Émilie du Châtelet facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Émilie du Châtelet
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Portrait by Maurice Quentin de La Tour
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| Born | 17 December 1706 |
| Died | 10 September 1749 (aged 42) Lunéville, Kingdom of France
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| Nationality | French |
| Known for | Translation of Newton's Principia into French, natural philosophy which combines Newtonian physics with Leibnizian metaphysics, and advocacy of Newtonian physics |
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Marquis Florent-Claude du Chastellet-Lomont
(m. 1725) |
| Partner(s) | Voltaire (1733–1749) |
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| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Natural philosophy Mathematics Physics |
| Influences | Isaac Newton, Gottfried Leibniz, Willem 's Gravesande |
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Gabrielle Émilie Le Tonnelier de Breteuil, Marquise du Châtelet ( 17 December 1706 – 10 September 1749) was a French natural philosopher and mathematician. Her most recognized achievement is her translation of and commentary on Isaac Newton's 1687 book Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica containing basic laws of physics. The translation, published posthumously in 1756, is still considered the standard French translation.
Contents
Early life and education
Émilie du Châtelet was born on 17 December 1706 in Paris, the only girl amongst six children. Her father was Louis Nicolas le Tonnelier de Breteuil, a member of the lesser nobility. At the time of Du Châtelet's birth, her father held the position of the Principal Secretary and Introducer of Ambassadors to King Louis XIV. He held a weekly salon on Thursdays, to which well-respected writers and scientists were invited. Her mother was Gabrielle Anne de Froullay, Baronne de Breteuil.
When Du Châtelet was little, her father arranged training for her in physical activities such as fencing and riding, and as she grew older, he brought tutors to the house for her. As a result, by the age of twelve she was fluent in Latin, Italian, Greek and German; she was later to publish translations into French of Greek and Latin plays and philosophy. She received education in mathematics, literature, and science.
Among their acquaintances was Fontenelle, the perpetual secretary of the French Académie des Sciences. Du Châtelet's father Louis-Nicolas, recognizing her early brilliance, arranged for Fontenelle to visit and talk about astronomy with her when she was 10 years old.
Du Châtelet also liked to dance, was a passable performer on the harpsichord, sang opera, and was an amateur actress. As a teenager, short of money for books, she used her mathematical skills to devise highly successful strategies for gambling.
Marriage
On 12 June 1725, she married the Marquis Florent-Claude du Chastellet-Lomont. Her marriage conferred the title of Marquise du Chastellet. Like many marriages among the nobility, theirs was arranged. As a wedding gift, her husband was made governor of Semur-en-Auxois in Burgundy by his father; the recently married couple moved there at the end of September 1725. Du Châtelet was eighteen at the time, her husband thirty-four.
Children
The Marquis Florent-Claude du Chastellet and Émilie du Châtelet had three children: Françoise-Gabrielle-Pauline (30 June 1726 – 1754, married in 1743 to Alfonso Carafa, Duca di Montenero), Louis Marie Florent (born 20 November 1727), and Victor-Esprit (born 11 April 1733). Victor-Esprit died as an infant in late summer 1734, likely the last Sunday in August. On 4 September 1749 Émilie du Châtelet gave birth to Stanislas-Adélaïde du Châtelet (daughter of Jean François de Saint-Lambert). She died as a toddler in Lunéville on 6 May 1751.
Resumption of studies
After bearing three children, Émilie, Marquise du Châtelet, considered her marital responsibilities fulfilled and reached an agreement with her husband to live separate lives while still maintaining one household. In 1733, aged 26, Du Châtelet resumed her mathematical studies. Initially, she was tutored in algebra and calculus by Moreau de Maupertuis, a member of the Academy of Sciences; although mathematics was not his forte, he had received a solid education from Johann Bernoulli, who also taught Leonhard Euler. However by 1735 Du Châtelet had turned for her mathematical training to Alexis Clairaut, a mathematical prodigy known best for Clairaut's equation and Clairaut's theorem. Du Châtelet resourcefully sought some of France's best tutors and scholars to mentor her in mathematics. On one occasion at the Café Gradot, a place where men frequently gathered for intellectual discussion, she was politely ejected when she attempted to join one of her teachers. Undeterred, she returned and entered after having men's clothing made for herself.
Relationship with Voltaire
Du Châtelet may have met Voltaire in her childhood at one of her father's salons; Voltaire himself dates their meeting to 1729, when he returned from his exile in London. However, their friendship developed from May 1733 when she re-entered society after the birth of her third child.
Du Châtelet invited Voltaire to live at her country house at Cirey in Haute-Marne, northeastern France, and he became her long-time companion. There she studied physics and mathematics and published scientific articles and translations. To judge from Voltaire's letters to friends and their commentaries on each other's work, they lived together with great mutual liking and respect. As a literary rather than scientific person, Voltaire implicitly acknowledged her contributions to his 1738 Elements of the Philosophy of Newton. This was through a poem dedicated to her at the beginning of the text and in the preface, where Voltaire praised her study and contributions. The book's chapters on optics show strong similarities with her own Essai sur l'optique. She was able to contribute further to the campaign by a laudatory review in the Journal des savants.
Sharing a passion for science, Voltaire and Du Châtelet collaborated scientifically. They set up a laboratory in Du Châtelet's home in Lorraine. In a healthy competition, they both entered the 1738 Paris Academy prize contest on the nature of fire, since Du Châtelet disagreed with Voltaire's essay. Although neither of them won, both essays received honourable mention and were published. She thus became the first woman to have a scientific paper published by the Academy.
Final pregnancy and death
Du Châtelet died on 10 September 1749 at Château de Lunéville, from a pulmonary embolism after giving birth to a daughter. She was 42. Her daughter died 20 months later.
Scientific research and publications
Warmth and brightness
In 1737 du Châtelet published a paper Dissertation sur la nature et la propagation du feu, based upon her research into the science of fire. In it she speculated that there may be colours in other suns that are not found in the spectrum of sunlight on Earth.
Institutions de Physique
Her book Institutions de Physique ("Lessons in Physics") was published in 1740. The book contributed to her becoming a member of the Academy of Sciences of the Institute of Bologna in 1746.
The Institutions discussed, refuted, and synthesized many ideas of prominent mathematicians and physicists of the time, including Newton, Descartes, and Leibniz.
Forces Vives
In 1741 du Châtelet published a book titled Réponse de Madame la Marquise du Chastelet, a la lettre que M. de Mairan. Dortous de Mairan, secretary of the Academy of Sciences, had published a set of arguments addressed to her regarding the appropriate mathematical expression for forces vives. Du Châtelet presented a spirited point by point rebuttal of de Mairan's arguments, causing him to withdraw from the controversy.
Immanuel Kant's first publication in 1747 'Thoughts on the True Estimation of Living Forces' (Gedanken zur wahren Schätzung der lebendigen Kräfte) focuses on Du Châtelet's pamphlet against the secretary of the French Academy of Sciences, Mairan. Kant's opponent, Johann Augustus Eberhard accused Kant of taking ideas from Du Châtelet.
Translations
Du Châtelet translated The Fable of the Bees in a free adaptation. She also wrote works on optics, rational linguistics, and the nature of free will.
Legacy
Du Châtelet made a crucial scientific contribution in making Newton's historic work more accessible in a timely, accurate and insightful French translation, augmented by her own original concept of energy conservation.
A main-belt minor planet and a crater on Venus have been named in her honor, and she is the subject of three plays: Legacy of Light by Karen Zacarías; Émilie: La Marquise Du Châtelet Defends Her Life Tonight by Lauren Gunderson and Urania: the Life of Émilie du Châtelet by Jyl Bonaguro. The opera Émilie by Kaija Saariaho is about the last moments of her life.
The Institut Émilie du Châtelet, which was founded in France in 2006, supports "the development and diffusion of research on women, sex, and gender".
Since 2016, the French Society of Physics (la Société Française de Physique) has awarded the Émilie Du Châtelet Prize to a physicist or team of researchers for excellence in Physics.
Duke University also presents an annual Du Châtelet Prize in Philosophy of Physics "for previously unpublished work in philosophy of physics by a graduate student or junior scholar".
Works
Scientific
- Dissertation sur la nature et la propagation du feu (1st edition, 1739; 2nd edition, 1744)
- Institutions de physique (1st edition, 1740; 2nd edition, 1742)
- Principes mathématiques de la philosophie naturelle par feue Madame la Marquise du Châtelet (1st edition, 1756; 2nd edition, 1759)
Other
- Examen de la Genèse
- Examen des Livres du Nouveau Testament
- Discours sur le bonheur
See also
In Spanish: Émilie du Châtelet para niños
Images for kids
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Dissertation Sur La Nature et La Propagation du feu, 1744
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Réponse de Madame la Marquise du Chastelet, 1741
