Jean-Joseph Cérou

Jean-Joseph Cérou was born in Gignac (Lot) on April 25, 1705.^[1]

The family home, imposing with its Mansard roof, was located in the center of the village, near the grain market. It was used as a schoolhouse after the death of Doctor Joseph de Cérou on August 31, 1866, and was then destroyed in 1904. The current school was built on its site in 1905-1906. He is the son of Jean Cérou, a bourgeois from Gignac and Jeanne Chalvet.^[1] He is the older brother of Pierre Cérou, playwright and tutor of the Infante Isabella of Bourbon-Parma.^[2]

He became a doctor in medicine in Toulouse in the Pont-Neuf district, then capitoul of the same city in 1770. The privileges of the nobility being attached to the capitoulate, Joseph Cérou became Joseph de Cérou. On this occasion, he created a coat of arms for his family, featuring seven wheels (a play on his surname).

Ill, he abandoned his duties as capitoul and returned to settle in his native country. Shortly after, he was appointed judge of the Gignac (Lot) Gignac castellany in Quercy. He married Pétronille de Laval de Fassimbal. Together theyhad six children: Dominique, Joseph, Thérèse, Suzanne, Anne, and Marie-Thérèse. He died in Gignac on October 13, 1778 at the age of 73.^[2] He was buried in the church of Gignac, at his request: "I wish to be buried in the church of Gignac and in the tombs of my ancestors, and that my funeral honors be conducted simply," he wrote in his will. His nephew, Dominique Cérou, would become the first mayor of Gignac in 1790.

• Gignac municipal archives, parish registers (baptisms, deaths), and municipal meeting records.[1]
• Private archives.