Pierre Pithou

His taste for literature was early seen, and his father Pierre (1496-1556) cultivated it to the utmost. He was called to the Paris bar in 1560. On the outbreak of the second war of religion in 1567, Pithou, who was a Calvinist, withdrew to Sedan and afterwards to Basel, whence he returned to France on the publication of the edict of pacification. Soon afterwards he accompanied the duc de Montmorency on his embassy to England, returning shortly before the massacre of St Bartholomew[?], in which he narrowly escaped with his life. Next year he followed the example of Henry of Navarre by abjuring the Protestant faith.

Henry, shortly after his own accession to the throne of France, recognized Pithou's talents and services by bestowing upon him various legal appointments. The most important work of his life was his co-operation in the production of the Satire Ménippée (1593), which did so much to damage the cause of the League[?]; the harangue of the Sieur d'Aubray is usually attributed to his pen. He died at Nogent-sur-Seine on the 1st of November 1596. His valuable library, specially rich in manuscripts, was for the most part transferred to what is now the Bibliothèque Nationale in Paris.

Pithou wrote a great number of legal and historical books, besides preparing editions of several ancienc authors. His earliest publication was Adversariorum subsectorum lib. II. (1565). Perhaps his edition of the Leges Visigothorum (1579) was his most valuable contribution to historical science; in the same line he edited the Capitula of Charlemagne, Louis the Pious, and Charles the Bald in 1588, and he also assisted his brother François in preparing an edition of the Corpus juris canonici (1687). His Libertés de l'église gallicane (1594) is reprinted in his Opera sacra juridica his orica miscellanea collecta (1609). In classical literature he was the first who made the world acquainted with the Fables of Phaedrus (1596); he also edited the Pervigilium Veneris (1587), and Juvenal and Persius (1585).

Three of Pithou's brothers acquired distinction as Jurists: Jean (1524-1602), author of Traite de police et du gouvernement des républiques, and, in collaboration with his twin brother Nicolas (1524-1598), of Institution du manage chrétien; and François (1543-1621), author of Glossarium ad libros capitularium (1588), Traité de l'excommunication et de l'interdit, etc. (1587).

Reference

• This entry incorporates public domain text originally from the 1911 Encyclopaedia Britannica.