Bernard Palissy, a French potter, born at Oapelle-Biron, near Agen, about 1510, died in Paris in 1590. He was first employed, as we learn from himself, in "portraiture and vitri-faction," which probably means that he painted on glass; and being acquainted with geometry, he was occasionally employed in surveying and in drawing maps. Having seen some ornamented pottery from Nuremberg as some think, or as others suppose from Italy, he resolved to discover the method of enamelling which had been brought to such perfection in the latter country. Regardless of expense, labor, disappointment, and hardship, he reduced himself and family to poverty rather than give up his undertaking, and about 1555 succeeded after 16 years of exertion. Having in the mean time become a Protestant, he was imprisoned at Bordeaux during the reign of Henry II.; but through the intervention of some of the nobility, among others the constable de Montmorency, he was released, and appointed "maker of the king's rustic potteries" (rustiques Jigulines). He removed to Paris, and resided in the neighborhood known as the Tuileries. On the building of the palace of the Tuileries he had charge of the decoration of the gardens.

This post saved him from the massacre of St. Bartholomew. He improved his discovery, and manufactured earthen figures and ornaments, which in artistic perfection rivalled those of Faenza or Oastel Durante, and were generally used in the decoration of castles and palaces. His other works,such as vases, jugs, ewers, and salvers, were eagerly sought for, and are still highly valued. Meanwhile he was engaged in scientific pursuits, and it has been appropriately said that he was to chemistry what Lord Bacon was to philosophy, and that his Traite de Vart de terre is the Novum Organum of the science. In his other treatises, De la marne, De la nature des eaux et fontaines, etc, anticipating modern scientific discoveries, he expounded a method of taking soundings, and gave the theory of artesian wells and stratifications. Toward the end of the reign of Henry III. he was again involved in serious difficulties on account of his religion. Probably through the enmity of the leaguers, he was arrested in 1588 and confined in the Bastile, where he died. - The name of Palissy, scarcely noticed by his contemporaries and completely ignored during the 17th century, was brought again to light by Fontenelle, Buffon, and others, who pointed out the value of his scientific researches.

Being ignorant of Greek and Latin, he wrote altogether in French. An edition of his works was published in 1777 by Faujas de St. Fond and Gobet, and reprinted in part in 1844 by A. Cap (Paris). J. Salles has written Etude sur la vie et les travaux de B. Palissy (8vo, Mmes, 1855), and his life has also been written by H. Morley (2 vols., London, 1852). Specimens of his art are preserved in the museums of the Louvre, of Sevres, of the hotel Cluny in Paris, and of the Favorite near Munich. His oven, with some other relics, was discovered in 1865 in the place du Carrousel.