Claude Chastillon

Claude Chastillon or Chatillon (1559 or 1560 – 27 April 1616) was a French architect, military and civil engineer, and topographical draughtsman, who served under Henry IV of France. His most notable work, Topographie françoise, a collection of 500 views of French towns and buildings, published posthumously in 1641, constitutes a unique, if partial, historical account of French topography and architecture at the beginning of the 17th century.

Chastillon was born in Châlons-en-Champagne.

In the 1580s Chastillon became a part of the military retinue of Henry of Navarre (as Henry IV was known before he became king of France in 1589). In 1591 Henry made Chastillon the Royal Topographer (Topographe du Roi), a post that at the time was otherwise unknown, and in 1595, a Royal Engineer (Ingénieur du Roi), a post established in the early 16th century which identified a member of a corps responsible for military fortifications, the mechanics of besiegement, and hydraulics.

In the course of his professional duties, Chastillon toured France and neighboring countries and made drawings of many of the places he visited, including views of towns and buildings, ancient and contemporary. Many of these he began to have engraved. Among the engravers were Mathieu Merian, Léonard Gaultier, Joachim Duviert, and Jacques Poinssart. In 1616 Chastillon died in Paris without having published the bulk of his collection of drawings.

Fifteen years after Chastillon's death, the publisher Jean Boisseau purchased the existing plates and drawings. He had Isaac Briot and Nicolas Briot, among others, engrave the drawings which had not yet been engraved and published the collection in 1641 as Topographie francoise ou representations de plusieurs villes, bourgs, chasteaux, maisons de plaisance, ruines & vestiges d’antiquité du royaume de France, crediting Chastillon as the creator of the drawings. Usually referred to simply as Topographie françoise, it provides a unique account of France at the beginning of the 17th century. It includes views of the houses and châteaux of officials and friends of the king, many now destroyed, and is therefore an invaluable source for the study of French noble residences of the period.

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