Jean-Baptiste Bourguignon d'Anville (; born in
Paris
Paris () is the Capital city, capital and List of communes in France with over 20,000 inhabitants, most populous city of France, with an estimated population of 2,165,423 residents in 2019 in an area of more than 105 km² (41 sq mi), ma ...
11 July 169728 January 1782) was a French geographer and
cartographer who greatly improved the standards of map-making. D'Anville became cartographer to the king, who purchased his cartographic materials, the largest collection in France. He made more than 200 maps during his lifetime, which are characterized by a careful, accurate work largely based on
original research. In particular, D'Anville left unknown areas of continents blank and noted doubtful information as such, contrary to the lavish maps of his predecessors. His maps remained the reference point in cartography throughout the 19th century and were used by numerous explorers and travellers.
Biography
Jean-Baptiste Bourguignon d'Anville was born in Paris on 11 July 1697, in the
Kingdom of France
The Kingdom of France ( fro, Reaume de France; frm, Royaulme de France; french: link=yes, Royaume de France) is the historiographical name or umbrella term given to various political entities of France in the medieval and early modern period ...
. His passion for geographical research displayed itself from early years: at age of twelve he was already amusing himself by drawing maps for
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...
authors. Later, his friendship with the antiquarian, Abbé Longuerue, greatly aided his studies.
His first serious map, that of
Ancient Greece
Ancient Greece ( el, Ἑλλάς, Hellás) was a northeastern Mediterranean Sea, Mediterranean civilization, existing from the Greek Dark Ages of the 12th–9th centuries BC to the end of Classical Antiquity, classical antiquity ( AD 600), th ...
, was published when he was fifteen. At the age of twenty-two, he was appointed one the king's geographers, and began to attract the attention of first authorities. D'Anville's studies embraced everything of geographical nature in the world's literature, as far as he could muster it: for this purpose, he not only searched ancient and modern historians, travelers and narrators of every description, but also poets, orators and philosophers. One of his cherished subjects was to reform geography by putting an end to the blind copying of older maps, by testing the commonly accepted positions of places through a rigorous examination of all the descriptive authority, and by excluding from cartography every name inadequately supported. Vast spaces, which had before been bordered with countries and cities, were thus suddenly reduced mostly to a blank.
D'Anville was at first employed in the humbler task of illustrating by maps the works of different travellers, such as Marchais, Charlevoix, Labat and
du Halde
Jean-Baptiste Du Halde (; 1 February 1674 – 18 August 1743) was a French Jesuit historian specializing in China. He did not travel to China, but collected seventeen Jesuit missionaries' reports and provided an encyclopedic survey of the histo ...
. For the history of China by the last-named writer he was employed to make an atlas, which was published separately at
the Hague
The Hague ( ; nl, Den Haag or ) is a city and municipality of the Netherlands, situated on the west coast facing the North Sea. The Hague is the country's administrative centre and its seat of government, and while the official capital o ...
in 1737. Information for the maps of China came from
land surveys made by the Chinese empire in 1708. His China maps have been called the "standard Western source for the geography of China and adjacent regions," throughout the 19th century.
[
In 1735 and 1736, he brought out two treatises on the figure of the earth; but these attempts to solve geometrical problems by literary material were, to a great extent, refuted by ]Maupertuis
Pierre Louis Moreau de Maupertuis (; ; 1698 – 27 July 1759) was a French mathematician, philosopher and man of letters. He became the Director of the Académie des Sciences, and the first President of the Prussian Academy of Science, at the ...
' measurements of a degree within the polar circle. D'Anville's historical method
Historical method is the collection of techniques and guidelines that historians use to research and write histories of the past. Secondary sources, primary sources and material evidence such as that derived from archaeology may all be drawn ...
was more successful in his 1743 map of Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...
, which first indicated numerous errors in the mapping of that country and was accompanied by a valuable mémoir (a novelty in such work), showing in full the sources of the design. A trigonometrical survey which Benedict XIV
Pope Benedict XIV ( la, Benedictus XIV; it, Benedetto XIV; 31 March 1675 – 3 May 1758), born Prospero Lorenzo Lambertini, was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from 17 August 1740 to his death in May 1758. Pope ...
soon after had made in the papal states strikingly confirmed the French geographer's results. In his later years d'Anville did yeoman service for ancient and medieval geography, accomplishing something like a revolution in the former; mapping afresh all the chief countries of the pre-Christian civilizations (especially Egypt), and by his ''Mémoire et abrégé de géographie ancienne et générale'' and his ''États formés en Europe après la chute de l'empire romain en occident'' (1771) rendering his labours still more generally useful. His last employment consisted in arranging his collection of maps, plans and geographical materials. It was the most extensive in Europe, and had been purchased by the king, who, however, left him the use of it during his life. This task performed, he sank into a total imbecility both of mind and body, which continued for two years, till his death in January 1782.
Honors
In 1754, at the age of fifty-seven, he became a member of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles Lettres, whose transactions he enriched with many papers. In 1773, he became ''adjoint géographe'' of the Académie des Sciences
The French Academy of Sciences (French: ''Académie des sciences'') is a learned society, founded in 1666 by Louis XIV at the suggestion of Jean-Baptiste Colbert, to encourage and protect the spirit of French scientific research. It was at th ...
, and in the same year was appointed first geographer to the king. He was also a member of the Society of Antiquaries of London
A society is a group of individuals involved in persistent social interaction, or a large social group sharing the same spatial or social territory, typically subject to the same political authority and dominant cultural expectations. Soci ...
and the Russian Academy of Sciences
The Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS; russian: Росси́йская акаде́мия нау́к (РАН) ''Rossíyskaya akadémiya naúk'') consists of the national academy of Russia; a network of scientific research institutes from across ...
.
A street was named after him 82 years after his death in the 14th arrondissement of Paris
The 14th arrondissement of Paris ( ), officially named ''arrondissement de l'Observatoire'' (; meaning "arrondissement of the Observatory", after the Paris Observatory), is one of the 20 arrondissements of the capital city of France. It is situa ...
, and his statue was placed on the city's Hotel de Ville in 1881.
The crater Anville on the Moon
The Moon is Earth's only natural satellite. It is the fifth largest satellite in the Solar System and the largest and most massive relative to its parent planet, with a diameter about one-quarter that of Earth (comparable to the width of ...
and the community of Danville, Vermont
Danville is a town in Caledonia County, Vermont, United States. The population was 2,335 at the 2020 census. The primary settlement in town is recorded as the Danville census-designated place (CDP) and had a population of 385 at the 2020 census.
...
are also named after him.
Bibliography
D'Anville's published memoirs and dissertations amounted to 78, and his maps to 211. A complete edition of his works was announced in 1806 by de Manne in 6 vols. quarto, but only two had appeared when the editor died in 1832. See Bon-Joseph Dacier, ''Éloge de d'Anville'' (Paris, 1802). Besides the separate works noticed above, d'Anville's maps executed for Rollin's ''Histoire ancienne'' and ''Histoire romaine'', and his ''Traité des mesures anciennes et modernes'' (1769), deserve special notice.
* Pere J. B. du Halde with maps by d'Anville, "Description geographique de la Chine", 1735.
* "Nouvel Atlas de la Chine", 1737
digitized version
.
* "Atlas General", ''circa'' 1740.
* "Geographie Ancienne et Abregee", 1769.
Further reading
*
References
;Attribution
*
External links
{{DEFAULTSORT:Anville, Jean Baptiste Bourguignon D'
Scientists from Paris
1697 births
1782 deaths
French geographers
Members of the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres
Contributors to the Encyclopédie (1751–1772)
Members of the French Academy of Sciences
Honorary members of the Saint Petersburg Academy of Sciences
18th-century French cartographers