Hello All, I think it was Suz who was asking about this name although I do believe that the date is long before the time she was asking about and in France ? Another reason for throwing this fellow into the discussion pot is due to the reference abount the French East India Co. I know someone who likes to mess about in boats from that time on this list. Now back to reading about one Pierre CHARROn and wasn't he an interesting character ? CHARPENTIER, FRANCOIS (1620-1702), French archaeologist and man of letters, was born in Paris on the I5th of February 1620. He was intended for the bar, but was employed by Colbert, who had determined on the foundation of a French East India Company, to draw up an explanatory account of the project for Louis XIV. Charpentier regarded as absurd the use of Latin in monumental inscriptions, and to him was entrusted the task of supplying the paintings of Lebrun in the Versailles Gallery with appropriate legends. His verses were so indifferent that they had to be replaced by others, the work of Racine and Boileau, both enemies of his. Charpentier in his Excellence de Ia langzie fran Qaise (1683) had anticipated Perrault in the famous academical dispute concerning the relative merit of the ancients and moderns. He is credited with a share in the production of the magnificent series of medals that commemorate the principal events of the age of Louis XIV. Charpentier, who was long in receipt of a pension of 1200 livres from Colbert, was erudite and ingenious, but he was always heavy and commonplace. His other works include a Vie de Socrate (1650), a translation of the Cyropaedia of Xenophon (1658), and the Trait de la peinture parlante (1684). ---------------------------- Kind Regards, Peter Leroy