M. Renan is a member of the French Institute, and in 1860 was sent by the imperial government on a literary mission to Syria. In February, 1861, he was appointed professor of the Hebrew, Chaldee, and Syriac languages in the collège de France. Some expressions in his introductory lecture gave natural offence, and he was suspended. M. Renan has since published the lecture—"De la part des peuples Sémitiques dans l'histoire de la civilisation," 1862. In 1864 appeared his "Life of Jesus," and in 1865 the "Lives of the Apostles"—works of high literary merit, but in which bold averments and the assumption of disputed points hold the place of argument.—F. E.
RENAU D'ELICAGARAY, Bernard, a celebrated French naval officer, naval architect, and military engineer, was born in the province of Béarn in 1652, of a poor but noble family, and died at Pougues on the 30th of September, 1719. Having turned his attention at an early age to the construction of ships, he obtained in 1679 a government appointment which enabled him to put in practice an improved system of building ships of war, and to take a leading part in that renewal and development of the French navy, which took place under Louis XIV. He was not less eminent as a military engineer than as a naval architect, and distinguished himself by his skill, gallantry, and success in the conduct of many sieges, amongst which may be mentioned that of Gibraltar in 1704, which was only saved by a very determined defence on the part of the British garrison. In 1699, Renau was elected a member of the Academy of Sciences, and at a later period he was made a councillor of state, and received the grand cross of the order of Saint Louis. His personal character was frank, generous, and brave.—W. J. M. R.
RENAUDOT, Eusebius, an eminent orientalist, was born at Paris, 20th July, 1646, his father being a court physician. He was educated at the Jesuit college, and he was for some time in the Oratoire. He became an ecclesiastic for the purpose of enjoying literary leisure and opportunity. Eastern languages especially occupied him—Arabic, Coptic, and Syriac—as they afforded facilities for the study of the history and worship of the Eastern churches. He enjoyed the patronage of the prince of Condé, Colbert, and other distinguished statesmen, and was sometimes employed in diplomatic business. He became a member of the French Academy in 1689, and about three years after of the Academy of Inscriptions and Belles Lettres. In 1700 he accompanied the archbishop of Paris, Cardinal Noailles, to Rome, and acted as his conclavista at the election of Clement XI. During this sojourn he eagerly availed himself of the oriental treasures of the Vatican. The new pope was attentive to him, and gave him the priory of Frossey in Bretagne, the only preferment which he could be induced to accept. As he was returning through Florence he was made an associate of the Academia della Crusca. His subsequent life in Paris was spent in his favourite studies. Among other works he published "Historia Patriarcharum Alexandrinorum Jacobitarum" in 1713; "Liturgiarum Orientalium Collectio" in 1716, a work of great research and high authority. He published also "Défense de la Perpetuité de la Foi" in 1708, in connection with the famous treatise of Arnauld and Nicole. Renaudot died in 1720, at the age of seventy-four. His extensive collection of oriental MSS., bequeathed by him to the abbey of St. Germain-de-Pres, is now deposited in the royal library.—J. E.
RENAUDOT, Theophraste, a French physician, born in 1584 at Loudun, studied medicine at Montpellier, and a few years after taking his degree of doctor, settled in Paris, where he became physician-in-ordinary to the king. Medicine, however, was not his chief resource, and indeed, so far as the faculty of Paris could forbid it, he was not allowed to practise the profession. In addition, therefore, to the management of a sort of pawnbroking establishment, he undertook to found a gazette in France. Richelieu, in the name of Louis XIII., gave him a patent, which was confirmed to him and his heirs by Louis XIV. The famous Gazette de France was thus founded in 1631. It was continued by his two sons, Isaac and Eusebius. Besides a continuation of the Mercure Français from 1635 to 1643, Renaudot published several biographies—Condé, Gassion, and Mazarin.—J. S., G.
RÉNÉ, the last of the dynasty of Anjou who sat on the throne of Naples, was the son of Louis II., duke of Anjou, and count of Provence. He was born in 1409, and succeeded his brother Louis III., in 1434, having previously married Isabella of Lorraine. In 1435 he laid claim to the Neapolitan sceptre, which he at last nominally obtained and held, until his rival, Alfonso of Arragon, deprived him of it in 1442. Réné escaped to Provence, and employed himself in the arts of peace. The life of this prince was marked by strange vicissitudes, and his character presented peculiar aspects. In a violent and tempestuous age he cultivated the arts of painting, poetry, and agriculture; and when he could obtain repose from the alarms of war and the strife of politics, delighted in the tranquil administration of his territories. All who have read Anne of Geierstein will remember his picture painted there, although it cannot be denied that the great novelist has to some extent unduly caricatured the original. He who received the distinctive name of "le bon Roi Réné," and died universally regretted, must have possessed some of the finer and nobler qualities of humanity. Réné expired at Aix in Provence in 1480.—J. J.
RENÉE de France, Duchess of Ferrara, the daughter of Louis XII. and of Anne of Brittany, was born at Blois, 25th October, 1510. In 1528 she was married to Hercules II., duke of Ferrara, having as her dowry the duchies of Montargis and Chartres. Not distinguished for personal beauty, but remarkable for her devotion to letters, the sciences, and the arts; she rendered her little court at Ferrara famous through the eminent men whom her patronage attracted thither. From Calvin, to whom she gave an asylum, she conceived an inclination towards protestantism, which was confirmed by Clement Marot, whom she also welcomed to Ferrara, and selected as her secretary. Various attempts were made to bring her back to the bosom of the Roman catholic church. Persuasion and persecution were both tried, and both were unavailing. On the death of her husband she returned to France (1560); and throughout the troubles of the civil war she showed the calmest courage and the most steadfast adherence to her principles. When the Duc de Guise threatened to besiege her in her castle at Montargis, she answered that she would show herself upon the walls, and see whether he and his followers would have the audacity to kill the daughter of a king. She died at Montargis, 12th June, 1575. She had two sons—Alfonso II. of Ferrara, and the Cardinal Louis d'Este; and three daughters, one of whom was the Leonora who is supposed to have been the object of Tasso's unfortunate passion.—W. J. P.
RENI. See Guido Reni.
RENKIN, Swalm, a Belgian engineer (called by French writers Rannequin or Rennequin, and in Latin Rannequinius), was born at Liége in 1644, and died at or near Marli in France on the 29th of July, 1708. He was the son of a carpenter, and was bred to his father's trade, which probably embraced the business of what would now be called a millwright; and at an early age he appears to have acquired a high position for skill in practical hydraulics: for on the recommendation to Colbert of a gentleman of Liége named Deville, he was appointed by Louis XIV., in 1675, to construct works for supplying water to the palace of Versailles. This he accomplished by means of the celebrated "machine of Marli," in which the waters of the Seine—confined by a dam, partly natural and partly artificial, of about six miles long—drove fourteen water wheels of thirty-six feet in diameter, which by means of two hundred and twenty-one forcing pumps raised a sufficient quantity of water, by three successive lifts, over the summit of the hill of Marli and into a reservoir on the top of a tower, whence it was conducted by an aqueduct to Versailles. The execution of this machine occupied seven years, and it continued at work for more than a century; but although it was a wonderful example of engineering skill at the time when it was first planned, it had become antiquated and behind the mechanical knowledge of the time, long before it was ultimately demolished, as being wasteful of power and injurious to the navigation. A full account of it is given in Belidor's Architecture Hydraulique, and in a report of a commission of the Academy of Sciences, drawn up by Prony in 1801.—W. J. M. R.
RENNEL, James, Major, an eminent geographer and military engineer, was born in 1742, at Chudleigh in Devonshire, and at the age of fifteen entered the navy, in which he served for nine years, not without distinction. At the siege of Pondicherry he volunteered to approach by night some of the enemy's vessels that had taken refuge from the English guns in shallow waters. Accompanied by one sailor in a boat, he reconnoitred the position, and obtained information that resulted in the capture of the vessels. At the age of twenty-four he quitted the navy for the East India Company's service, and was at once
