Charles Étienne Louis Camus

Background

Camus was born at Crécy-la-Chapelle, France, on August 25, 1699. He was the son of Marguerite Maillard and Étienne Camus, a surgeon.

Education

Camus early evidenced mathematical and mechanical abilities that induced his parents to send him to the Collège de Navarre. He subsequently continued to study mathematics (with Varignon) and also undertook work in civil and military architecture, mechanics, and astronomy.

Career

In 1727 Camus entered the Academy of Sciences’ prize competition for the best manner of masting vessels. His memoir on this subject won half the prize money and was published by the Academy; more important, it was mainly responsible for bringing him election to that body as an assistant mechanician on 13 August 1727. During the next forty years, Camus served the Academy as administrator (he was its director in 1750 and 1761), as frequent commissioner for diverse examinations, and as an active scientist. In the last capacity, he presented some purely mathematical memoirs, although the greatest number of his contributions dealt with problems of mechanics. These included treatments of toothed wheels and their use in clocks, studies of the raising of water from wells by buckets and pumps, an evaluation of an alleged solution to the problem of perpetual motion, and works on devices and standards of measurement.

His most important scientific service was with Maupertuis, Clairaut, and Lemonnier on the Academy’s 1736 expedition to Lapland to determine the shape of the earth. He subsequently served with the same people to determine the amplitude of the arc of Picard’s earlier measure and, several years later, with Bouguer, Pingre, and Cassini de Thury in closely related operations. He was also involved in Cassini de Thury’s famous cartographical venture, which produced the Carte de la France published by the Academy in 1744-1787.

In 1730 Camus was named to the Academy of Architecture and became its secretary shortly thereafter. There he gave public lessons to aspiring architects as the Academy’s professor of geometry. These lessons later served as the basis of a Cours de mathématiques that he drew up for the use of engineering students, a task he assumed in 1748 in conjunction with the creation of the École du Génie at Mézières. A standard examination procedure was also established, and Camus was named the examiner of engineering students. According to his instructions, Camus’s course was to consist of four parts - arithmetic, geometry, mechanics, and hydraulics; the Cours, published in three parts from 1749-1751, covered all but the last. In 1755, when Camus was also named the examiner for artillery schools, this Cours became the standard work for artillery students. Its great success was, therefore, due more to Camus’s monopoly on examinations than to its intrinsic merit. In point of fact, the Cours came under increasing attack in the 1760’s as inappropriate for artillery students and too elementary for those at Mdzieres.

Camus died on February 2, 1768, in Paris.

Achievements

• Camus is best known as the author of a Cours de mathématiques (1766), and a number of essays on mathematical and mechanical subjects. He was elected a fellow of the Royal Society of London.

Works

More photos

• book

  • Traité Des Forces Mouvantes

    (French edition)

    1722
  • Cours de Mathématique

    (French edition)

    1749

Membership

• Royal Society of London , United Kingdom

Connections

Father:

Étienne Camus

Mother:

Marguerite Maillard

References

• The Biographical Encyclopedia of Astronomers The Biographical Encyclopedia of Astronomers is a unique and valuable resource for historians and astronomers alike. The two volumes include approximately 1550 biographical sketches on astronomers from antiquity to modern times.
  2009
• Dictionary of Scientific Biography Volume 3
  1971