A little known episode in the life of the future revolutionary Fabre d'Eglantine: his involvement in mephitism.
On one hand we have Philippe-François-Nazaire Fabre, known as Fabre d'Eglantine, an undistinguished playwright, who, in September 1792, during the French Revolution, was elected a member of the Convention nationale and voted for the execution of Louis XVI in January 1793. On the other hand we have Jean-Antoine-Michel-Dieudonné Janin de Combe-Blanche, one of the most famous ophthalmologists of the eighteenth century, raised to the peerage in 1787, physician to crowned heads and dignitaries of the Church. These two men were diametrically opposed, but were brought together by chance, shortly before the outbreak of the French Revolution, by a pamphlet on mephitism.
Olry
Régis
R
Université du Québec a Trois-Rivières, Département de chimie-biologie, Trois-Rivières, PQ, Canada G9A 5H7. regis.olry@uqtr.ca
D000397:Air Pollution / Q000266:history; D004324:Drama / Q000266:history*; D047850:French Revolution; D049671:History, 18th Century; D006801:Humans; D009885:Ophthalmology / Q000266:history; D011057:Politics