The glory of the Fresnels

If a single family name could be said to be associated with the history of lighthouses in France, it would undoubtedly be Fresnel, Augustin Fresnel, a scientist and ponts et chaussées engineer who died in 1827 at the age of 39.

He was the inventor of lens devices which, in the early 19th century, revolutionised the techniques of light projection. Indeed, the origin of modern lighthouses revolves around the objects whose paternity is attributed to him, glass lenses preserved like holy relics by several scientific institutions: