Montaigne's education began in early childhood, and followed a pedagogical plan, that his father had developed, refined by the advice of the latter's humanist friends. Montaigne's relationship with his father however is frequently reflected upon and discussed in his essays. ĭuring a great part of Montaigne's life his mother lived near him, and even survived him but she is mentioned only twice in his essays. His maternal grandmother, Honorette Dupuy, was from a Catholic family in Gascony, France. His maternal grandfather, Pedro Lopez, from Zaragoza, was from a wealthy Marrano ( Sephardic Jewish) family, that had converted to Catholicism. Īlthough there were several families bearing the patronym "Eyquem" in Guyenne, his father's family is thought to have had some degree of Marrano (Spanish and Portuguese Jewish) origins, while his mother, Antoinette López de Villanueva, was a convert to Protestantism. His father, Pierre Eyquem, Seigneur of Montaigne, was a French Catholic soldier in Italy for a time, and had also been the mayor of Bordeaux. His great-grandfather, Ramon Felipe Eyquem, had made a fortune as a herring merchant - and had bought the estate in 1477, thus becoming the Lord of Montaigne. Montaigne was born in the Aquitaine region of France, on the family estate Château de Montaigne in a town now called Saint-Michel-de-Montaigne, close to Bordeaux. He is most famously known for his skeptical remark, '' Que sçay-je?" ("What do I know?", in Middle French now rendered as " Que sais-je?" in modern French).īiography Family, childhood and education In time, however, Montaigne came to be recognized as embodying, perhaps better than any other author of his time, the spirit of freely entertaining doubt that began to emerge at that time. The tendency in his essays to digress into anecdotes and personal ruminations was seen as detrimental to proper style rather than as an innovation, and his declaration that "I am myself the matter of my book" was viewed by his contemporaries as self-indulgent. Montaigne had a direct influence on numerous Western writers his massive volume Essais contains some of the most influential essays ever written.ĭuring his lifetime, Montaigne was admired more as a statesman than as an author. His work is noted for its merging of casual anecdotes and autobiography with intellectual insight. He is known for popularizing the essay as a literary genre. Michel Eyquem, Sieur de Montaigne ( / m ɒ n ˈ t eɪ n/ mon- TAYN French: 28 February 1533 – 13 September 1592 ), also known as the Lord of Montaigne, was one of the most significant philosophers of the French Renaissance. The coat of arms of Michel Eyquem, Lord of Montaigne
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