BARTAS, GUILLAUME SALLUSTE du. - French poet, b. at Montfort near Auch in 1544, d. in Paris in 1590. A Huguenot of tolerant disposition, he served Henry of Navarre, the future Henry IV, in several diplomatic missions.
In his principal work *La première semaine*, which treats of the creation of the world, he departed almost entirely from classical inspiration, seeking originality of poetry in biblical lyricism which he developed following the footsteps of those in France who had previously attempted scientific poetry, from Ronsard to Scève, to La Boderie, to Peletier. In the *Seconde semaine* (1608), left incomplete and in which he deals more particularly with humanity, he refines and expands the scientific assertions of the *Première*. Animated by sincere religious enthusiasm, he subordinated poetry to the demonstration of divine truths and science to morality. Generally pedantic and prolix (though not without fine passages), bombastic and verbose, the work of du B., which received commentaries from both Catholic and non-Catholic theologians, was soon forgotten in France; in compensation, however, it was popular and admired in Protestant countries by major writers, from Milton to Byron to Goethe, who extolled it enthusiastically.
A recent edition has appeared edited by U. T. Holmes, *The Work of G. de S. sieur du B.* (The University of North Carolina Press 1935), which is prefaced by a critical study.