degree, he travelled to Paris (in 1605–1606, with his patron

Guillaume du Vair Guillaume du Vair (7 March 1556 – 3 August 1621) was a French bishop, author, lawyer, Magistrate of the Parliament and Keeper of the Seals of France under French king Louis XIII. Life Du Vair was born in Paris. After taking holy orders, he ex ...

, president of the

Parlement Under the French Ancien Régime, a ''parlement'' () was a provincial appellate court of the Kingdom of France. In 1789, France had 13 ''parlements'', the original and most important of which was the ''Parlement'' of Paris. Though both th ...

of Provence),

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

and

Flanders Flanders ( or ; ) is the Dutch language, Dutch-speaking northern portion of Belgium and one of the communities, regions and language areas of Belgium. However, there are several overlapping definitions, including ones related to culture, la ...

before returning to Aix in 1607 to take over his uncle's position as '' conseiller'' in the

of Provence under du Vair. He held this post until 1615.

Intellectual and collector

Buste de Nicolas Fabri de Peiresc par Caffieri Bibliotheque Mazarine Paris n1

From 1615 until 1622, Peiresc again visited Paris with du Vair. He then returned to Provence to serve as senator of the sovereign court. He became a patron of science and art, studied

fossil A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserve ...

s, and supported the astronomer

Pierre Gassendi Pierre Gassendi (; also Pierre Gassend, Petrus Gassendi, Petrus Gassendus; 22 January 1592 – 24 October 1655) was a French philosopher, Catholic priest, astronomer, and mathematician. While he held a church position in south-east France, he a ...

from 1634 to 1637.

Virginio Cesarini Virginio Cesarini (20 October 1595, in Rome – 1 April 1624, in Rome) was an Italian poet and intellectual. Youth and Education The son of Giuliano Cesarini, duke of Civitanova, and his wife Livia Orsini, he was sent together with his brother ...

proposed him for membership of the

Accademia dei Lincei The (; literally the "Academy of the Lynx-Eyed"), anglicised as the Lincean Academy, is one of the oldest and most prestigious European scientific institutions, located at the Palazzo Corsini on the Via della Lungara in Rome, Italy. Founded in ...

in 1621, but it is not certain whether he joined. Peiresc's position as a great intellectual at the time of the

Scientific Revolution The Scientific Revolution was a series of events that marked the emergence of History of science, modern science during the early modern period, when developments in History of mathematics#Mathematics during the Scientific Revolution, mathemati ...

has led to his being called a "Prince of the Republic of Letters". He was also a noted politician in his home region, and a tireless letter-writer (10,000 of his letters survive, and he was in constant correspondence with

François de Malherbe François de Malherbe (, 1555 – 16 October 1628) was a French poet, critic, and translator. Life He was born in Le Locheur (near Caen, Normandie), to a family of standing, although the family's pedigree did not satisfy the heralds in terms o ...

Hugo Grotius Hugo Grotius ( ; 10 April 1583 – 28 August 1645), also known as Hugo de Groot () or Huig de Groot (), was a Dutch humanist, diplomat, lawyer, theologian, jurist, statesman, poet and playwright. A teenage prodigy, he was born in Delft an ...

, the brothers Dupuy,

Alphonse-Louis du Plessis de Richelieu Alphonse-Louis du Plessis de Richelieu (; 1582 – 23 March 1653) was a French Carthusian, bishop and Cardinal. He was the elder brother of Armand Cardinal Richelieu, the celebrated minister of Louis XIII. Life He was born in Paris and was ed ...

, and with his great friend

Rubens Sir Peter Paul Rubens ( ; ; 28 June 1577 – 30 May 1640) was a Flemish artist and diplomat. He is considered the most influential artist of the Flemish Baroque tradition. Rubens' highly charged compositions reference erudite aspects of clas ...

. His correspondence to Malherbe throws light on the personality of Malherbe's troubled son Marc-Antoine Malherbe. Peiresc became one of the first admirers and supporters of Caravaggio in France. He first discovered Caravaggio's works in the

Contarelli chapel The Contarelli Chapel or Cappella Contarelli is located within the church of San Luigi dei Francesi in Rome. It is famous for housing three paintings on the theme of Saint Matthew the Evangelist by the Baroque master Caravaggio. The paintings wer ...

in Rome in 1600 when he was only 20 years old.Dossier de Presse, Les caravages de Peiresc, Conférence de Presse Organisée par la mairie de Cavaillon et l’association des amis de l’Hôtel d’Agar (reconnue d’intérêt général). Cavaillon salle du conseil le 21 Mars 2019 In his hometown, he gathered around him a sort of 'caravaggesque workshop of Southern France' with artists including Flemish artist

Louis Finson Louis Finson, Lodewijk Finson or Ludovicus Finsonius (between 1574 and 1580 – 1617) was a Flemish painter, draughtsman, copyist and art dealer. He painted portraits, religious compositions, allegorical paintings and genre scenes. Moving to Ital ...

Martin Hermann Faber Martin Hermann Faber (1586–1648), was a German painter, architect, and cartographer. He was born in Emden and made a trip southwards to Italy in 1611 where he met the "Caravaggist" Louis Finson.Trophime Bigot and other painters.Olivier Morand, ''Le Finson de Toulouse''
2019 He promoted the Caravaggesque style by arranging commissions for these artists. He was instrumental in obtaining a number of commissions for Finson, including for history paintings and portraits.Paul Smeets (editor), ''Louis Finson, The four elements: The four elements Responsibility''; R. Smeets, c. 2007 Finson also painted a ''portrait of de Peyresc''. Peiresc was an avid art collector and relied on Finson's contacts in Italy to acquire two works of Caravaggio from the Pasqualini family of Rome. Peiresc's house in Aix-en-Provence was a veritable museum, and held a mix of antique sculptures, modern paintings, medals, books and gardens with exotic plants. He acquired the Byzantine Barberini ivory (it is not known how or from whom) and offered it to Francesco Barberini: the work is now in the

Louvre The Louvre ( ), or the Louvre Museum ( ), is a national art museum in Paris, France, and one of the most famous museums in the world. It is located on the Rive Droite, Right Bank of the Seine in the city's 1st arrondissement of Paris, 1st arron ...

. He had the Codex Luxemburgensis, the surviving Carolingian copy of the

Chronography of 354 The Chronograph of 354 is a compilation of chronological and calendrical texts produced in 354 AD for a wealthy Roman Christian named Valentinus by the calligrapher and illustrator Furius Dionysius Filocalus. The original illustrated manuscri ...

in his possession for many years; after his death it disappeared. He owned over 18,000 coins and medals, and was also an archaeologist, amateur artist, historian (he demonstrated that Julius Caesar's invasion of Britain set out not from

Calais Calais ( , , traditionally , ) is a French port city in the Pas-de-Calais department, of which it is a subprefecture. Calais is the largest city in Pas-de-Calais. The population of the city proper is 67,544; that of the urban area is 144,6 ...

but from St Omer), Egyptologist, botanist, zoologist (studying chameleons, crocodiles, the elephant and the alzaron, a sort of

Nubia Nubia (, Nobiin language, Nobiin: , ) is a region along the Nile river encompassing the area between the confluence of the Blue Nile, Blue and White Nile, White Niles (in Khartoum in central Sudan), and the Cataracts of the Nile, first cataract ...

n gazelle with a bull-like head, now disappeared), physiologist, geographer (put on the project of linking Aix to Marseilles), and ecologist. Partiel 26nov1610 Orion

Astronomer

Peiresc was also an astronomer. In 1610 du Vair purchased a

telescope A telescope is a device used to observe distant objects by their emission, Absorption (electromagnetic radiation), absorption, or Reflection (physics), reflection of electromagnetic radiation. Originally, it was an optical instrument using len ...

, which Peiresc and Joseph Gaultier used for observing the skies, including

Jupiter's moons There are 97 Natural satellite, moons of Jupiter with confirmed orbits . This number does not include a number of meter-sized moonlets thought to be shed from the inner moons, nor hundreds of possible kilometer-sized outer irregular moons that ...

; his courtly suggestion that individual names from the

Medici The House of Medici ( , ; ) was an Italian banking family and political dynasty that first consolidated power in the Republic of Florence under Cosimo de' Medici and his grandson Lorenzo "the Magnificent" during the first half of the 15th ...

family be applied to these "Medicean stars" was not taken up. Peiresc also made detailed observations of the

Orion Nebula The Orion Nebula (also known as Messier 42, M42, or NGC 1976) is a diffuse nebula in the Milky Way situated south of Orion's Belt in the Orion (constellation), constellation of Orion, and is known as the middle "star" in the "sword" of Orion. It ...

in 1610; Gaultier became the second person to see it in the telescope. To determine

with greater precision, he coordinated the observation of the lunar eclipses of 28 August 1635 right across the Mediterranean; this allowed him to work out that the Mediterranean sea was in fact 1,000 km shorter than had previously been thought. Peiresc also wrote letters to

Galileo Galileo di Vincenzo Bonaiuti de' Galilei (15 February 1564 – 8 January 1642), commonly referred to as Galileo Galilei ( , , ) or mononymously as Galileo, was an Italian astronomer, physicist and engineer, sometimes described as a poly ...

and

Tommaso Campanella Tommaso Campanella (; 5 September 1568 – 21 May 1639), baptized Giovanni Domenico Campanella, was an Italian Dominican friar, philosopher, theologian, astrologer, and poet. Campanella was prosecuted by the Roman Inquisition for he ...

, two of whom he defended when they were arrested by the Inquisition.

Final years

Peiresc wrote an "abridged history of Provence", but died before editing it: it was only published (edited by Jacques Ferrier and Michel Feuillas) in 1982. With Gassendi's support, notably financially, he and the engraver

Claude Mellan Claude Mellan (23 May 1598 – 9 September 1688) was a French draughtsman, engraver, and painter. Early life and training Mellan was born in Abbeville, the son of a customs official. His first known print (Préaud no. 288), made for a thesi ...

began to produce a map of the Moon's surface, but again Peiresc died before completing it. Peiresc died on 24 June 1637 in Aix-en-Provence.

Works

Peiresc's works include: *''Histoire abrégée de Provence'' *''Lettres à Malherbe'' (1606–1628) *''Traitez des droits et des libertés de l'Eglise gallicane'' (1639) *''Vita Peireskii'' (1641) *''Mémoires'' *''Bulletin Rubens'' *''Notes inédites de Peiresc sur quelques points d'histoire naturelle'' *''Correspondance de Peiresc et Aleandro'' (1616-1618) Aix-en-Provence Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc 20061227

Aix-en-Provence Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc 20061227

Legacy

A bronze bust of Peiresc stands on the square of the university in Aix-en-Provence, facing the cathedral of Saint Sauveur. His home near the palais de Justice was demolished to build the present Palais, and has completely disappeared. The village museum in

near

Digne-les-Bains Digne-les-Bains (; Occitan language, Occitan: ''Dinha dei Banhs''), or simply and historically Digne (''Dinha'' in the Franco-Provençal, classical norm or ''Digno'' in the Mistralian norm), is the Prefectures in France, prefecture of the Alpe ...

is wholly given over to his work. Peiresc was honored in 1935 by the naming of the lunar

crater A crater is a landform consisting of a hole or depression (geology), depression on a planetary surface, usually caused either by an object hitting the surface, or by geological activity on the planet. A crater has classically been described ...

Peirescius (46.5S, 67.6E, 61 km diameter); and in 1993 by the naming of the asteroid 19226 Peiresc.

References

Bibliography

* * * * * * * *

External links

The Correspondence of Nicolas-Claude Fabri de Peiresc
i
EMLO

Galileo Project at Rice University

{{DEFAULTSORT:Peiresc, Nicholas Claude Fabri De 1580 births 1637 deaths People from Var (department) French antiquarians 17th-century French astronomers French Renaissance humanists Catholic clergy scientists 17th-century antiquarians French male non-fiction writers Members of the Lincean Academy French numismatists 17th-century French male writers Sigillographers People from Provence (French province)