Françoise Gilberte Périer (1 January 1620 – 25 April 1687) was a French biographer and the older sister of

Blaise Pascal Blaise Pascal (19June 162319August 1662) was a French mathematician, physicist, inventor, philosopher, and Catholic Church, Catholic writer. Pascal was a child prodigy who was educated by his father, a tax collector in Rouen. His earliest ...

whose biography she wrote.

Biography

Françoise Gilberte Pascal was the eldest of three surviving children born to mathematician

Étienne Pascal Étienne Pascal (; 2 May 1588 – 24 September 1651) was a French chief tax officer and the father of Blaise Pascal (1623–1662). Biography Pascal was born in Clermont to Martin Pascal, the treasurer of France, and Marguerite Pascal de Mons. H ...

(1588–1651) and his wife Antoinette Pascal, nee Bégon (1596–1626). Her paternal grandfather was Martin Pascal, treasurer of France. When Gilberte's mother died in 1626, her father moved the family to Paris and employed a governess, Louise Delfault, to bring up his children. However,

Étienne Étienne, a French analog of Stephen or Steven, is a masculine given name. An archaic variant of the name, prevalent up to the mid-17th century, is Estienne. Étienne, Etienne, Ettiene or Ettienne may refer to: People Artists and entertainers * ...

chose to educate them himself.Pouzet, Régine. "Gilberte Pascal entre ses débiteurs et ses créanciers-1672-1687. Histoire du patrimoine Périer–Pascal d’après les Archives Départementales du Puy-de-Dôme." ''Courrier du Centre International Blaise-Pascal'' 10 (1988): 12-24. In Paris, Gilberte ran her father's household for years before following him to a new position in

Rouen Rouen (, ; or ) is a city on the River Seine, in northwestern France. It is in the prefecture of Regions of France, region of Normandy (administrative region), Normandy and the Departments of France, department of Seine-Maritime. Formerly one ...

. There, in June 1641, Gilberte married (1605–1672), a lawyer at the Supreme Tax Court in

Clermont-Ferrand Clermont-Ferrand (, , ; or simply ; ) is a city and Communes of France, commune of France, in the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes regions of France, region, with a population of 147,284 (2020). Its metropolitan area () had 504,157 inhabitants at the 2018 ...

. He was not only a colleague of her father Étienne, but he was also her cousin. Her marriage produced four daughters (

Marguerite Périer Marguerite Périer (6 April 1646 – 14 April 1733) was a French nun and follower of Jansenism. She was the niece of Blaise Pascal, and wrote a biography of her uncle that has been preserved. The miracle of the Holy Thorn Marguerite Périer was ...

(1646–1733), Jacqueline (1644–1696), Marie (1647–1649) and Louise (1651–1713)) and two sons (Blaise (1653–1684) and Étienne (1642–1680)). In 1646, like her husband, she had a religious conversion to

Jansenism Jansenism was a 17th- and 18th-century Christian theology, theological movement within Roman Catholicism, primarily active in Kingdom of France, France, which arose as an attempt to reconcile the theological concepts of Free will in theology, f ...

, a separatist movement in

Roman Catholicism The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

, and sent her children to

Port-Royal Abbey, Paris Port-Royal Abbey () was an abbey in Paris that was a stronghold of Jansenism. Cistercian nuns moved from the older abbey, Port-Royal-des-Champs, founded in 1204, to Paris and founded Port-Royal-de-Paris in 1626. There were frequent controversies a ...

to be educated. Increasingly, Gilberte withdrew from public life and later chose to live in solitude. Her religiosity was, however, of a gentler nature than that of her better-known younger sister, Jacqueline Pascal. Gilberte was exceptionally well educated, studied philosophy and theology, was known for her eloquence and spoke several languages. Pascal made her his executor, and in 1670 she published the ''Pensées de Pascal'' (''Thoughts of Pascal''). However, despite their efforts, the text was not printed unchanged. In 1663 she published biographies of Pascal and her sister, Jacqueline. Gilberte also helped Pascal prepare his ''Apologie de la religion chrétienne'' (''Apology of the Christian Religion'') from which he drew the Pensées.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Périer, Gilberte 1620 births 1687 deaths French biographers Jansenism Blaise Pascal 17th-century French women writers