Gustave de Ponton d'Amécourt

Gustave de Ponton d'Amécourt hailed from an ancient bourgeois family bearing the surname Ponthon.{{Cite web |title=GRAND ARMORIAL DE FRANCE. TOME V |url=https://palisep.fr/bibliotheque/jougla/tome_05.pdf |access-date=2024-03-26 |website=palisep.fr}}{{Cite book |last=Charondas |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=esjRAAAACAAJ |title=Un juge d'armes au Jockey-Club |date=2000 |publisher=Intermédiaire des chercheurs et curieux |isbn=978-2-908003-16-1 |language=fr}} The lineage traced back to Augustin de Ponton (1736–1808), a commissioner of the Navy and later inspector general of the king's farms, who married Louise Maille in 1768. His parents were Jean-Baptiste de Ponton and Louise Machet de La Martinière.

File:Gustave d'Amecourt young.png

Gustave de Ponton d'Amécourt was the son of Antoine de Ponton d'Amécourt, an officer, and Marie Élisabeth Madeleine Collette de Baudicour. He married Anne-Marie Dumont de Signéville, daughter of François Dumont de Signéville and Victoire Haudos de Possesse.

File:Röm. Republik- M. Iunius Brutus und P. Servilius Casca Longus - Münzkabinett, Berlin - 5475432.jpg

File:Gustave d'Amecourt.png]]

Gustave de Ponton d'Amécourt, an erudite who studied mathematics, Sanskrit, Greek, and Latin, was a numismatist and archaeologist. He founded the French Numismatic Society and became its first president in 1865. Notably, he conducted extensive studies on Merovingian coins delivered to the Historical and Archaeological Society of Maine, of which he was a member. In 1857, he acquired the treasure of Imphy, consisting of around a hundred Carolingian deniers. In 1886, his numismatic collections were sold, and in 1881, a collection of 1,131 Merovingian coins was acquired by the Cabinet des Médailles of the Bibliothèque nationale de France.

File:Chere helice.jpg in 1863.]]

He successfully invented one of the first prototypes of a helicopter by designing his "{{Interlanguage link|Chère hélice|lt=dear propeller|fr}}" in 1861, with his friend Gabriel de La Landelle, an experimental small prototype of a "{{Interlanguage link|Plus lourd que l'air|lt=heavier-than-air|fr}}" aerostat with counter-rotating rotor with two coaxial aerial propellers, and a bicarbonate steam engine{{Cite web |title=MACHINES A VAPEUR INSOLITES |url=https://www.vapeuretmodelesavapeur.com/telechargements/machines-a-vapeur-insolites-1-.pdf |access-date=2024-03-26 |website=vapeuretmodelesavapeur.com}}{{Cite web |last=Roy |first=Thierry Le |date=2007 |title=L'hélicoptère : une invention prometteuse au XIXe siècle |url=https://www.pourlascience.fr/sr/histoire-objets/l-helicoptere-une-invention-prometteuse-au-xixe-siecle-1365.php |access-date=2024-03-26 |website=Pourlascience.fr |language=fr}} (whose boiler was one of the first uses of aluminum), inspired, among other things, by the aerial screw and the ornithopter from {{Interlanguage link|Manuscrits de l'Institut|lt=Leonardo da Vinci's manuscripts|fr}} of the 1480s, the Chinese bamboo-copter of the 4th century,{{Cite web |title=BnF - Objets dans l'objectif |url=http://expositions.bnf.fr/objets/grand/135_4.htm |access-date=2024-03-26 |website=expositions.bnf.fr}} and their early study prototypes of aerial propeller, the "spiralifers".{{Cite web |title=BnF -Les Nadar, une légende photographique |url=http://expositions.bnf.fr/les-nadar/grand/nad_284.php |access-date=2024-03-26 |website=expositions.bnf.fr}}

He coined the term "helicopter"{{Cite journal |date=2021-07-01 |title=En bref |url=http://dx.doi.org/10.3917/pls.525.0009b |journal=Pour la Science |volume=Juillet |issue=7 |pages=9b |doi=10.3917/pls.525.0009b |issn=0153-4092|url-access=subscription }} from the ancient Greek έλιξ, έλικος or 'helix' ("spiral", "propeller") and πτερὸν or 'pteron' ("wing"). This term first appeared on 3 August 1861 in a patent application in the United Kingdom, then on 16 April 1862 in an additional certificate to patent 49,077 originally filed on 3 April 1861 in France, which only mentioned the term "aircraft". By analogy with the word "navigation", he also coined with Gabriel de La Landelle the word "aviation", "derived from the verb 'avier', synonymous with flying in the air."{{Cite book |last=Gabriel : de La Landelle |url=http://archive.org/details/bub_gb_pA9-D4QETAoC |title=Aviation ou Navigation aerienne par G. de La Landelle |date=1863 |publisher=E. Dentu |others=National Library of Naples |language=French}}

Tournachon, Gaspard-Félix - Helikoptermodelle von Ponton d'Amécourt (1) (Zeno Fotografie).jpg|Prototypes of aerial propellers spiralifers.

Tournachon, Gaspard-Félix - Helikoptermodelle von Ponton d'Amécourt (2) (Zeno Fotografie).jpg|Spiralifer propeller prototypes with parachutes.

Helicopter of de La Landelle.JPG|Imaginary helicopter ship by Guillaume Joseph Gabriel de La Landelle (1863).

Hubschraubermuseum Bückeburg 2010 0019.JPG|The Albatros, an imaginary flying ship from the science fiction novel Robur the Conqueror by Jules Verne (1886).

The device was photographed by their friend Nadar in 1863 (a pioneer of aerial photography in 1858). Together, they founded the society for the encouragement of aerial locomotion by means heavier than air, in Paris, in 1863, with their famous visionary novelist friend Jules Verne, who drew inspiration from this invention to create the imaginary flying ship albatross of 30 meters long, for 37 masts, propelled by 74 double aerial propellers with electric motors and two electric motors with front and rear propellers, for his science fiction novel Robur the Conqueror of 1886{{Cite web |title=Bn-R - Aux racines du steampunk : les voyages extraordinaires de Jules Verne |url=https://www.bn-r.fr/espace-thematique/aux-racines-du-steampunk-les-voyages-extraordinaires-de-jules-verne/aux-romans-d-anticipations-d-inventions-et-d-innovations/robur-le-conquerant-1886 |access-date=2024-03-26 |website=www.bn-r.fr |language=fr}}{{Cite web |title=Recherche - Base de données Léonore |url=http://www.cite-sciences.fr/francais/ala_cite/expositions/jules_verne/divers/Jules_Verne_en_80_jours.pdf |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20061008120727/http://www.cite-sciences.fr/francais/ala_cite/expositions/jules_verne/divers/Jules_Verne_en_80_jours.pdf |archive-date=2006-10-08 |access-date=2024-03-26 |website=cite-sciences.fr}} (followed by Master of the World of 1904). The "dear propeller" contributed to the progress of future aircraft propulsion.

• Knight of the Legion of Honour (15 August 1868){{Cite web |title=Recherche - Base de données Léonore |url=https://www.leonore.archives-nationales.culture.gouv.fr/ui/#show |access-date=2024-03-26 |website=www.leonore.archives-nationales.culture.gouv.fr}}
• Knight of the Order of Saint Gregory the Great (Vatican)
• Knight of the Order of Christ (Portugal)

File:Stèle Ponton Amécourt Parc Ancien Château Trilport 1.jpg]]

A commemorative stele is erected in the park of the commune of Trilport near Paris, where he served as mayor from 1855 to 1876.{{Cite web |title=Gustave de PONTON d'AMECOURT - Trilport 1862 {{!}} Aerosteles |url=https://www.aerosteles.net/steleen-trilport-pontonamecourt |access-date=2024-03-26 |website=www.aerosteles.net |language=en}}

• Helicopter
• History of aviation
• Timeline of aviation

{{Commons}}

• Gustave de Ponton d'Amécourt, "Les monnaies mérovingiennes du Cénomannicum," in the Revue Historique et Archéologique du Maine, Le Mans, 1881–1882, volumes X, XI, and XII.
• Vte De Ponton d'Amécourt, [https://books.google.com/books?id=g4ZCAAAAIAAJ La conquête de l'air par l'hélice], Chez tous les libraires, Paris, 1863.

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Category:French archaeologists

Category:French numismatists

Category:French engineers

Category:1825 births

Category:1888 deaths

Category:Knights of the Legion of Honour