Jacques Nicolas Colbert (14 February 1655, in

Paris Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, largest city of France. With an estimated population of 2,048,472 residents in January 2025 in an area of more than , Paris is the List of ci ...

– 10 December 1707, in Paris) was a French churchman. Youngest son of Minister

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 countr ...

, he was educated for a career in the church, tutored by Noël Alexandre, a Dominican

theologian Theology is the study of religious belief from a religious perspective, with a focus on the nature of divinity. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itself with the unique content of ...

and philosopher later condemned for his

Jansenist Jansenism was a 17th- and 18th-century theological movement within Roman Catholicism, primarily active in France, which arose as an attempt to reconcile the theological concepts of free will and divine grace in response to certain development ...

views. The young Colbert was abbot at Le Bec-Hellouin before becoming

Archbishop of Rouen The Archdiocese of Rouen (Latin: ''Archidioecesis Rothomagensis''; French: ''Archidiocèse de Rouen'') is a Latin Church archdiocese of the Catholic Church in France. As one of the fifteen Archbishops of France, the Archbishop of Rouen's ecclesi ...

in 1691. He was admitted to the

Académie Française An academy (Attic Greek: Ἀκαδήμεια; Koine Greek Ἀκαδημία) is an institution of tertiary education. The name traces back to Plato's school of philosophy, founded approximately 386 BC at Akademia, a sanctuary of Athena, the go ...

on 31 October 1678 and was one of the first members of the

Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres The () is a French learned society devoted to history, founded in February 1663 as one of the five academies of the . The academy's scope was the study of ancient inscriptions (epigraphy) and historical literature (see Belles-lettres). History ...

. He was a patron of

Jules Hardouin-Mansart Jules Hardouin-Mansart (; 16 April 1646 – 11 May 1708) was a French Baroque architect and builder whose major work included the Place des Victoires (1684–1690); Place Vendôme (1690); the domed chapel of Les Invalides (1690), and the Gra ...

and

André Le Nôtre André Le Nôtre (; 12 March 1613 – 15 September 1700), originally rendered as André Le Nostre, was a French landscape architect and the principal gardener of King Louis XIV of France. He was the landscape architect who designed Gardens ...

and commissioned the restoration of the official residence of the Archbishops of Rouen, the Château de Gaillon.

Publications

*''Philosophia vetus et nova, ad usum scholae accommodata, in regia Burgundia novissimo hoc biennio pertractata'' (1674) *''Harangue faite au roi, à Versailles, le 21 juillet 1685, par monseigneur l'illustrissime et révérendissime Jacques-Nicolas Colbert, archevêque et primat de Carthage, assisté de messeigneurs les archevêques, évêques, et autres députés de l'Assemblée générale tenue à Saint-Germain-en-Laye en ladite année 1685, en prenant congé de Sa Majesté'' (1685)

References

External links

*
Biographical note at the Académie française
{{DEFAULTSORT:Colbert, Jacques-Nicolas 1655 births 1707 deaths Clergy from Paris Archbishops of Rouen French Oratory Members of the Académie Française Colbert family