Christopher de Paus

Christopher Paus
Count of Paus
Christopher Paus (painting, Herresta) in the court dress of a papal chamberlain, in Spanish Renaissance style
Coat of arms
Born	10 September 1862 Christiania, Norway
Died	10 September 1943 Skodsborg, Denmark
Buried	Vår Frelsers gravlund
Noble family	Paus
Father	Major Johan Altenborg Paus
Mother	Agnes Tostrup

Christopher Tostrup Paus, Count of Paus (10 September 1862 – 10 September 1943), usually known as Christopher Paus and also known as Christopher de Paus, was a Norwegian land owner, heir to the timber giant Tostrup & Mathiesen, papal chamberlain and count, known as philanthropist, art collector and socialite in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He gave large donations to museums in Scandinavia and to the Catholic Church. In the Acta Apostolicae Sedis and the Annuario Pontificio, his name is spelled (conte) Cristoforo de Paus.

Born in Christiania, he belonged to the Skien branch of the Paus family, and was the son of Major and War Commissioner in Molde Johan Altenborg Paus (1833–1894) and Agnes Tostrup (1839–1863). His father was a son of lawyer and judge Henrik Johan Paus (1799–1893), who owned the estate Østerhaug in Elverum, while his mother was a daughter of timber magnate Christopher Henrik Holfeldt Tostrup (1804–1881), one of the two main owners of Tostrup & Mathiesen, one of Norway's largest timber companies. Christopher Paus's father was also a first cousin of playwright Henrik Ibsen. As a young man, Christopher Paus would visit the then-famous Henrik Ibsen in Rome, where he lived. His great-grandfather Christian Lintrup was one of the pioneers of the medical profession in Norway.

Christopher Paus inherited a fortune from his maternal grandfather and his two childless uncles Oscar and Thorvald Tostrup, who were all co-owners of Tostrup & Mathiesen. His family sold their shares of Tostrup & Mathiesen to their business partners, the Mathiesen family, in the 1890s, and the company was since renamed Mathiesen Eidsvold Værk and continued under that name and as Moelven Industrier. His maternal grandfather had also owned the estate Kjellestad in Stathelle.