French pharmacists and chemists during the Napoleonic era (V)

French pharmacists and chemists during the Napoleonic era (I)

French pharmacists and chemists during the Napoleonic era (II)

French pharmacists and chemists during the Napoleonic era (IV)

Known as a translator and illustrator of chemical texts, Marie-Anne Paulze-Lavoisier (1758–1836) has been often represented as the associate of male savants and especially of her husband, the French chemist Antoine-Laurent Lavoisier. This article explores her biography from a different angle and focuses on her trajectories as a secrétaire ; namely, someone whose main charge was to store and exchange information by means of writing. The article investigates the presence of women in Paulze-Lavoisier's network before and after Lavoisier's death in 1794. First, it shows that her work as a secrétaire combined a wide set of writing practices with domestic sociability. Then, it examines how other women contributed to her collaboration with Lavoisier. Finally, it analyses how these relationships changed in the post-revolutionary and Napoleonic era, when Paulze-Lavoisier's role as a secrétaire took on a new meaning.