ANNALS 



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PHILOSOPHY- 



MAY, 1814o 



Article L 



biographical Account of M. le Comle Lagrange^ By M. le 



Chevalier Delambre.* 



JOSEPH-LOUIS LAGRANGE, one of the founders of the 

 Academy of Turin, Director during 20 years of the Berlin Academy 

 for the Physlco-Mathematical Sciences, Foreign Associate of the 

 Academy of Sciences of Paris, Member of the Imperial Institute 

 and of the Board of Longitude, Senator and Comte of the Em- 

 pire, Grand Officer of the Legion of Honour, Grand Cross of the 

 Imperial Order of Re- union, was born at Turin, on the 25th of 

 November, 1736. He was the son of Joseph- Louis Lagrange, 

 Treasurer of War, and of Marie-Therese Gros, only daughter of 

 a rich physician of Cambiano. 



His great-grandfather, a captain of horse in the servJcfe of 

 France, had gone over to that of Emanuel II. King of Sardinia, 

 who established him at Turin by marrying him to a Indy of Conti, 

 of an illustrious Roman family. He was originally a Parisian, and 

 a relation of Marie-Ijouise, dressing maid to the mother t»f Lbtiis 

 XIV., and afterwards wife of Francis Gaston de Bethune. 



These details are of no importance for the illustrious mathemati- 

 cian, whose reputation renders his genealogy of no consequence to 

 him; but they are not indifferent to France, who eagerly recalled 

 him, and restored him to his ancient rights. His name, and that 

 of his mother, show that he was of French extraction. All bis 



• Trantlated from the Monitcur for the ITtli, l8th, ami 19lh of Janoary, IS14. 



•» • Our readers will rerncinber that we presented them with a short t)i(();ra' 

 |)hieal Hketrh of M. I,agran(;e at the cotnmeiicemeflt of (lu; ^efoi.d volume of thr 

 ^nnitlt of Philotuphy: we now, according to our prumrsc, have ihc pleasure «f 

 lajriiii; heforc them a very luniteily account of that cmiDeiit aialbcmaticiua. 



Vol. III. N'^ V. X 



