ANDRE, SEIGNEUR DES AVAUX ET DE JAVECQ, a distinguished French writer on various departments of art, was born at Chartres in 1619. In his twenty-eighth year he was appointed secretary to the French embassy at Rome, and availed himself of his sojourn in that city to cultivate the acquaintance of the greatest living exponents of art, the most notable of whom at that time was his countryman Poussin. On his return home he was promoted to a number of important offices in connection with the arts and manufactures, and was made councillor and historiographer to the king. He died in 1695. His principal works are his Entretiens sur les Vies et les Ouvrages des plus Excellents Peintres Anciens et Modernes, 1666-88, 5 vols. 4to; Principes de l'Architecture, de la Sculpture, et de la Peinture, avec un Dictionnaire des Termes propres de ces Arts, 1676, 4to; and Origine de la Peinture, 1660, 4to.

His son, Jean Francois, inherited to a certain extent his taste for the fine arts, and enjoyed considerable fame as the author of the Collection Historique des Vies et des Ouvrages des Architectes les plus Celebres; and also for his comparative view of ancient and modern Versailles.