Jean Godin des Odonais (5 July 1713

Saint-Amand-Montrond Saint-Amand-Montrond () is a commune in the Cher department in the Centre-Val de Loire region of France and the historical province of Bourbonnais. Saint-Amand-Montrond literally translates to Saint Amand round hill, despite not being on a round ...

France France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...

- 1 March 1792

Paris Paris () is the capital and 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), making it the 30th most densely populated city in the world in 2020. S ...

) was a French

cartographer Cartography (; from grc, χάρτης , "papyrus, sheet of paper, map"; and , "write") is the study and practice of making and using maps. Combining science, aesthetics and technique, cartography builds on the premise that reality (or an im ...

and naturalist.

Biography

Godin des Odonais had joined the world's first geodesy expedition to the

equator The equator is a circle of latitude, about in circumference, that divides Earth into the Northern and Southern hemispheres. It is an imaginary line located at 0 degrees latitude, halfway between the North and South poles. The term can als ...

, led by

Charles Marie de La Condamine Charles Marie de La Condamine (28 January 1701 – 4 February 1774) was a French explorer, geographer, and mathematician. He spent ten years in territory which is now Ecuador, measuring the length of a degree of latitude at the equator and prepar ...

. He had been recommended to La Condamine by the expedition's chief

astronomer An astronomer is a scientist in the field of astronomy who focuses their studies on a specific question or field outside the scope of Earth. They observe astronomical objects such as stars, planets, natural satellite, moons, comets and galaxy, g ...

, his cousin

Louis Godin Louis Godin (28 February 1704 – 11 September 1760) was a French astronomer and member of the French Academy of Sciences. He worked in Peru, Spain, Portugal and France. Biography Godin was born in Paris; his parents were François Godin and Eli ...

. To be distinguished from his relative, Jean added to his surname that of his mother, Odonais. When the commission returned to France, Godin des Odonais became professor of astronomy and natural science at the College of Quito, 1739. At the same time he studied the Indian languages and the flora of Ecuador. His marriage with an heiress, Isabel Gramesón, gave him the means, and in 1743 he resigned his chair and gave his whole time to natural science and the Indian language. He explored Ecuador and the northern provinces of Peru, and collected an herbarium containing more than 4,000 species of plants. He also made drawings of over 800 species of animals. Having lost the greater part of his wife's dowry in speculations, he resolved to try his fortune in Cayenne, where he arrived in May, 1750, and settled on the banks of the river Oyapok. For fifteen years he explored Cayenne and the Brazilian Guiana, north of the Amazon, and collected nearly 7,000 species of plants. From 1765 till 1773 he explored the Amazon. In the latter year he finally returned to France, and settled on his estate of St. Amand. He gave his botanical collections to the museum of natural history, where they are still preserved. In 1784 he was elected a member of the

French Academy of Science 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 t ...

, and he labored thenceforth to arrange the notes taken during the many years of his explorations.

Works

* ''Flore raisonnée du Perou, comprenant 4,000 espèces, dont plus de 1,500 nouvelles'' (6 vols., Paris, 1776, with two volumes of illustrations containing over 750 plates) * ''Les plantes de la Guyane'' (1777) * ''Faune du Perou'' (4 vols., 1778, with two volumes of illustrations) * ''Plan de navigation libre de l'Amazone, dedié au Duc de Choiseul'' (1779) * ''Flore de la Guyane, explication de l'herbier déposé au museum d'histoire naturelle'', with three volumes of illustrations (5 vols., 1779) * ''Flore de l'Amazone, explication, etc.'' (4 vols., 1780, with one volume of illustrations) * ''Grammaire de la langue Quichua ou des Incas'' (1782) * ''Dictionnaire de la langue Quichua'' (1782) * ''Vocabulaire des dialectes Indiens de la Guyane'' (1783) * ''Grammaire comparée des langues Indiennes de l'Amérique du Sud'' (2 vols., 1784)

Notes

References

* Anthony Smith (2003) ''The Lost Lady of the Amazon: The Story of Isabela Godin and Her Epic Journey'', Carroll & Graf * Robert Whitaker (2004) ''The Mapmaker's Wife: A True Tale of Love, Murder, and Survival in the Amazon'', Basic Books * Celia Wakefield (1994) ''Searching for Isabel Godin'', Chicago Review Press * *

External links

Jean Godin biography
* * {{DEFAULTSORT:Godin des Odonais, Jean History of Ecuador 1713 births 1792 deaths 18th-century French cartographers French naturalists Members of the French Academy of Sciences