André Tiraqueau

He was a legal humanist based in Fontenay-le-Comte, Poitou, where he knew Amaury Bouchard.[3] He married Marie Cailler, daughter of Artus Caillier, a legal officer at Fontenay; the marriage took place in 1512, when she was still very young, and he proceeded with two works on the Querelle des femmes and married life.[4][5]

Tiraqueau held the local legal offices of juge-châtelain and lieutenant. He was appointed a counsellor of the Parlement of Paris in 1531.[6]

Pierre Bayle included a chapter on "Books and Children" in his Historical and Critical Dictionary calling into question a claim that Tiraqueau fathered 45 children and wrote as many books, creating one of each per year.[7]

Tiraqueau had a reputation as a prolific writer.

• De legibus connubialibus (1513). This work justifies the legal disabilities of women by appeal to jus gentium and divine law.[8] It began as part of a commentary on the customs of Poitou, and grew through numerous editions.[9]

Frontispiece of Regii in curia parisiensi senatoris (1554), woodcut by Claude Bezoard.

• De nobilitate et jure primigeniorum (1549).[10] This work addressed the topic of nobility as social status and recognition, picking up from Bartolus who wrote a work with the same title. Tiraqueau's theory followed that of Bartolus, on the political and legal origins of nobility, as opposed to kinship; and integrated it with the French situation and the scientia juris.[11] The theory was undermined in the longer term by the French kings' use of venal office.[12]

He wrote a commentary on the Geniales dies of Alessandro Alessandri.[13]

Tiraqueau's works were collected, firstly in five volumes (1574), and then in seven (Frankfurt, from 1597). The arrangement in the seven-volume edition is:

• I: On nobility and primogeniture;
• II: legal rights in marriage;
• III: law of repossession;
• IV: Cessante causa;
• V: Legacies for pious use, and other works;
• VI: Commentary on Si unquam;
• VII: moderation of punishments.[14]

Rabelais met Tiraqueau during his time as an Observantine Franciscan at Fontenay; he participated in the humanist circle there, in the early 1520s.[15] Tiraqueau was the dedicatee of an edition by Rabelais of the letters of Giovanni Manardi.[16]

As Rabelais was writing his Tiers Livre, Tiraqueau was collecting authorities for his work on nobility (1549). It has been suggested that Rabelais took largely from Tiraqueau's references.[2] Tiraqueau apparently cooled towards Rabelais in later life, and played down his public disagreement with Amaury Bouchard over women (of which Rabelais made much literary use).[17]

• Jean Plattard (1968), The Life of François Rabelais
• M. A. Screech (1979), Rabelais

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• Open Library page