Thuret, Isaac II

Fichier indisponible.

“Thuret, Isaac II”, Dictionary of precision Instrument-makers and related craftsmen. Consulté le 23 mai 2025, https://bibnum.explore.psl.eu/s/psl/ark:/18469/1rgjj

Notice

Date de naissance
c. 1630
Date de mort
11 April 1706
Lieu de naissance
Senlis
Lieu de mort
Paris
Couverture temporelle
2/2 17th century
Biographie
Thuret was born into a Protestant family and was perhaps apprenticed to his brother-in-law, Charles Sarrabat. Received as master in the faubourg of Saint Germain before 1662, he married Margaret [or Madeleine] Hélot in April 1663. In Paris he was Marchand Orlogeur Ordinaire du Roi before 1663, Horloger Ordinaire du Roi et de l'Académie des Sciences before 1672. Thuret was considered to be the leading clockmaker of his time. Germain Brice praised 'the clockmaker of the Académie des Sciences with a profound knowledge of mathematics, who made a great contribution to the improvement of clocks'. The astronomer Richer maintained that Thuret 'by his exactitude and the delicacy of his products has surpassed all those who up to now have concerned themselves with making watches and pendulum clocks' (1), whilst Leibnitz called him 'the famous clockmaker'.
Thuret was in contact with Huygens from very early on, perhaps from as early as Huygens first visit to Paris in 1655. He may have been the maker of Huygens’ first pendulum clocks of 1657 (2), although there is no mention of him in Huygens’ correspondence until April 1662 when, in a letter to his brother Lodewijk then in Paris, Christiaan asks for information about how Thuret made the clocks ‘For which my father would give 10 or 12 pistoles more than for his own? If we could know the form it could be used to instruct the clockmakers here…'. (3). In March 1665, Thuret had already applied a remontoir to spring clocks (4) and he made a contract with Huygens for constructing marine clocks (5). Unfortunately, the relations between the two men deteriorated because of the attempt made by Thuret to claim paternity of the hairspring for watches in 1675 (6).
The name of Isaac Thuret appears for the first time in the accounts of the Bâtiments du Roi only on 31 January 1669 for a 'payment on account for the work that he has done at the Académie des Sciences (in 1667)' and from 1672 to 1694, he appears in the accounts of the Bâtiments under the heading 'Officers who receive a salary for serving generally in all the houses and buildings of His Majesty'. He received 300 livres a year for 'maintaining all the clocks of the Académie des Sciences, those that are at the Observatory as well as those in the aforementioned Académie'.
In 1679 He made a 'hairspring pendulum clock with eight panels, embellished with many ornaments and gold scrolls filled with weapons and mottoes enamelled in various colours' for Louis XIV.

The 17 and 31 August 1680 Roemer described to his colleagues in the Académie des Sciences, his plans for two machines: one showing the movement of the planets, the other solar and lunar eclipses (7). Execution of these for the King’s Library was entrusted to Thuret. That for the eclipses, at least, was displayed at the Académie in mid-January 1681, Roemer having delayed his return to Denmark in order to present i (8). For the planisphere Thuret was paid 3000 livres, for the eclipse machine 2500 livres (9), and on 5 December they were explained by Cassini to Louis XIV ‘who paused over them for a goodish time’, during the course of his visit to the Observatory (10). The 22 August 1690 the two machines, conserved in the Salle de machines, were seen by the exiled James II of England ‘[on] admira principalement celle des Eclipses inventée par Mr. Romer et exécutée par le Sr. Thuret d’une manière toute particulière. Elle [James II] vit aussy celle des planets suivant le systeme de Copernic qu’un seul mouvement fait tourner toutes differemment autour du Soleil’. 11
The Roemer/Thuret machines attracted some attention. When they were first described in print in January 1682 , the writer suggested that copies should be taken by Jesuit missionaries to India to ensure there ‘plus d’estime pour notre Nation’. That this occurred is not known but there are reports of Jesuits taking examples to Siam and to China. Better documented is an example of the planetary machine taken to Isfahan by the French Ambassador François Piquet, although there, since it was not made of gold and displayed the Copernican system which the court astrologers dismissed as ridiculous, it was little esteemed and rapidly relegated to a store-room for useless objects in the fortress of Qal‘a-yi Tabâruk (12). That these machines were all made by Thuret requires confirmation but that he effected the copies acquired by Christiaan V of Denmark no later than the spring of 1685 seems certain (13).
On 31 January 1686 Thuret received quarters in the Grand Galerie du Louvre (14). The following year he built a ‘parallatic’ machine (15), which is likely to be that used by Cassini.
Thuret’s activity was considerable. The King, the Royal family, his ministers, the great financiers and nobility of the highest rank were his clients. He sold the greatest part of his production directly himself, but also worked with the marchands. His cases were mostly supplied by André-Charles Boulle. Successful and prosperous in 1688 he had his portrait painted by Hyacinthe Rigaud at a cost 67 livres ten sous, a price which implies a half length portrait (16). He died at Paris in April 1706.

Apprentices: Pierre Quimbel Dumont 1701
Etienne Baillon 1705.

Children: Jacques Thuret (1669-6 August 1738), married the daughter of Jean Berain
Suzanne Thuret, married the royal engraver and drawing master to the children of France, Charles François Silvestre.

















17 Defossez (n. 1) calls it a ‘machine parallactique servant aux observations’ but it iis likely to be the ‘machine parallatique’, a polar mounted telescope turning on itself used for following the course of a star along its proper parallel. Lalande (Astronomie 793-4) distinguishes this instrument from the machine ‘parallactique’ or triquetrum of Ptolemy, deriving the former from Christoph Scheiner (Rosa Ursina, 347). He notes that the Cassini’s father and son made extensive use of it. A detailed description by Cassini the elder (printed in Wolf 147-9) does not mention who made the instrument although construction of it was overseen by Couplet.
18 Joseph Roman, Le Livre de raison du peintre Hyacinthe Rigaud, Laurens 1919.
Notes biographiques
1 Quoted from L. Defossez, Les Savants du XVIIe sièclce et la mesure du temps, Lausanne 1946, 198.
2 Sebastian Whitestone, ‘The Identification and attribution of Christiaan Huygens’ first pendulum Clock’, Antiquarian Horology, xxxi 2008, 201-22.
3 Huygens OC. iv 110.
4 Defosssez (n.1), 199.
5 Whitestone (n. 2) 221; Augarde 402.
6 For this dispute see Defossez 200.
7 ‘M. Roëmer fit voir aussi deux Machines différentes, dont l’une répresentoit le mouvement des Planettes avec tout l’exactitude dont une machine est capable; c’étoit une Ephémeride perpetuelle: l’autre étoit de la même espéce, & servoit seulement à faire voir des Eclipses du Soleil & de la Lune, et les différens mouvemens de ces Astres’. Histoire de l’Académie Royale des Sciences Tome I. Depuis son établissement en 1666 jusqu’à 1686, Paris 1733, 317.
8 Journal des Sçavans 19 January 1682, 22-4
9 Charles Wolf, Histoire de l’observatoire de Paris de sa fondation à 1793, Paris 1902, 201.
10 Histoire… (n. 7), 320.
11 Narrative of the visit by Cassini, printed in Wolf, 129.
12 Journal des Sçavans 19 January 1682, 16-18.
13 Jacobæus, pt ii, section iv, 193 citing Itinerario Siamensi 1685 I, 10. Zinner 44-45.
14 David A. King,World-Maps for finding the Direction and Distance of Mecca: Innovation and tradition in Islamic Science, London & Leiden 1999, 316.
15 They are listed in the inventory of the kunstkammer at Rosenborg Castle 5 May 1684; Roemer was paid 1200 Rigsdalers for them.
16 AN. 01* 1051 f.402.
17. Defossez (n.1) calls it a 'machine parallactique servant aux observations', but it is likely to be the 'machine parallatique' a polar mounted telescope turning on itself used for following the course of a star along its proper parallel. Lalande (Astronomie 793-4) distinguishes this instrument from the machine 'parallactique' or trfiquetrum of Ptolemy, deriving the former from Chistoph Scheiner (Rosa Ursina 347). He notes that the Cassinis father and son extensive use of it. A detailed description by Cassini I (printed in Wolf 147-9) does not mention who made the instrument although constrfuction of it was overseen by Couplet.
18. Joseph Roman, 'Le Livre de raison du peintre Hyacinthe Rigaud, Laurens 1919.
Adresse ; enseigne ; période ; source
1663: Rue Neuve Saint Louis Paris Augarde
1675: Place Dauphine Paris at the sign of La Renommée ( Augarde).
31 January 1686 - 11 April 1706: Galeries du Louvre Paris (AN 01* 1051 f.402).
Identifiant
1566
ark:/18469/1rgjj

Votre sélection

Pas de sélection

X