Louis Ventenat (1765 - 1794) was a French Catholic priest and naturalist born in Limoges.
Ventenat was a member of a mission led by Antoine Bruni d'Entrecasteaux (1737-1793) in a search for explorer Jean-François de La Pérouse (1741-1788), of whom there was no news of for five years.
In captivity he became gravely ill, but was able to obtain leave to the Île-de-France, where he died soon afterwards.
Ventenat's botanical collections were preserved by Benjamin Delessert (1773-1784) at an herbarium in Geneva.
Dutch botanist Friedrich Anton Wilhelm Miquel (1811-1871) dedicated the botanical species Peperomia ventenatii in his honor.