ANNALS 
OF 
PHILOSOPHY. 
DECEMBER, 1815, 
Arricre [, 
“Biographical Account of Charles Bossut. By M. le Chevalier 
Delambre, Secretary of the Institute. 
CHARLES BOSSUT, Member of the Academy of Sciences, 
and afterwards of the Institute, of the Academies of Bologna, 
Lyons, and Utrecht, Examiner of the Pupils of the Military Corps 
of Engineers, and of the Polytechnic School, and Member of the 
Legion of Honour, was born at Tartaras, in the department of the 
Rhone-and-Loire, on the 11th of August, 1730, and was the son 
of Barthelemi Bossut and Jeanne Thonnerine. His family belonged 
originally to the country of Liege, from which some misfortunes 
had obliged them to emigrate about the year 1542, At the age of 
six months he lost his father. A paternal uncle taught him the 
principles of grammar and the languages, and made him early ac- 
quainted with the Latin and French classics. At the age of 14 he 
was sent to the College of Jesuits at Lyons to finish his studies. 
Here he was soon distinguished by his masters, for the ease with 
which he cartied off all the prizes; and by his class-fellows, for 
his amiable and sensible disposition which interested them in his 
success. Here he soon acquired a kind of reputation which in a 
short time extended beyond the limits of the College. 
The Eloges of Fontenelle having fallen into his hands, raised in 
him the most violent passion for mathematics. He was eager to 
follow the footsteps of those great men, whose discoveries inflamed 
his imagination ; and finding nobody at Lyons who could guide his 
first steps, he ventured to write directly to Fontenelle to request his 
advice. He received an encouraging answer, “ I request of you,” said 
the old man, more than 90 years of age, “ to give me from time to 
Vor. VI, N° VI, 2C 
