The Collaborative International Dictionary of English v.0.48:

Pallissy \Pallissy\ (p[aum]*l[-e]*s[-e]"), prop. n. Bernard
   Pallissy, the great French potter, was born in Agen, in 1509,
   and wandered as a glass and portrait painter until he married
   and settled in Saintes in 1538. While working here as a
   surveyor his attention was attracted by an enameled cup, and
   he determined to discover the process and after 16 years of
   continuous labor and experiment in which he used all his
   resources and burned the tables and floors for fuel, he
   succeeded, and though imprisoned in 1562 as a Huguenot he was
   released by royal edict and appointed "inventor of figulines"
   to the king. He removed to Paris in 1564, and through the aid
   of Catherine de Medici was saved from the massacre of St.
   Bartholomew. From 1575 to 1584 he gave a course of lectures
   on physics and natural history, demonstrating the origin of
   springs, the formation of fossil shell, and the best method
   of purifying water. In 1585, however, he was again arrested
   as a Huguenot and imprisoned in the Bastille, where he died
   in 1589. See H. Morley's Palissy the Potter. --Student's
   Cyclopedia, 1897.
   [PJC] Palkee \Pal"kee\, n. [Hind. p[=a]lk[imac]; of the same
   origin as E. palanquin.]
   A palanquin. --Malcom.
   [1913 Webster]