Jean-Baptiste Bécœur

Who is Jean-Baptiste Bécœur?

Jean-Baptiste Bécœur was a French ornithologist.

Bécœur’s parents were well-placed.His father, François Bécœur, was an apothecary, his mother, Anne Vaucremont, was the daughter of a doctor. He studied pharmacy first with his father and then in Germany, and finally in Paris where he attended the courses of Antoine de Jussieu. He then returned to Metz.

He was initially interested first in philosophy and mathematics but then devoted himself to natural history studying mainly insects and birds. At this time conservation techniques were mediocre. Bécoeur developed a method that preserved bird specimens and prevented them from being damaged by insect attack. He sent birds thus prepared to Muséum national d'Histoire naturelle, which earned him the praises of Georges-Louis Buffon and helped revolutionize the conservation of birds and ornithology at the museum.He tried several times, but without success, to become an assistant at the museum.

His method of conservation, based on arsenic was popularized in 1830 under the name of the Bécoeur recipe.

Bécoeur was an associate of François Levaillant, who played a significant role in the establishment of French ornithology. The huge collection of Bécoeur was purchased by the Duke of Zweibrücken for the cabinet of curiosities of the Château de Karlsberg, destroyed after the Siege of Mainz in 1793.