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François Blondel ( June 1618 – 21 January 1686) was a soldier, engineer of fortifications, mathematician, diplomat, military and civil engineer and architect, called "the Great Blondel", to distinguish him in a dynasty of
French architect The following is a chronological list of French architects. Some of their major architectural works are listed after each name. Middle Ages Étienne de Bonneuil (late 13th century) * Uppsala Cathedral, Sweden Jean de Chelles (13th century ...
s. He is remembered for his ''Cours d'architecture'' which remained a central text for over a century. His precepts placed him in opposition with
Claude Perrault Claude Perrault (25 September 1613 – 9 October 1688) was a French physician and an amateur architect, best known for his participation in the design of the east façade of the Louvre in Paris.culture war known under the heading '' Querelle des anciens et des modernes''. If François Blondel was not the most highly reputed among the ''académiciens'' of his day, his were the writings that most generally circulated among the general public, the ''Cours de Mathématiques'', the ''Art de jetter les Bombes'', the ''Nouvelle manière de fortifier les places'' and, above all his '' Cours d'Architecture''.


Early life

Born Nicolas-François Blondel at
Ribemont Ribemont () is a commune in the Aisne department in Hauts-de-France in northern France. It is the birthplace of Marquis de Condorcet (1743-1794), figure of the French Revolution History Two treaties were signed in Ribemont: *The Treaty of ...
in the Picardy region of France, he was baptized on 15 June 1618. His father was François-Guillaume Blondel, who studied law in
Toulouse Toulouse ( , ; oc, Tolosa ) is the prefecture of the French department of Haute-Garonne and of the larger region of Occitania. The city is on the banks of the River Garonne, from the Mediterranean Sea, from the Atlantic Ocean and from Par ...
and bought the position of ''avocat du roi'' in Ribemont after receiving his degree in 1624. Nicolas-François' mother was Marie de Louen, whose family belonged to the local nobility. Although his father François-Guillaume was not born a nobleman, he was able to purchase (or inherit via his wife's relations) two close-by ''
seigneuries ''Seigneur'' is an originally feudal title in France before the Revolution, in New France and British North America until 1854, and in the Channel Islands to this day. A seigneur refers to the person or collective who owned a ''seigneurie'' (o ...
'', Gaillardon in 1620 and Les Croisettes before 1635, and was the mayor of Ribemont several times in the 1630s and 1640s. Nicolas-François was well educated in languages as a youth, and participated for a time in the
Thirty Years' War The Thirty Years' War was one of the longest and most destructive conflicts in European history The history of Europe is traditionally divided into four time periods: prehistoric Europe (prior to about 800 BC), classical antiquity (80 ...
.


Career

In 1640
Cardinal Richelieu Armand Jean du Plessis, Duke of Richelieu (; 9 September 1585 – 4 December 1642), known as Cardinal Richelieu, was a French clergyman and statesman. He was also known as ''l'Éminence rouge'', or "the Red Eminence", a term derived from the ...
entrusted Blondel with diplomatic missions in Portugal, Spain and Italy, which gave him an opportunity to study at first hand the fortification systems of those nations. He returned from Italy with a greatly enhanced knowledge of mathematics, and it may have been during this trip that he met
Galileo Galileo di Vincenzo Bonaiuti de' Galilei (15 February 1564 – 8 January 1642) was an Italian astronomer, physicist and engineer, sometimes described as a polymath. Commonly referred to as Galileo, his name was pronounced (, ). He was ...
, with whom he later claimed to have studied personally. Blondel subsequently became one of Galileo's earliest French supporters. Richelieu named Blondel sub-lieutenant of one of his
galley A galley is a type of ship that is propelled mainly by oars. The galley is characterized by its long, slender hull, shallow draft, and low freeboard (clearance between sea and gunwale). Virtually all types of galleys had sails that could be used ...
s, ''La Cardinale'', aboard which he participated in the attack on the port of
Tarragona Tarragona (, ; Phoenician: ''Tarqon''; la, Tarraco) is a port city located in northeast Spain on the Costa Daurada by the Mediterranean Sea. Founded before the fifth century BC, it is the capital of the Province of Tarragona, and part of Tar ...
and served for a time as governor at Palamos. In 1647 Blondel commanded the artillery of the naval expedition against the Spanish at Naples. With the peace he finished his military career with the brevet of '' maréchal des camps'' (26 November 1652). Around 1648 Blondel received his first architectural commission, the grand stables at the
Château de Chaumont-la-Guiche The French Château de Chaumont-la-Guiche r -Laguiche located in Saint-Bonnet-de-Joux (Saône-et-Loire), in a region formerly known as Charolais in southern Burgundy, was constructed beginning in 1500 for the .Babelon 1989, pp. 797–798. Th ...
in
Saint-Bonnet-de-Joux Saint-Bonnet-de-Joux () is a commune in the Saône-et-Loire department in the region of Bourgogne-Franche-Comté in central eastern France. In the Charolais natural region of Burgundy. See also *Communes of the Saône-et-Loire department The ...
in southern Burgundy. The stables were executed 1648–1652 by the local mason and entrepreneur François Martel, to whom the design has frequently been attributed. However, Blondel mentions that he was responsible in a note in his 1685 edition of Louis Savot's ''L'architecture françoise'', and, according to his biographer Anthony Gerbino, there is no reason to question Blondel's claim. The cross-vaulted ground floor is divided into three aisles by two Tuscan arcades with stalls for more than eighty horses. On the exterior of the entrance front are two impressive double staircases ascending to a large hall on the upper floor. They frame the central portal, strikingly surmounted by a life-sized equestrian statue of the previous ''seigneur'', Philibert de La Guiche. His daughter, Henriette de La Guiche built the stables for her husband, who at the time was , the
governor of Provence The land of Provence has a history quite separate from that of any of the larger nations of Europe. Its independent existence has its origins in the frontier nature of the dukedom in Merovingian Gaul. In this position, influenced and affected by ...
and a grandson of Charles IX of France. Alais also owned the
Château d'Écouen The Château d'Écouen is an historic château in the commune of Écouen, some 20 km north of Paris, France, and a notable example of French Renaissance architecture. Since 1975, it has housed the collections of the Musée national de la Renaissan ...
. These royal connections account for the monumentality of the design. Alais probably met Blondel in the military. In 1652 Blondel became the tutor of the son of the Secretary of State for foreign affairs, Loménie de Brienne, with whom he made the
Grand Tour The Grand Tour was the principally 17th- to early 19th-century custom of a traditional trip through Europe, with Italy as a key destination, undertaken by upper-class young European men of sufficient means and rank (typically accompanied by a tuto ...
: Langres — Besançon — Basel — Alsace (Brisach) — Strasbourg (where he inspected the mechanism of the famous clock) — Philippsburg — Mannheim — Mayence — The Hague — Hamburg — Lübeck — Kiel — Denmark — Sweden (Stockholm, Uppsala) — Finland — Estonia (Riga) — Königsberg — Dantzig — Cracow — Pressburg — Vienna — Prague — Vence — Rome — Florence — Toulon. His travels would stand him in good stead when he came to compile his ''Cours d'Architecture''. During the 1660s Blondel made a second tour with a son of
Jean Baptiste Colbert Jean-Baptiste Colbert (; 29 August 1619 – 6 September 1683) was a French statesman who served as First Minister of State from 1661 until his death in 1683 under the rule of King Louis XIV. His lasting impact on the organization of the country ...
, of which the itinerary is less known. In 1656, Blondel was named reader in Mathematics and Fortification at the Collège Royal, where his place was filled during his numerous absences by the astronomer Picard. From 1662 to 1668, Blondel exercised the functions of
Syndic Syndic (Late Latin: '; Greek: ' – one who helps in a court of justice, an advocate, representative) is a term applied in certain countries to an officer of government with varying powers, and secondly to a representative or delegate of a universi ...
of the College. In the years 1657 to 1663 Mazarin sent him on diplomatic missions in Italy, Egypt, Greece, Turkey, Germany, Poland, Moscow (where he regretted not having seen the fortifications at
Kazan Kazan ( ; rus, Казань, p=kɐˈzanʲ; tt-Cyrl, Казан, ''Qazan'', IPA: ɑzan is the capital and largest city of the Republic of Tatarstan in Russia. The city lies at the confluence of the Volga and the Kazanka rivers, covering a ...
against the
Tatars The Tatars ()Tatar
in the Collins English Dictionary is an umbrella term for different
, and found that the maritime defenses were in the Dutch manner), Prussia, Livonia (with the Swedish fortifications of
Riga Riga (; lv, Rīga , liv, Rīgõ) is the capital and largest city of Latvia and is home to 605,802 inhabitants which is a third of Latvia's population. The city lies on the Gulf of Riga at the mouth of the Daugava river where it meets the Ba ...
), and Lithuania. In the course of his travels he encountered Paul Wurz, occasioning the correspondence that resulted in Blondel's first publication, a mathematical pamphlet entitled ''Epistola ad P. W. aulum Wurzium', which discussed the breaking resistance of beams. Blondel demonstrates that a mathematical proof of Galileo, allowing the cross-section of a beam to be parabolically shaped such that its weight was reduced by one third, only applied to cantilevered beams and did not apply to the specified aim, a beam supported at both ends, for which a semicircular or elliptical shape would apply. Some of these questions were taken up again in 1673, when he published his ''Résolution des quatre principaux problèmes d'Architecture''. In 1659, on a voyage to
Constantinople la, Constantinopolis ota, قسطنطينيه , alternate_name = Byzantion (earlier Greek name), Nova Roma ("New Rome"), Miklagard/Miklagarth (Old Norse), Tsargrad ( Slavic), Qustantiniya (Arabic), Basileuousa ("Queen of Cities"), Megalopolis (" ...
he saw an aqueduct "in a place that one calls ''Belgrade'', which by its grandeur, its height and the magnificence of its structure, cedes nothing to that of the
Pont du Gard The Pont du Gard is an ancient Roman aqueduct bridge built in the first century AD to carry water over to the Roman colony of ''Nemausus'' ( Nîmes). It crosses the river Gardon near the town of Vers-Pont-du-Gard in southern France. The Pont ...
." That same year he was posted as diplomatic resident to
Copenhagen Copenhagen ( or .; da, København ) is the capital and most populous city of Denmark, with a proper population of around 815.000 in the last quarter of 2022; and some 1.370,000 in the urban area; and the wider Copenhagen metropolitan ar ...
, and post he filled until 1663, when he was recalled to France to become a ''conseiller d'État.'' The following year, 1664, Colbert named him ''Ingénieur du Roy pour la Marine'', which occasioned his supervision of harbour fortifications in Normandy (Cherbourg, Le Havre), in Brittany and in the Antillies (Martinique, Guadeloupe, Saint-Domingue), where he witnessed at first hand the prodigious effects of a
hurricane A tropical cyclone is a rapidly rotating storm system characterized by a low-pressure center, a closed low-level atmospheric circulation, strong winds, and a spiral arrangement of thunderstorms that produce heavy rain and squalls. Depend ...
at the island of Saint-Christophe, and where he found the materials for numerous memoires presented to the Académie des Sciences.
Quatremère de Quincy Antoine-Chrysostome Quatremère de Quincy (21 October 1755 – 28 December 1849) was a French armchair archaeologist and architectural theorist, a Freemason, and an effective arts administrator and influential writer on art. Life Born in Paris, ...
reported that Blondel's talents for architecture were first tested in 1665, in building the royal ''corderie'' ( ropewalk) at Rochefort. Blondel was also put in charge of constructing the Roman bridge at Saintes. In 1669, Blondel was admitted to the Académie des Sciences as a geometer (cartographer).Vuillemin 2008, p. 158. Tagell 1996 states Blondel was admitted as a mathematician. That year, in the course of a trip to London in the company of Jean-Baptiste du Hamel, secretary of the Académie, he witnessed an unsuccessful blood transfusion effected by the
Royal Society The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...
in hopes of curing a madman, with the thought that the human passions were transmitted in the blood. That same year he was commissioned with
urbanization Urbanization (or urbanisation) refers to the population shift from rural to urban areas, the corresponding decrease in the proportion of people living in rural areas, and the ways in which societies adapt to this change. It is predominantly t ...
projects for the embellishment of Paris, notably the reconstruction of the Porte Saint-Denis and the Porte Saint-Bernard, and the plan for the city's expansion, which he accomplished with the collaboration of the architect
Pierre Bullet Pierre Bullet (c. 1639 – 1716) was a French architect. He was one of the students of François Blondel. Among his works are the Château de Champs-sur-Marne, and Porte Saint-Martin The Porte Saint-Martin ( en, St. Martin Gate) is a Parisia ...
. On 31 December 1671, the King named Blondel Director and Professor of the Académie Royale d'Architecture. In 1673, Blondel was appointed professor of mathematics to the Grand Dauphin; if the royal pupil was of mediocre talent, the project resulted in Blondel's ''Cours de Mathématiques'' (1683). From 1670 until his death in 1686, Blondel was wholly occupied in professional matters and teaching. He collaborated on the dictionaries of
Antoine Furetière Antoine Furetière (28 December 161914 May 1688) was a French scholar, writer, and lexicographer, known best for his satirical novel ''Scarron's City Romance''. He was expelled from the Académie Française for seeking to publish his own French ...
, of
Adrien Auzout Adrien Auzout ronounced in French somewhat like o-zoo(28 January 1622 – 23 May 1691) was a French astronomer. He was born in Rouen, France, the eldest child of a clerk in the court of Rouen. His educational background is unknown, although ...
for mathematics and Giovanni Alfonso Borelli for astronomy.


References

Notes Sources * Gerbino, Anthony (2010). ''François Blondel: Architecture, Erudition, and the Scientific Revolution''. London and New York: Routledge. . * Herrmann, Wolfgang (1982). "Blondel, François", vol. 1, pp. 216–219, in ''Macmillan Encyclopedia of Architects'', 4 volumes, edited by Adolf K. Placzek. New York: The Free Press. . * Tadgell, Christopher (1996). "Blondel, (Nicolas-)François", vol. 4, pp. 165–166, in ''
The Dictionary of Art ''Grove Art Online'' is the online edition of ''The Dictionary of Art'', often referred to as the ''Grove Dictionary of Art'', and part of Oxford Art Online, an internet gateway to online art reference publications of Oxford University Press, ...
'', 34 volumes, edited by Jane Turner, reprinted with minor corrections in 1998. New York: Grove. . *
Vuillemin, Jean-Claude Jean-Claude Vuillemin (born 24 March 1954) is Liberal Arts Research Professor Emeritus of French literature in the Department of French and Francophone Studies at The Pennsylvania State University. Career The recipient in March 2011 of the prest ...
(2008). “Blondel, Nicolas-François”, vol. 1, pp. 157–161, in ''
The Dictionary of Seventeenth-Century French Philosophers The ''Dictionary of Seventeenth-Century French Philosophers'' is a dictionary of philosophical writers in France between 1601 and 1700, edited by Luc Foisneau. An augmented and revised French edition has been published in 2015. Content The ''D ...
'', 2 volumes, edited by Luc Foisneau. London and New York: Thoemmes Continuum. .


External links

* ''Cours d'architecture'', Part
1 (1675)2 & 3 (1683)4, 5 & 6 (1683)
from the Getty Research Institute, bound as one volume, digitized by the
Internet Archive The Internet Archive is an American digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It provides free public access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, software applications/games, music, ...
* ''Cours d'architecture'', second edition (1698), Part
12 & 34, 5, & 6
at Heidelberg University Library {{DEFAULTSORT:Blondel, Francois 1618 births 1686 deaths 17th-century French architects 17th-century French mathematicians French Baroque architects Members of the French Academy of Sciences Members of the Académie royale d'architecture French military engineers