Gérard Pierre Antoine de Bosc de la Calmette, often referred to as Antoine de la Calmette, was a Danish County Governor, geheimrat, and landowner.
Background
Born in Lisbon, Portugal, Calmette was the son of the Dutch resident minister of the States-General to Portugal, Charles François de Bosc de la Calmette, a Hugenot who had left France to avoid religious persecution. His mother was Antoinette Elisabeth de Godin. He came with his parents to Denmark in 1759 when his father was transferred to Copenhagen.
Career
About 1770, the Calmette family acquired the 15th century royal farm of Sømarkegård, a swampy area at the northeastern end of Møns Klint. The father also acquired Marienborg Manor on Møn which he left to Antoine when he died in 1781. In 1777, Calmette married Anna Catharina Elisabeth (Lisa) Baroness Iselin (1759-1805), the daughter of Reinhard Iselin, a highly successful Swiss merchant employed by the Danish State.
In 1781, she inherited Rosenfeldt Manor, just west of Vordingborg.
In 1769, Calmette held the rank of Cornet. In 1772, he served as captain of a cavalry regiment.
In 1774, he was appointed chamberlain, and in 1777, he was naturalized as a Danish nobleman. In 1783, he became governor of Møn (Møn Amt) and in 1794, also of Nykøbing.
Calmette also took an interest in prehistoric monuments, excavating Møn"s Neolithic burial mound, Klekkende Høj, in 1797 while he was governor.
In 1803, he was elevated to the position of Geheimrat. Calmette was a figure of his time, inspired by the Age of Enlightenment and by philosophers such as Jean-Jacques Rousseau. He had also taken a specific interest in the gardens and parks of England and France.
While travelling widely across Europe in 1790, he had been attracted by the style of the romantic English landscape garden, a favourite with the nobility of the day.
Here nature was allowed to thrive in large parks studded with monuments, temples and ornamental buildings. While he entrusted Andreas Kirkerup with the design of the garden"s centerpiece, a thatched manor serving as a summer residence, it was Calmette himself who developed the garden, bringing in rare plants, shrubs and trees, all carefully laid out in accordance with a detailed plan.
His knowledge of architecture also seems to have contributed to the design of the various buildings around the park. He was certainly inspired to design the Chinese pavilion after visiting Copenhagen"s Frederiksberg Park as can be seen from his drawing of the park"s Chinese pavilion and bridge (c 1798).
Views
He is, however, remembered above all as an artist and landscape architect, contributing to Danish Romanticism, especially in the design of Liselund on the island of Møn with its English garden, thatched summer residence and distributed buildings in various styles.