Philippe de La Canaye

(1551–1610)

4

Philippe de La Canaye, Sieur de Fresnes, was a second great-grandson of Jehan Gobelin.

Born in Paris in 1551, the son of an advocate of the Parlement of Paris, he studied law at Heidelberg and became prominent at the Paris bar. Raised in an atmosphere of intellectual liberty, he chose Calvinism and became a committed Huguenot.

At fifteen he travelled through Germany, Italy, and as far as Istanbul. In 1572 he accompanied the secretary to the Bishop of Acqs along the established diplomatic caravan route from Venice to Ragusa (Dubrovnik), through Adrianople, arriving in Constantinople in June 1573. He remained there six months as a member of the French embassy under François de Noailles.

His observations, recorded in Le Voyage du Levant (originally written in Italian under the title Ephémerides), reveal remarkable maturity and acuity for a young traveller. Though dazzled by Ottoman magnificence, he studied closely the political climate following the Ottoman defeat at Lepanto (1571), noting the intense shipbuilding efforts to rebuild the imperial fleet. He described Patriarch Jeremiah Tranos, the Zygomalas family, a Greek wedding in Pera, women’s dress and coiffure, conditions in Chios after the Ottoman conquest of 1566, and travels in Zakynthos. His account was published in French in the nineteenth century and remains a valuable humanist record of the eastern Mediterranean.

Under Henry III he purchased a position on the King’s Royal Council. Henry IV later employed him as ambassador to England (1586), Switzerland (1588), and various German states. In 1595 he became Président de la Chambre at Castres.

In 1600 Henry IV appointed him arbiter at the Fontainebleau conferences between Cardinal Jacques Du Perron (Catholic) and Philippe Duplessis-Mornay (Protestant). In 1602 he converted from Calvinism to Catholicism in order to serve as ambassador to Venice. During the Venetian Interdict he skilfully mediated between the Republic and Pope Paul V, earning papal gratitude.

He died in Paris on 27 February 1610.

Publications

Philippe de La Canaye left memoirs and diplomatic correspondence, including:

• Lettres et ambassade de messire Philippe Canaye, seigneur de Fresne (1635–1636)

• Remonstrances et discours (1598)

• L’Organe (1589), a work based on Aristotle’s Organon

• Le Voyage du Levant (1573; modern edition with notes by Henri Hauser, 1986)

Sources and Further Reading

• Encyclopaedia Britannica, “Philippe de La Canaye.”

• Hauser, Henri (ed.), Le Voyage du Levant.

• French historical biographical records on Philippe de Fresnes.