Abbé Nicolas-Louis de Lacaille, formerly sometimes spelled de la Caille, was a French astronomer and geodesist who named 14 out of the 88 constellations. From 1750 to 1754, he studied the sky at the Cape of Good Hope in present-day South Africa. Lacaille observed over 10,000 stars using a refracting telescope.
Joseph Jérôme Lefrançois de Lalande was a French astronomer, freemason and writer.
Nicolas Thomas Baudin was a French explorer, cartographer, naturalist and hydrographer, most notable for his explorations in Australia and the southern Pacific. He carried a few corms of Gros Michel banana from Southeast Asia, depositing them at a botanical garden on the Caribbean island of Martinique.
Anne Louise Bénédicte de Bourbon was the daughter of Henri Jules de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, and Anne Henriette of Bavaria. As a member of the reigning House of Bourbon, she was a princesse du sang. Forced to marry the Duke of Maine, legitimised son of Louis XIV and Madame de Montespan, she revelled in politics and the arts, and held a popular salon at the Hôtel du Maine as well as at the Château de Sceaux.
Nicole-Reine Lepaute, also erroneously known as Hortense Lepaute, was a French astronomer and human computer. Lepaute along with Alexis Clairaut and Jérôme Lalande calculated the date of the return of Halley's Comet. Her other astronomical feats include calculating the 1764 solar eclipse and producing almanacs from 1759 to 1783. She was also a member of the Scientific Académie de Béziers.
Marie-Louise O'Murphy, also variously called Mademoiselle de Morphy, La Belle Morphise, Louise Morfi or Marie-Louise Morphy de Boisfailly, was the youngest lesser mistress of King Louis XV of France, and the model for François Boucher's painting The Blonde Odalisque, also known as The Resting Girl.
La Loge des Neuf Sœurs, established in Paris in 1734, was a prominent French Masonic Lodge of the Grand Orient de France that was influential in organising French support for the American Revolution. A "Société des Neuf Sœurs," a charitable society that surveyed academic curricula, had been active at the Académie Royale des Sciences since 1769. Its name referred to the nine Muses, the daughters of Mnemosyne/Memory, patrons of the arts and sciences since antiquity, and long significant in French cultural circles. The Lodge of similar name and purpose was opened in 1776, by Jérôme de Lalande. From the start of the French Revolution in 1789 until 1792, Les Neuf Sœurs became a "Société Nationale".
The Baudin expedition of 1800 to 1803 was a French expedition to map the coast of New Holland. Nicolas Baudin was selected as leader in October 1800. The expedition started with two ships, Géographe, captained by Baudin, and Naturaliste captained by Jacques Hamelin, and was accompanied by nine zoologists and botanists, including Jean-Baptiste Leschenault de la Tour, François Péron and Charles-Alexandre Lesueur as well as the geographer Pierre Faure.
Charles-Nicolas Cochin was a French engraver, designer, writer, and art critic. To distinguish him from his father of the same name, he is variously called Charles-Nicolas Cochin le Jeune, Charles-Nicolas Cochin le fils, or Charles-Nicolas Cochin II.
Louise-Magdeleine Horthemels, or Louise-Madeleine Hortemels, also called Magdeleine Horthemels, was a French engraver, the mother of Charles-Nicolas Cochin. She is also sometimes credited under her married name of Louise Madeleine Cochin or Madeleine Cochin.
Louise Élisabeth de Bourbon was a daughter of Louis III de Bourbon, Prince of Condé, and his wife, Louise Françoise de Bourbon, légitimée de France, a legitimised daughter of King Louis XIV of France and his famous mistress, Madame de Montespan.
Charlotte de Rohan was a French aristocrat who married into the House of Condé, a cadet branch of the ruling House of Bourbon, during the Ancien Régime. She was Princess of Condé by her marriage. She has no known descendants today as her grandson, heir to the Condé family, died without children and her daughter remained childless. Charlotte was praised for being a cultured and attractive princess of her age.
Anne Julie de Melun was a French court office holder. She served as deputy Governess of the Children of France.
The Freycinet Map of 1811 is the first map of Australia to be published which shows the full outline of Australia. It was drawn by Louis de Freycinet and was an outcome of the Baudin expedition to Australia. It preceded the publication of Matthew Flinders' map of Australia, Terra Australis or Australia, by three years.
Guy-André-Pierre de Montmorency-Laval, 1st Duke of Laval, 1st Baron of Marche, Marquis of Lezay, was a French general and Marshal of France.
Nicolas Filleul de La Chesnaye was a French poet. He was professor at the College of Harcourt, Eure where in 1563, he produced Achille (1563). His texts were used for the Ballet Comique de la Reine in 1581.
Nicolas-Henri Tardieu, called the "Tardieu the elder", was a prominent French engraver, known for his sensitive reproductions of Antoine Watteau's paintings. He was appointed graveur du roi to King Louis XV of France. His second wife, Marie-Anne Horthemels, came from a family that included engravers and painters. She is known as an engraver in her own right. Nicolas-Henri and Marie-Anne Tardieu had many descendants who were noted artists, most of them engravers.
Jacques-Nicolas Tardieu, called "Tardieu fils" or "Tardieu the younger", was a French engraver.
Events from the year 1750 in France
Neoclassicism is a movement in architecture, design and the arts which emerged in France in the 1740s and became dominant in France between about 1760 to 1830. It emerged as a reaction to the frivolity and excessive ornament of the baroque and rococo styles. In architecture it featured sobriety, straight lines, and forms, such as the pediment and colonnade, based on Ancient Greek and Roman models. In painting it featured heroism and sacrifice in the time of the ancient Romans and Greeks. It began late in the reign of Louis XV, became dominant under Louis XVI, and continued through the French Revolution, the French Directory, and the reign of Napoleon Bonaparte, and the Bourbon Restoration until 1830, when it was gradually replaced as the dominant style by romanticism and eclecticism.
