Jean Bullant

Who was Jean Bullant?

Jean Bullant was a French architect and sculptor who built the tombs of Anne de Montmorency, Grand Connétable of France, Henri II, and Catherine de' Medici. He also worked on the Tuileries, the Louvre, and the Château d'Écouen. Bullant was a Huguenot.

On his return in 1537 from study in Rome, Bullant worked for Montmorency, for whom he transformed the Château d'Écouen about 1550, built the "petit château" at Chantilly, and modernised the Château de Fère-en-Tardenois, with its splendid bridge.

He took up the on-going works at the Tuileries upon the death of Philibert Delorme, and was appointed royal architect,. At Chenonceaux he built the gallery that spans the river on arches. For Catherine de Médicis he built the Hôtel de Soissons, of which only the Medicis column remains.

His treatise on architecture, La Règle générale d'architecture sur les cinq manières de colonnes, was published at Paris, 1564 and 1568. Bullant was also the author of treatises linking theory to practice, on geometry for craftsmen, and horology, notably quadrants and solar clocks.