Des Perriers

Des Perriers, Bonaventure (circa 1499-1544), a French poet and philosopher, born at Arnay-le-Duc in Burgundy. He was educated in a monastery, and seems there to have imbibed a hatred of monks and of religion generally. He obtained a post in the household of Margaret of Valois, and is thought to have probably had a hand in the production of the Heptameron. At any rate in the witty Court he was in his element, and his scepticism found there a ready welcome. The King of Navarre, however, took a dislike to him, from what cause is not exactly known, and expelled him from the Court. His satirical Cymbalum Mundi was condemned by the authorities of the Sorbonne, and, with no less heartiness, by Calvin. A French critic has said that the most prominent men of the early part of the 16th century were Rabelais, Morot (Deschamps), and Des Perriers, and that none of them was inferior to the others.