Nicéron was born in Paris, a relative of the mathematician and Minim friar Jean François Niceron.
[1] Nicéron taught rhetoric in the college of Loches, and soon after at Montargis, where he remained ten years.
His aim was to put together, in a logically arranged compendium, a series of biographical and bibliographical articles on the men who had distinguished themselves in literature and sciences since the time of the Renaissance.
[2] After eleven years Nicéron published the first volume of his monumental work under the title of "Mémoires pour servir à l'histoire des hommes illustres de la république des lettres avec le catalogue raisonné de leurs ouvrages" (Paris, 1727).
[2] Louis Delamarre the author of Nicéron's biography in the Catholic Encyclopedia states it has been said that "Mémoires" lacks method, and that the length of many articles is out of proportion to the value of the men to whom they are devoted, but the work does contain a great amount of information that could hardly be obtained elsewhere.