Thevet, Andrew

, a writer of some note in the 16th century, was horn at Angflulesme, and entered the Franciscan order, and afterwards visited Italy, the Holy Land, Egypt, Greece, and Brasil. At his return to France in 1556, he quitted the cordelier’s habit, took that of an ecclesiastic, and was appointed almoner to queen Catherine de Medicis. He had the titles of historiographer of France, and cosmographer to the king, and received the profits of those offices. He died Nov. 23, 1590, aged eighty-tight, leaving “Cosmographie de Levant,” Lyons, 1554, 4to; “A History of illustrious Men/' 1671, 8 vols. 12mo, or 1684, 2 vols. fol. a work of very little merit; but the folio edition is esteemed of some price on account of the portraits. He wrote also” Singularity’s de la France Aniarctique," Paris, 1558, 4to, and several other books, from which the author appears to have been a great reader, but at the same time, to have possessed great credulity, and little judgment. ¹