Adéhmar Jean Claude Barré, Count de Saint-Venant
(1797-1886)

Barré de Saint-Venant is generally recognized as the most outstanding elastician of all time.  Born near Paris, he studied briefly at the École Polytechnique and later graduated from the École des Ponts et Chaussées.  His later professional career suffered greatly from his refusal, as a matter of conscience and politics, to join his schoolmates in preparing for the defense of Paris in March 1814, just prior to Napoleon's abdication.  As a consequence, his achievements received greater recognition in other countries than they did in France.  Some of his most famous contributions are the formulation of the fundamental equations of elasticity and the development of the exact theories of bending and torsion.  He also developed theories for plastic deformations and vibrations.

From Mechanics of Materials, 4th Ed., by J.M. Gere and S.P. Timoshenko, PWS Publishing, 1997, p. 836.