Jean Nicot

Who was Jean Nicot?

Jean Nicot was a French diplomat and scholar.

Born in Nîmes, in the south of France, he was French ambassador in Lisbon, Portugal from 1559 to 1561.

Jean Nicot was 29 years old in 1559 when he was sent from France to Portugal to negotiate the marriage of six-year-old Princess Marguerite de Valois to five-year-old King Sebastian of Portugal.

When Nicot returned, he brought tobacco plants. He introduced snuff tobacco to the French royal court. The queen mother, Catherine de' Medici, became an instant tobacco convert. The plant was also an instant success with the Father Superior of Malta, who shared tobacco with all of his monks. More and more of the fashionable people of Paris began to use the plant, making Nicot a celebrity.

At first, the plant was called Nicotina. But nicotine later came to refer specifically to the particular chemical in the plant.

The tobacco plant, Nicotiana, also a flowering garden plant, is named after him, as is nicotine. Nicot described its believed medicinal properties and sent it as a medicine to the French court.

Jean Nicot also compiled one of the first French dictionaries Thresor de la langue françoyse tant ancienne que moderne.