Bio 12

Louis-Antoine de Bougainville (1729-1808)

Commander and Admiral of the French Crown, Louis-Antoine de Bougainville (1729-1808), was an intrepid traveller and explorer, who between 1766 and 1769 succeeded in the arduous feat of circumnavigating the globe, starting from Nantes and returning to Saint-Malo. This feat was reported in Voyage autour du monde, published in 1771, which made Bouganville very popular among the philosophers and courts of his time, particularly for his descriptions of Tahiti: it is thought that as a result of this work, Voltaire began studying Tahitian.