Pierre Poivre
Encyclopedia
Lyon
Lyon , is a city in east-central France in the Rhône-Alpes region, situated between Paris and Marseille. Lyon is located at from Paris, from Marseille, from Geneva, from Turin, and from Barcelona. The residents of the city are called Lyonnais....
; missionary to China and Cochinchina, Intendant of the Islands of Mauritius and Bourbon, and wearer of the cordon of St. Michel
Order of the Holy Spirit
The Order of the Holy Spirit, also known as the Order of the Knights of the Holy Spirit, was an Order of Chivalry under the French Monarchy. It should not be confused with the Congregation of the Holy Ghost or with the Order of the Holy Ghost...
. Poivre was an uncle to renowned French naturalist
Natural history
Natural history is the scientific research of plants or animals, leaning more towards observational rather than experimental methods of study, and encompasses more research published in magazines than in academic journals. Grouped among the natural sciences, natural history is the systematic study...
Pierre Sonnerat
Pierre Sonnerat
Pierre Sonnerat was a French naturalist and explorer.Sonnerat was the nephew of the botanist Pierre Poivre. He made several voyages to southeast Asia, visiting the Philippines and Moluccas between 1769 and 1772, and India and China from 1774 to 1781. He was the first person to give a scientific...
(1748-1814).
In his early 20s he was a missionary in Far Eastern locations such as Cochinchina
Cochinchina
Cochinchina is a region encompassing the southern third of Vietnam whose principal city is Saigon. It was a French colony from 1862 to 1954. The later state of South Vietnam was created in 1954 by combining Cochinchina with southern Annam. In Vietnamese, the region is called Nam Bộ...
, Guangzhou
Guangzhou
Guangzhou , known historically as Canton or Kwangchow, is the capital and largest city of the Guangdong province in the People's Republic of China. Located in southern China on the Pearl River, about north-northwest of Hong Kong, Guangzhou is a key national transportation hub and trading port...
and Macau
Macau
Macau , also spelled Macao , is, along with Hong Kong, one of the two special administrative regions of the People's Republic of China...
. In 1745 as member of the French East India Company
French East India Company
The French East India Company was a commercial enterprise, founded in 1664 to compete with the British and Dutch East India companies in colonial India....
, on a journey to the East Indies he was involved in a naval battle with the British when he was struck by a cannonball on the wrist. This injury required amputation of part of his right arm.
In the 1760s, Poivre became administrator of Ile de France (Mauritius
Mauritius
Mauritius , officially the Republic of Mauritius is an island nation off the southeast coast of the African continent in the southwest Indian Ocean, about east of Madagascar...
) and Ile Bourbon (Réunion
Réunion
Réunion is a French island with a population of about 800,000 located in the Indian Ocean, east of Madagascar, about south west of Mauritius, the nearest island.Administratively, Réunion is one of the overseas departments of France...
) in the Indian Ocean
Indian Ocean
The Indian Ocean is the third largest of the world's oceanic divisions, covering approximately 20% of the water on the Earth's surface. It is bounded on the north by the Indian Subcontinent and Arabian Peninsula ; on the west by eastern Africa; on the east by Indochina, the Sunda Islands, and...
. He is famous for the construction of a botanical garden
Botanical garden
A botanical garden The terms botanic and botanical, and garden or gardens are used more-or-less interchangeably, although the word botanic is generally reserved for the earlier, more traditional gardens. is a well-tended area displaying a wide range of plants labelled with their botanical names...
on Mauritius which consisted of trees, shrubs and plants from tropical sites worldwide and where he was succeeded as Director by Jean-Nicolas Céré
Jean-Nicolas Céré
Jean-Nicolas Céré was a French botanist and agronomist born on the Indian Ocean Ile de France but educated in Brittany and Paris. On the Ile de France he was befriended by Pierre Poivre , administrator of the Ile de France and Ile Bourbon , who he assisted in the cultivation of spices...
. He is especially known for introduction of spice plants such as clove
Clove
Cloves are the aromatic dried flower buds of a tree in the family Myrtaceae. Cloves are native to the Maluku islands in Indonesia and used as a spice in cuisines all over the world...
and nutmeg
Nutmeg
The nutmeg tree is any of several species of trees in genus Myristica. The most important commercial species is Myristica fragrans, an evergreen tree indigenous to the Banda Islands in the Moluccas of Indonesia...
to Mauritius and Reunion. During this period of time the Dutch had a virtual monopoly on these spices in the East Indies
East Indies
East Indies is a term used by Europeans from the 16th century onwards to identify what is now known as Indian subcontinent or South Asia, Southeastern Asia, and the islands of Oceania, including the Malay Archipelago and the Philippines...
. In order to obtain these spices, Poivre had to had organize clandestine smuggling forays to obtain plants and seeds from the Indies; the expeditions to obtain the species were conducted in 1769-1770. Poivre also was responsible for introducing these spice plants to the Seychelles
Seychelles
Seychelles , officially the Republic of Seychelles , is an island country spanning an archipelago of 115 islands in the Indian Ocean, some east of mainland Africa, northeast of the island of Madagascar....
.
Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam Botanical Garden
The Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam Botanical Garden , commonly known as the Pamplemousses Botanical Garden, is a popular tourist attraction near Port Louis, Mauritius, and the oldest botanical garden in the Southern Hemisphere...
that Poivre created still flourishes, it is now a 25-hectare garden containing tropical plants and trees from Africa, Asia, the Americas as well as islands of the Indian Ocean. Also, Poivre Atoll in the Amirantes Island Group is named after him.
Poivre's book, "The Voyages of a Philosopher", was read with interest by Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson
Thomas Jefferson was the principal author of the United States Declaration of Independence and the Statute of Virginia for Religious Freedom , the third President of the United States and founder of the University of Virginia...
; his description of mountain rice cultivated in Vietnam caught Jefferson's attention.
Black pepper
Black pepper is a flowering vine in the family Piperaceae, cultivated for its fruit, which is usually dried and used as a spice and seasoning. The fruit, known as a peppercorn when dried, is approximately in diameter, dark red when fully mature, and, like all drupes, contains a single seed...
(Poivre;) in French.
Writings by Poivre
- Voyages of a Philosopher (Voyages d'un philosophe ou observations sur les moeurs et les arts des peuples de l'Afrique, de l'Asie et de l'Amérique) by Pierre Poivre, Fortuné-Barthélemy de Félice, 1769 - freely available at Google Books.
- Tableau historique de l'Inde, contenant un abrégé de la mithologie et des mœurs indiennes; Pierre Poivre Издательство: Aux dépens de la Société typographique, 1771
External links
- Photos of the Botanical Garden of Pamplemousses
- Mauritius Heritage in Pamplemousses Gardens - article by Tony Smart, July 30, 2008