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Revista CENIC. Ciencias Químicas ISSN: 1015-8553 [email protected] Centro Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas Cuba Wisniak, Jaime Nicolas Lémery Revista CENIC. Ciencias Químicas, vol. 36, núm. 2, 2005, pp. 123-130 Centro Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas La Habana, Cuba Disponible en: http://www.redalyc.org/articulo.oa?id=181620581010 Cómo citar el artículo Número completo Sistema de Información Científica Más información del artículo Red de Revistas Científicas de América Latina, el Caribe, España y Portugal Página de la revista en redalyc.org Proyecto académico sin fines de lucro, desarrollado bajo la iniciativa de acceso abierto Revista CENIC Ciencias Químicas, Vol. 36, No. 2, 2005. RESEÑA BIOGRAFICA Nicolas Lémery Jaime Wisniak. Department of Chemical Engineering, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beer-Sheva, Israel 84105. [email protected] Recibido: 5 de septiembre de 2003. Aceptado: 2 de enero de 2004. Palabras clave: Nicolas Lémery, enseñanza de la Química, Química, drogas, farmacopea, sales. Key words: Nicolas Lémery, chemical teaching, Chemistry, drugs, pharmacopeia, salts. RESUMEN. A Nicolas Lémery (1645-1715), uno de los químicos Franceses lí- (1657-1757):2 Il sadressa à Glaser, deres de la segunda mitad del siglo diecisiete, se le considera haber escrito alors démonstrateur de chymie au poco, pero haber enseñado mucho y muy bien a estudiantes muy calificados y Jardin du Roi, et se mit en pension haber popularizado la enseñanza de la química en Francia y Europa. Lémery chez lui pour être à une bonne source sacó la enseñanza Francesa de la Química fuera de la tradición Parcelsiana dexpériences et danalyses. Mais il hacia la filosofía Cartesiana atomística natural. Aun cuando Lémery no desa- se trouve malheuresement que rrolló ninguna teoría rigurosa de la materia, explicó las reacciones químicas Glaser étoit un vrai chymiste, plein en términos de forma y movimiento de partículas, tal como lo hizo Jean- d idées oscures, avare de ces idées- Baptiste Sénac. la-mêmes, et très-peu sociable. Lémery le quitta donc au bout de ABSTRACT. Nicolas Lmery (1645-1715), a leading French chemist of the sec- ond half of the seventeenth century, is considered to have written little but deux moins (Lémery became a taught much and very well to highly qualified students, and of having boarding apprentice with Glaser, popularised Chemistry in France and Europe. Lémery brought French chemi- then demonstrator in chemistry at cal teaching out of the Paracelsian tradition into the Cartesian and atomistic the Jardin du Roi, to be near a good natural philosophy. Although Lémery did not develop any rigorous theories source of experiment and analysis. of matter he explained chemical reactions in terms of particle shape and move- Unfortunately he found him to be a ment, the same as Jean-Baptiste Sénac did. real chemist, full of obscure ideas, LIFE AND CAREER Nicolas Lémery (Fig. 1) was born at Rouen, France, on November 17, 1645, the fifth of seven children born to Julien Lémery, Procurator to the Parliament of Normandy, and his second wife, Susan Duchemin. When Nicolas was eleven years old, his father died, leaving a widow and four surviving children. Little is known about the initial education of Lémery but it is very possible that for his being the son of a Protestant that he began his studies at the Protestant school of Queville, in the banlieu of Rouen, his natal town.1 Shortly before his fifteenth birthday he was inden- tured as an apprentice apothecary to his uncle Pierre Duchemin in Rouen. In 1666, after serving six years with his uncle, Lémery moved to Paris, where he became a board- ing apprentice with Christopher Glaser (1628-1670). According to Fig. 1. Nicolas Lémery (1645-1715). By permission of Edgar Fahs Smith Collection, Bernard le Bouvier de Fontenelle University of Pennsylvania Library. 123 Revista CENIC Ciencias Químicas, Vol. 36, No. 2, 2005. covetous of these ideas, and unso- fice of the apothecary to the King prodigious sale of them in Paris and ciable and left him after about two and grand prévôt of France, and in the provinces; the sale of magis- months). In addition to being dem- thus circumventing the legal ob- tere du bismuth (magistery of bis- onstrator Glaser was the apothecary stacles in the path of a Protestant muth, Spanish white, bismuth in ordinary to both King Louis XIV seeking admission to the guild of oxynitrate), of which only he had a and his brother, the Duke of Orleans, apothecaries of Paris. During the successful recipe, alone, sufficed for and had also published a very suc- next seven years he established a all the expenses of his household. cessful chemical textbook, Traité de highly successful pharmaceutical Magistery of bismuth, not a remedy la Chymie.3 Most importantly Glaser, business in the rue Galande, where but a cosmetic, was prepared by dis- like Lémery, was a Protestant, and he lodged, specializing in patent solving bismuth in nitric acid and could offer Lémery legal protection medicines. Fontanelle (1715) de- precipitating out bismuth nitrate from the Catholic-dominated apoth- scribed Lémerys laboratory in the with salt water. It was also consid- ecaries guild of Paris.4,5 following terms: less a room ered by some to be a remedy for After quitting Glaser resolved to than a cellar, an almost a magic cav- chronic diarrhoea and cholera.2 travel through France, to see those ern, illuminated only by the light of For most of the second half of skilled in the art, one by one, and to the furnaces; yet the influx of the sixteenth century France had compose science for himself from people was so great that there was been raged by bloody religious con- the diverse information that he scarcely enough room for his opera- flicts between Huguenots (Protes- would draw from his trip.. Few de- tions. Even women, carried along tants) and Catholics. After Henry IV tails survive of this period in his life. by fashion, had the audacity to (1553-1610) ascended to the throne Lémery traveled for six years; he is show themselves at such learned he decided to put an end to this known to have visited Lyon and assemblies. In addition, he gained fight and in 1598 he issued the so- Geneva and to spend a considerable a considerable reputation as a called Edict of Nantes, in which part of the time between 1668 and teacher of chemistry by his private Catholicism was declared the estab- 1671 in Montpellier, where he re- courses, which not only catered to lished religion of France but gave sided with the young Protestant the professional needs of pharmacy the Huguenots freedom to practice master apothecary Henry Verchant, apprentices, but also attracted a their religion, the right to work in where he had the convenience of large audience from fashionable any field or for the State, and to working and, what was more impor- Parisian society interested in semi- bring their grievances directly to tant, the advantage of giving lessons popular scientific expositions.5 The the King. The Edict did not solve to a number of his hosts students. most famous named heard his the religious problem but brought He did not fail to profit much from course in chemistry: François some tranquility to the country. his own lessons and soon drew all Bernier (1620-1688), Adrien Auzout By 1680 mounting religious in- the professors of the faculty of medi- (1622-1691, astronomer), Régis tolerance placed Lémerys legal cine and the curious of Montpellier, (physicist), Jacques Rouhalt (ex- rights as a practicing apothecary in for he already had novelties to offer perimental physicist), and Joseph jeopardy. Louis XIV, under the in- the most adept. In the summer of Pitton de Tournefort (1656-1708, fluence of a radical Catholic contin- 1670 he was registered as a student botanist).2 Lémerys initiative of gent at court gradually began to of Pharmacy in Montpellier was per- giving private lectures was not a limit the professional liberties of mitted to attend the courses on novelty. From the beginning of the Protestants and purge Protestant simples and anatomy given at the seventeenth century on it had be- members of his household. In 1681 Faculty of Medicine for such stu- come very common for scientists to Lémery lost his position as apoth- dents.2 give private courses open to a fee- ecary to the King, being replaced by In 1672 he returned to Paris and paying audience composed of inter- Denis Machereau. Unworried he worked in the laboratory of Bernar- ested students and general public. continued to manage his apoth- din Martin, the apothecary to Louis, What made Lémerys course so re- ecary commerce and to give chemi- the Prince of Condé and a Catholic markable was his way of teaching cal instruction until April 1683, convert who still had Protestant and the extraordinary successful when the Court ordered Nicolas sympathies. Through his connec- notes he prepared for them,6 which Gabriel de Le Reynie (1605-1729), tion with Martin he was able to at- remained a bestseller during most the Parisian lieutenant general de tend scientific salons at the homes of the eighteenth century, even af- police, to close down Lémerys shop. of various private persons, such as ter his death. According to Fontane- Friedrich Wilhelm, the Elector of the Abbé Bourdelot, physician to the lle (1715), the book sold like a work Brandenburg seized this occasion prince, and the jurist Henri Justel of romance or satire. Lémery to propose, through Ezechiel Span- (1620-1693), secretary of King Louis brought French chemical teaching heim (1629-1710), his envoy to XIV (1638-1715). In this manner he out of the Paracelsian tradition into France, that Lémery come to Ber- associated with members of the the Cartesian and atomistic natu- lin where the Elector would create household of the prince and was in- ral philosophy; he did not develop for him a commission as chemist.