The entry of Fresnel: physical optics, 1815–1824

Abstract

If the word did not refer to someone who owns a shop where one buys spectacles, I would be tempted to call Fresnel an ‘optician’. Yet this would also be unfair, for he also contributed to electrodynamics (§14.2.4). Born in 1788 at Broglie in Normandy to an architect and builder, Augustin Jean Fresnel was brought up in Caen, where he studied at the local school. Entering the Ecole Polytechnique in 1804 with Binet, a year after Arago and a year before Cauchy, he passed out in 1806 to de Pronyés Ecole des Ponts et Chaussées and then worked as engineer in the Corps in road-building and similar projects in various dèpartements.