Elisabeth Celnart

She is the daughter of Nicolas-François Canard and Élisabeth Groujus. His father, a teacher at the Lycée de Moulins, is today known for various works in economics and law. He allowed his daughter to complete secondary education, a remarkable fact for the time.

She married a lawyer from Clermont-Ferrand, Jean-Baptiste Bayle-Mouillard, who became attorney general at the royal court of Riom. She wrote many works of various kinds there and her fame went far beyond the framework of her Auvergne province. For Pierre Larousse, "she made herself known through numerous works written, for the most part, with the aim of educating or moralizing women and young girls". She is notably the author of several "Roret manuals" made to order by their publisher Nicolas Roret.

Like her contemporary Marie Armande Jeanne Gacon-Dufour, Celnart was a prolific author and, like her, she published numerous works on rural life and domestic economy. His Complete Manual of Domestic Economy, published in 1826 and reprinted several times, contains culinary recipes, recipes for preserves and vinegar, comments on the cellar, the preparation of barrels and the care to be given to wine, notices on Muscat, Lunel wine, Malaga, absinthe, beer and kwas, methods for recognizing falsifications.

In 1834, his best-known work, Le Guide de la parfumerie, or Manuel du parfumeur, appeared. If it is taxed as soon as it is published as plagiarism, it will however be very popular, often reissued, also translated into several languages ​​and in turn widely plagiarized. Large sections are devoted to perfumes, toothpastes, cosmetics and hair care, with particular attention to their manufacture.