Nicolas-Jacques Conté (4 August 1755 – 6 December 1805) was a French painter,

balloonist In aeronautics, a balloon is an unpowered aerostat, which remains aloft or floats due to its buoyancy. A balloon may be free, moving with the wind, or tethered to a fixed point. It is distinct from an airship, which is a powered aerostat that ...

army An army (from Old French ''armee'', itself derived from the Latin verb ''armāre'', meaning "to arm", and related to the Latin noun ''arma'', meaning "arms" or "weapons"), ground force or land force is a fighting force that fights primarily on ...

officer An officer is a person who has a position of authority in a hierarchical organization. The term derives from Old French ''oficier'' "officer, official" (early 14c., Modern French ''officier''), from Medieval Latin ''officiarius'' "an officer," f ...

, and inventor of the modern

pencil A pencil () is a writing or drawing implement with a solid pigment core in a protective casing that reduces the risk of core breakage, and keeps it from marking the user's hand. Pencils create marks by physical abrasion, leaving a trail ...

. He was born at Saint-Céneri-près-Sées (now

Aunou-sur-Orne Aunou-sur-Orne (, literally ''Aunou on Orne'') is a commune in the Orne department in northwestern France. History In 1811 Aunou-sur-Orne absorbed the neighbouring commune of Saint-Cenery-près-Séez (sometimes spelled Saint-Cénery-près-Sées ...

) in

Normandy Normandy (; french: link=no, Normandie ; nrf, Normaundie, Nouormandie ; from Old French , plural of ''Normant'', originally from the word for "northman" in several Scandinavian languages) is a geographical and cultural region in Northwestern ...

and distinguished himself for his mechanical genius, which was of great avail to the French army in

Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Medit ...

Napoleon Napoleon Bonaparte ; it, Napoleone Bonaparte, ; co, Napulione Buonaparte. (born Napoleone Buonaparte; 15 August 1769 – 5 May 1821), later known by his regnal name Napoleon I, was a French military commander and political leader who ...

called him “a universal man with taste, understanding and genius capable of creating the arts of France in the middle of the Arabian Desert”.

Aeronautics

One of his early interests while still at Sées was in the newly developing science of aeronautics. He made at least one

hot-air balloon A hot air balloon is a lighter-than-air aircraft consisting of a bag, called an envelope, which contains heated air. Suspended beneath is a gondola or wicker basket (in some long-distance or high-altitude balloons, a capsule), which carries p ...

, which he flew in the public square. He contributed to the improvement of the production of

hydrogen gas Hydrogen is the chemical element with the symbol H and atomic number 1. Hydrogen is the lightest element. At standard conditions hydrogen is a gas of diatomic molecules having the formula . It is colorless, odorless, tasteless, non-toxic, a ...

, as well as the treatment of the gas bag of the balloon itself. In Egypt, Conté was called on to exercise his expertise in ballooning and was asked to prepare an ascent for the celebration of the French New Year on 22 September 1798. He was not sufficiently prepared, so the event was postponed to 1 December. On that occasion his efforts met with a near disaster. The balloon caught fire, and the Egyptians received the impression that what had been demonstrated was a machine of war for setting fire to the enemy encampments. At a second attempt with a larger balloon, it is said that the ascent was witnessed in Esbekia Square by 100,000. It is probable that the use of the balloon in Egypt was limited to impressing the local population and was never found suitable for military purposes. Al-Jabarti, (‘Abd al-Rahman al-Jabarti al-Misri) in his account of the ascent said: “Their claim that this apparatus is like a vessel in which people sit and travel to other countries in order to discover news and other falsifications did not appear to be true.”

Writing and drawing equipment

Conté invented the modern

pencil lead A graphite pencil, also called a lead pencil, is a type of pencil in which a thin graphite core is embedded in a shell of other material. The pencil shell is typically wooden, but can be made of plastic or recycled paper. History A large deposi ...

at the request of

Lazare Nicolas Marguerite Carnot Lazare Nicolas Marguerite, Count Carnot (; 13 May 1753 – 2 August 1823) was a French mathematician, physicist and politician. He was known as the "Organizer of Victory" in the French Revolutionary Wars and Napoleonic Wars. Education and early ...

. The French Republic was at that time under economic

blockade A blockade is the act of actively preventing a country or region from receiving or sending out food, supplies, weapons, or communications, and sometimes people, by military force. A blockade differs from an embargo or sanction, which are leg ...

and unable to import

graphite Graphite () is a crystalline form of the element carbon. It consists of stacked layers of graphene. Graphite occurs naturally and is the most stable form of carbon under standard conditions. Synthetic and natural graphite are consumed on lar ...

from

Great Britain Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the northwest coast of continental Europe. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the largest European island and the ninth-largest island in the world. It i ...

, the main source of the material. Carnot asked Conté to create a pencil that did not rely on foreign imports. After several days of research, Conté had the idea of mixing powdered graphite with

clay Clay is a type of fine-grained natural soil material containing clay minerals (hydrous aluminium phyllosilicates, e.g. kaolin, Al2 Si2 O5( OH)4). Clays develop plasticity when wet, due to a molecular film of water surrounding the clay par ...

and pressing the material between two half-cylinders of wood. Thus was formed the modern pencil. Conté received a

patent A patent is a type of intellectual property that gives its owner the legal right to exclude others from making, using, or selling an invention for a limited period of time in exchange for publishing an enabling disclosure of the invention."A ...

for the invention in 1795 and formed la Société Conté to make them. He also invented the

conté Conté (), also known as Conté sticks or Conté crayons, are a drawing medium composed of compressed powdered graphite or charcoal mixed with a clay base, square in cross-section. They were invented in 1795 by Nicolas-Jacques Conté, who crea ...

crayon named after him, a hard pastel stick used by artists. At the 1798

Exposition des produits de l'industrie française The Exposition des produits de l'industrie française (Exhibition of Products of French Industry) was a public event organized in Paris, France, from 1798 to 1849. The purpose was "to offer a panorama of the productions of the various branches of ...

Conté won an honorable distinction, the highest award, for his "crayons of various colours"..

References

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Conte Nicolas-Jacques 1755 births 1805 deaths 18th-century French painters French male painters 19th-century French painters Commission des Sciences et des Arts members 19th-century French male artists 18th-century French male artists