Casaubon, Isaac (1559–1614)

Swiss-born French classical scholar. He published editions of numerous ancient writers, including Aristotle, Theophrastus, Polybius, Theocritus, Persius, and Suetonius. His own works include the treatises De Satirica Graecorum Poësi et Romanorum Satira/On Greek and Roman Satire (1605) and De Libertate Ecclesiastica/On the Liberty – or Free Estate – of the Church (1607).

His Correspondence, in Latin, and his diary, Ephemerides, were published posthumously.

Casaubon was born in Geneva, where he became professor of Greek in 1583. In 1596 he accepted the Greek professorship at Montpellier, France, and from 1600 to 1610 he was in Paris, pre-eminent among French scholars. Henry IV gave him a pension with a promise of the royal librarianship when it became vacant, which was not until 1604. After Henry's assassination, Casaubon was forced to move to London because of his Protestant religion, where he was made a prebendary of Canterbury.