François Sulpice Beudant

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François Sulpice Beudant

François Sulpice Beudant (born September 5, 1787 in Paris , † December 10, 1850 there ) was a French mineralogist and geologist .

childhood and education

A few years before Beudant was born, his father came to Paris from the Ardennes . On January 21, 1793, the father disappeared without a trace, the mother now had to cope with the family tasks alone. As a result, Beudant grew up in poverty; he was the only survivor of fifteen siblings. The mother turned to friends for support. The Gillet de Laumont family provided friendly assistance and had a formative influence on the boy's future.

Beudant completed his studies at the École Polytechnique and the École normal supérieure . After graduating, he worked as a répétiteur at the École normal supérieure .

Life

In 1811 he took over a professorship in mathematics at the Avignon Lyceum . Just two years later he went to Marseille , where he took over a physics professorship at the Lyceum.

After the return of Louis XVIII. Beudant worked from 1814 as a sub-director for the Royal Mineral Cabinet, which he also dealt with the collection of Jacques-Louis de Bournon and the systematics of minerals. A study trip financed by the French state took him to Hungary in 1818 . In his work "Voyage minéralogique et géologique en Hongrie pendant l'Année 1818." (Paris, 1822) Beudant reported on the research results of this trip. In a letter of January 12, 1823 to Count Kaspar Maria von Sternberg , Goethe angrily criticized some of Beudant's petrographic statements. Wilhelm Haidinger paid tribute to Beudant's knowledge about the composition of alum and his description of the alum factory in the Hungarian Mátra Mountains . In connection with this work, the first printed geological map of Transylvania was created through his recording work . This work, Carte géologique de la Hongrie et de la Transylvanie , showed the region on a scale of 1: 1,000,000.

After his return, he was appointed professor of mineralogy and physics at the Sorbonne in 1820 to succeed his late teacher René-Just Haüy . He carried out this activity until 1839.

In the last years of his life (1839-1850) Beudant worked as inspector general of the French school system. In this function he published "Nouveaux éléments de grammaire française" (Paris 1841).

Azurite (China)
Erythrin (Morocco)
Siderite (France)

Most important services

  • Beudant examined salt solutions and made attempts to crystallize. From this work he formulated a principle known as Beudan's law .
  • Carte géologique de la Hongrie et de la Transylvanie (copper engraved map from “Voyage mineralogique et géologique en Hongrie”, Paris 1822) approx. 61 x 95 cm
  • 1824 Description of the mineral azurite and naming it according to its color
  • 1824 Description of the mineral alunite and renaming (old name aluminilite )
  • 1824 Description of the mineral brucite and named after the American mineralogist Archibald Bruce
  • 1832 Description of the mineral sylvin and named after the Dutch doctor Franciscus Sylvius
  • 1832 Description of the mineral erythrin and its name because of its red color (Greek erythrós )
  • 1832 Description of the mineral Clausthalite and naming it after its place of discovery Clausthal
  • 1832 Description of the mineral Anglesite and named after the British island of Anglesey ( Wales )
  • 1832 Description of the mineral crocoite and its name because of its color (crocodile-saffron-colored)
  • 1832 Description of the mineral smithsonite and named after the scholar James Smithson
  • 1832 Description of the mineral Proustite after the chemist Joseph Louis Proust
  • 1832 Description of the mineral mimetite after the Greek word mimethes (imitator) because of its similarity to pyromorphite
  • 1832 Description of the mineral leadhillite after the Scottish town of Leadhills
  • 1832 Description of the mineral Stromeyerite after the chemist Friedrich Stromeyer
  • 1832 Discovery of the mineral Linneit von Beudant and description of the mineral in 1845 by Haidinger in honor of Carl von Linné
  • 1832 Description of the mineral Covellin after the Italian mineralogist Nicola Covelli
  • 1832 Description of the mineral siderose , which Haidinger renamed Siderit in 1845

Awards and memberships

Important publications

  • Traité élémentaire de minéralogie (Paris 1st edition 1824, 2nd edition 1830, German Leipzig 1826)
  • Essai d'un cours élémentaire et général des sciences physiques (Paris 1815)
  • Traité élémentaire de physique (4th edition 1829, 6th edition 1838, German Leipzig 1830)
  • Cours élémentaire de minéralogie et de géologie (1841, 12th edition Paris 1868, German Stuttgart 1858)

literature

  • Smaller Brockhaus'sches conversation lexicon for manual use. 1. Vol. A - Chateauneuf . Leipzig (FA Brockhaus) 1854
  • Meyers Konversations-Lexikon. 3rd volume Berlin-Bureja . Leipzig (Bibliographical Institute) 1874
  • Lexicon of important chemists by Winfried R. Pötsch (lead); Annelore Fischer; Wolfgang Müller. With the collaboration of Heinz Cassebaum . Bibliographisches Institut, Leipzig 1988 ISBN 3-323-00185-0 , p. 46.
  • Hans Jürgen Rösler: Textbook of Mineralogy . Leipzig (Verl. D. Basic industry) 1981

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Wilhelm Karl von Haidinger: Note on the occurrence of solid copper in Recsk near Erlau in Hungary (PDF; 582 kB). In: Yearbook of the Kaiserlich-Königliche Geologische Reichsanstalt 1, 1850, pp. 145–149.
  2. ^ Franz von Hauer , Guido Stache : Geology of Transylvania . Vienna 1863, p. 1
  3. ↑ Hans Jürgen Rösler: Textbook of Mineralogy. Leipzig (Verl. D. Basic industry) 1981, p. 714
  4. ↑ Hans Jürgen Rösler: Textbook of Mineralogy. Leipzig (Verl. D. Basic industry) 1981, p. 684
  5. ^ Member entry of François Sulpice Beudant at the German Academy of Natural Scientists Leopoldina , accessed on February 9, 2016.
  6. ^ Member entry by François Sulpice Beudant (with picture) at the Bavarian Academy of Sciences , accessed on February 7, 2016.
  7. ↑ Hans Jürgen Rösler: Textbook of Mineralogy. Leipzig (Verl. D. Basic industry) 1981, p. 676


personal data
SURNAME Beudant, François Sulpice
BRIEF DESCRIPTION French geologist and mineralogist
DATE OF BIRTH September 5, 1787
PLACE OF BIRTH Paris
DATE OF DEATH December 10, 1850
Place of death Paris