De Montaigne, Michel ___ 1533-1592 ___ French ___ lawyer

BIOGRAPHICAL SUMMARY
Montaigne was born in Chãteau de Montaigne, near Bordeaux, in southwest France. His father was a soldier and a lawyer, and his mother came from a Spanish Jewish family converted to protestantism. He studied at Collège de Guyenne in Bordeaux, and then trained for the law in Bordeaux and Toulouse. He worked at the Court des Aides of Périgueaux, and then in 1557 was appointed to the Bordeaux Parliament. From 1561 to 1563 he served at the court of Charles IX. In 1565, he married Françoise de la Chassaigne. They had one daughter that survived infancy. After his father died in 1568, Montaigne moved to the family Chãteau. There he wrote the essays which, subsequently, brought him fame. From 1578, he suffered from kidney stones which led him in search of cures in Switzerland, Germany and Italy. During these travels, he wrote a journal. In 1581 Montaigne was elected mayor of Bordeaux, and served for four years. In 1588 he accompanied Henry III to Rouen.
A biography link
Wikipedia bio
The Diary Review - No good barber in Italy

DIARY DATES, CONTENT DESCRIPTORS
1580-1581 ___ travel health Switzerland Germany Italy

WEB TEXT LINKS
etext
several extracts
about and extracts
 

ORIGINAL MANUSCRIPT LINKS
 

SOME PUBLISHED TITLES
Michel de Montaigne. The Complete Works. Essays, Travel Journal, Letters
The Journal of Montaigne's Travels
The Diary of Montaigne's Journey to Italy in 1580 and 1581
 

May 2005, June 2008, April 2013
Please email if you have any corrections, additions or comments, or if you've found the site useful. Thank you.

IMPORTANT NOTES AND CAUTIONS: 1) The first line of basic information may be incomplete in several ways: some historical figures have different names (titles, pen-names); their birth and death dates may be unknown or uncertain (g - guess, c - circa); similarly, their occupations may be unknown, or they may have had other jobs; and, for early diarists, I've used 'British' a bit too freely. 2) The biographical summary may not be accurate. It was compiled quickly from various sources, mostly on the internet, and the facts were not checked anywhere near as rigorously as they would have been if they'd been intended for publication in a printed form. 3) The journal dates and descriptors (which are in no particular order) must be treated with caution: since I have not examined the diaries myself, the descriptors are only guesses based on bibliographies, anthologies and internet biographies. 4) For the biography and etext links, I have ignored any sites with charges, and I have avoided, wherever possible, those with pop-ups or too much advertising. I have limited myself to providing three etext links where there is some variety between them. 5) For the original manuscript links, I have limited myself to providing a maximum of two (although, for a few diarists, their original diaries are held in more than two places). 6) I have provided the titles - chosen randomly - for up to three printed editions of the diaries.