Daniel de Superville (1657-1728)
Encyclopedia
Daniel de Superville also known as Daniel de Superville père (as his son was also called Daniel), was a Huguenot
pastor and theologian who fled France
for the Dutch Republic
in 1685 and became the minister of the Walloon church
in Rotterdam. He is known particularly for his published Sermons.
His first publication was a series of 12 letters, Lettres sur les devoirs de l'église affligée ("On the Duties of the Afflicted Church"), in November 1691. In 1706 he also published a catechism
entitled Les vérites et les devoirs de la religion chrétienne ("The Truths and Duties of Religion"), and in 1718 he published the treaty Le vrai communiant, ou Traité de la sainte cène et des moiens d'y bien participer ("The True Communicant"), translated into Dutch as De ware dischgenoot (1737).
in Béarn
, in the French Pyrenees
. His great-grandfather Jean de Superville served as personal physician to King Henry IV of France
. His grandfather and father, both called Jacques de Superville, were also physicians, the former in Niort
, the latter in Saumur.
De Superville was born in Saumur and studied theology there. From 1677 to 1679 he also followed studies in theology in Geneva
. In 1683 he became a pastor of the Protestant church in Loudun
. As part of King Louis XIV of France
's persecution of Huguenots, the dragonnade
s instituted in 1681, he was charged in mid-1685 with preaching a serditious sermon, and was detained in Paris for three months to await trial. Following Louis XIV's Edict of Fontainebleau
in October of 1685, revoking the Edict of Nantes
, Daniel de Superville and 600 of his followers fled France to seek asylum in the Dutch Republic. There, he and his first wife Elisabeth de Monnery settled in Maastricht
.
He was invited to become a pastor of the Walloon churches in both Berlin
and Hamburg
but decided instead to accept an invitation to become assistant pastor of the congregation in Rotterdam. He was appointed to that position on 13 January 1686. In 1691 he was invited to become pastor of the Eglise française de la Savoye in London
. In order to keep him in Rotterdam, the local authorities offered to make him full pastor in Rotterdam instead. He accepted the position and remained pastor until he was succeeded by one of his sons (also named Daniel de Superville) on 13 September 1725.
De Superville worked to have the Protestant Church in France restored and to have the Protestant preachers imprisoned in France (the so-called galériens) freed. During the peace negotiations leading up to the Peace of Utrecht
in 1713, he travelled frequently to Utrecht
to meet with foreign dignitarities in order to secure the release of the galériens.
Surviving children were:
His son Daniel de Superville (1700-1762) succeeded him as pastor of the Walloon Church in Rotterdam.
His daughter Emilie married Pierre Humbert, a merchant from Geneva
who had settled in Amsterdam
in 1706 as a bookseller and publisher. Their son Jean Humbert de Superville
(1734-1794) was a portrait painter. Jean's son Jean Emile Humbert
(1771-1839) was a lieutenant-colonel credited with rediscovering ancient Carthage
, and his son David Pierre Giottino Humbert de Superville
was an artist and art scholar who authored the influential Essai sur les signes inconditionnels dans l'art.
Daniel de Superville's nephew Daniel de Superville (1696-1773)
, a son of his brother Jacques, was a physician who founded the University of Erlangen in 1742.
Huguenot
The Huguenots were members of the Protestant Reformed Church of France during the 16th and 17th centuries. Since the 17th century, people who formerly would have been called Huguenots have instead simply been called French Protestants, a title suggested by their German co-religionists, the...
pastor and theologian who fled France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
for the Dutch Republic
Dutch Republic
The Dutch Republic — officially known as the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands , the Republic of the United Netherlands, or the Republic of the Seven United Provinces — was a republic in Europe existing from 1581 to 1795, preceding the Batavian Republic and ultimately...
in 1685 and became the minister of the Walloon church
Walloon church
A Walloon church describes any Calvinist church building in the Netherlands and its former colonies whose members originally came from the Southern Netherlands and France and whose native language is French...
in Rotterdam. He is known particularly for his published Sermons.
Writings
Daniel de Superville is best known for his Sermons sur divers textes de l'Écriture sainte. This collection of sermons was published in three volumes, the first of which was published in 1700. It was reprinted a number of times. In 1743 a fourth volume was published, containing 12 sermons. An English translation of the Sermons was published in 1816.His first publication was a series of 12 letters, Lettres sur les devoirs de l'église affligée ("On the Duties of the Afflicted Church"), in November 1691. In 1706 he also published a catechism
Catechism
A catechism , i.e. to indoctrinate) is a summary or exposition of doctrine, traditionally used in Christian religious teaching from New Testament times to the present...
entitled Les vérites et les devoirs de la religion chrétienne ("The Truths and Duties of Religion"), and in 1718 he published the treaty Le vrai communiant, ou Traité de la sainte cène et des moiens d'y bien participer ("The True Communicant"), translated into Dutch as De ware dischgenoot (1737).
Life and career
Daniel de Superville's family originated in Osse-en-AspeOsse-en-Aspe
Osse-en-Aspe is a commune in the Pyrénées-Atlantiques department in south-western France.-References:*...
in Béarn
Béarn
Béarn is one of the traditional provinces of France, located in the Pyrenees mountains and in the plain at their feet, in southwest France. Along with the three Basque provinces of Soule, Lower Navarre, and Labourd, the principality of Bidache, as well as small parts of Gascony, it forms in the...
, in the French Pyrenees
Pyrenees
The Pyrenees is a range of mountains in southwest Europe that forms a natural border between France and Spain...
. His great-grandfather Jean de Superville served as personal physician to King Henry IV of France
Henry IV of France
Henry IV , Henri-Quatre, was King of France from 1589 to 1610 and King of Navarre from 1572 to 1610. He was the first monarch of the Bourbon branch of the Capetian dynasty in France....
. His grandfather and father, both called Jacques de Superville, were also physicians, the former in Niort
Niort
Niort is a commune in the Deux-Sèvres department in western France.The Latin name of the city was Novioritum.The population of Niort is 60,486 and more than 137,000 people live in the urban area....
, the latter in Saumur.
De Superville was born in Saumur and studied theology there. From 1677 to 1679 he also followed studies in theology in Geneva
Geneva
Geneva In the national languages of Switzerland the city is known as Genf , Ginevra and Genevra is the second-most-populous city in Switzerland and is the most populous city of Romandie, the French-speaking part of Switzerland...
. In 1683 he became a pastor of the Protestant church in Loudun
Loudun
Loudun is a commune in the Vienne department in the Poitou-Charentes region in western France.It is located south of the town of Chinon and 25 km to the east of the town Thouars...
. As part of King Louis XIV of France
Louis XIV of France
Louis XIV , known as Louis the Great or the Sun King , was a Bourbon monarch who ruled as King of France and Navarre. His reign, from 1643 to his death in 1715, began at the age of four and lasted seventy-two years, three months, and eighteen days...
's persecution of Huguenots, the dragonnade
Dragonnade
"Dragonnades" was a French policy instituted by Louis XIV in 1681 to intimidate Huguenot families into either leaving France or re-converting to Catholicism.- History :This policy involved billeting ill-disciplined dragoons in Protestant households...
s instituted in 1681, he was charged in mid-1685 with preaching a serditious sermon, and was detained in Paris for three months to await trial. Following Louis XIV's Edict of Fontainebleau
Edict of Fontainebleau
The Edict of Fontainebleau was an edict issued by Louis XIV of France, also known as the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes. The Edict of Nantes of 1598, had granted the Huguenots the right to practice their religion without persecution from the state...
in October of 1685, revoking the Edict of Nantes
Edict of Nantes
The Edict of Nantes, issued on 13 April 1598, by Henry IV of France, granted the Calvinist Protestants of France substantial rights in a nation still considered essentially Catholic. In the Edict, Henry aimed primarily to promote civil unity...
, Daniel de Superville and 600 of his followers fled France to seek asylum in the Dutch Republic. There, he and his first wife Elisabeth de Monnery settled in Maastricht
Maastricht
Maastricht is situated on both sides of the Meuse river in the south-eastern part of the Netherlands, on the Belgian border and near the German border...
.
He was invited to become a pastor of the Walloon churches in both Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
and Hamburg
Hamburg
-History:The first historic name for the city was, according to Claudius Ptolemy's reports, Treva.But the city takes its modern name, Hamburg, from the first permanent building on the site, a castle whose construction was ordered by the Emperor Charlemagne in AD 808...
but decided instead to accept an invitation to become assistant pastor of the congregation in Rotterdam. He was appointed to that position on 13 January 1686. In 1691 he was invited to become pastor of the Eglise française de la Savoye in London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
. In order to keep him in Rotterdam, the local authorities offered to make him full pastor in Rotterdam instead. He accepted the position and remained pastor until he was succeeded by one of his sons (also named Daniel de Superville) on 13 September 1725.
De Superville worked to have the Protestant Church in France restored and to have the Protestant preachers imprisoned in France (the so-called galériens) freed. During the peace negotiations leading up to the Peace of Utrecht
Treaty of Utrecht
The Treaty of Utrecht, which established the Peace of Utrecht, comprises a series of individual peace treaties, rather than a single document, signed by the belligerents in the War of Spanish Succession, in the Dutch city of Utrecht in March and April 1713...
in 1713, he travelled frequently to Utrecht
Utrecht (city)
Utrecht city and municipality is the capital and most populous city of the Dutch province of Utrecht. It is located in the eastern corner of the Randstad conurbation, and is the fourth largest city of the Netherlands with a population of 312,634 on 1 Jan 2011.Utrecht's ancient city centre features...
to meet with foreign dignitarities in order to secure the release of the galériens.
Family
He was married twice. He married Elisabeth de Monnery in France in 1683 and had two children with her. She died a few weeks after the couple settled in Rotterdam in 1686, and both children died before he remarried in 1694 to Catherine van Armeiden. With his second wife, he had seven children, of which three sons and three daughters survived him. On 18 July 1709 he, his wife and their six children were naturalized as citizens of the Dutch Republic. His wife Catherine, who had also fled to Holland from France, died in 1719.Surviving children were:
- Catharine (baptised on 18 April 1696)
- Emilie (30 October 1698)
- Daniel (13 June 1700)
- Jean (1 September 1702)
- Christine Elisabeth (8 June 1704)
- Pierre Jacques (21 September 1708)
His son Daniel de Superville (1700-1762) succeeded him as pastor of the Walloon Church in Rotterdam.
His daughter Emilie married Pierre Humbert, a merchant from Geneva
Geneva
Geneva In the national languages of Switzerland the city is known as Genf , Ginevra and Genevra is the second-most-populous city in Switzerland and is the most populous city of Romandie, the French-speaking part of Switzerland...
who had settled in Amsterdam
Amsterdam
Amsterdam is the largest city and the capital of the Netherlands. The current position of Amsterdam as capital city of the Kingdom of the Netherlands is governed by the constitution of August 24, 1815 and its successors. Amsterdam has a population of 783,364 within city limits, an urban population...
in 1706 as a bookseller and publisher. Their son Jean Humbert de Superville
Jean Humbert (painter)
Jean Humbert de Superville was a Dutch painter of Swiss and French extraction. Humbert was primarily known as a portrait painter....
(1734-1794) was a portrait painter. Jean's son Jean Emile Humbert
Jean Emile Humbert
Jean Emile Humbert was a Dutch lieutenant-colonel who can be credited with rediscovering ancient Carthage. As an agent for the Dutch government he procured vital parts of the collection of the National Museum of Antiquities in Leiden...
(1771-1839) was a lieutenant-colonel credited with rediscovering ancient Carthage
Carthage
Carthage , implying it was a 'new Tyre') is a major urban centre that has existed for nearly 3,000 years on the Gulf of Tunis, developing from a Phoenician colony of the 1st millennium BC...
, and his son David Pierre Giottino Humbert de Superville
David Pierre Giottino Humbert de Superville
David Pierre Giottino Humbert de Superville was a Dutch artist and art scholar. He was a draughtsman, lithographer, etcher, and portrait painter, and also wrote treatises on art, including the influential work Essai sur les signes inconditionnels dans l'art...
was an artist and art scholar who authored the influential Essai sur les signes inconditionnels dans l'art.
Daniel de Superville's nephew Daniel de Superville (1696-1773)
Daniel de Superville (1696-1773)
Daniel de Superville was a Dutch physician who in 1742 founded the University of Erlangen in Germany. He served as chancellor of the university until 1748. De Superville also wrote several treatises on anatomy.Daniel de Superville came from a family of French Huguenots who had fled to the...
, a son of his brother Jacques, was a physician who founded the University of Erlangen in 1742.
Further reading
- Daniel de Superville's Sermons (English translation)
- Paul Fonbrune-Berbinau, Daniel de Superville (1657-1728): étude historique. Imprimerie Ménard, 1884 / C.-P. Ménard, 1886