MARECHAL, PIERRE-SYLVAIN

(b. Aug. 15, 1750, Parisd. Jan. 18, 1803, Montrouge, Fr.), poet and publicist whose plan for a secular calendar, presented in his Almanach des honntes gens (1788; Dictionary of Notables), was subsequently the basis for the French Republican Calendar adopted in 1793. By profession a lawyer and librarian, Marchal was by philosophy a Materialist and an atheist. After writing some erotic poetry, he turned his talents to antireligious propaganda. He parodied the Bible in Livre chapp au Dluge (1784; Book Salvaged from the Flood) and compiled his own Dictionnaire des athes anciens et modernes (1800; Dictionary of Ancient and Modern Atheists), in which he included Augustine, Pascal, and Bossuet. In the Almanach Marchal substituted the names of famous people for those of saints. His proposed calendar divided the year into 36 decades; the French Republican Calendar divided the year into 12 months, each containing 3 decades of 10 days each, with the addition of 5 supplementary days in ordinary years and 6 in leap years.