Jean-Baptiste Du Hamel - Early Life and Education

Early Life and Education

He was born at Vire, Normandy (now in the department of Calvados), the son of Vire lawyer Nicolas Du Hamel. The family also included two other brothers, Georges, who would become a lawyer like his father and go onto great success as a member of the Grand Conseil in Paris, and Guillaume, who became a priest and served in the court of the King of France. He began his formal studies at Caen, moving to Paris in 1642. Du Hamel demonstrated an early aptitude for scholarly work, and at the age of eighteen published an explanation of the work of Theodosius of Bithynia called Sphériques de Théodose, to which he added a treatise on trigonometry. He also showed an interest in a religious career, entering the Congregation of the Oratory in 1643, choosing them over other sects due to their focus on service and scholarship. He then moved to Angers to teach philosophy, and was formally ordained a priest while there in 1649. While in Angers, he not only focused his attention on theology, but also on the study of mathematics, astronomy, and science. He was then transferred back to Paris as an instructor at an Oratorian school on the Rue Saint Honoré. It is while in Paris that he published two of his works, the Astronomia Physica and De Meteoris et Fossibilus in 1660, both of which analyze and compare ancient theories with Cartesianism. This combination of theoretical and scientific analysis made many of Du Hamel's contemporaries see him and his work as a link between theology and the new ideas of science.