French hydrologist whose investigation of the origin of springs was instrumental in establishing the science of hydrology on a quantitative basis. He showed conclusively that precipitation was more than adequate to sustain the flow of rivers; thus he refuted theories traceable as far back as the writings of Plato and Aristotle that invoked some variety of subterranean condensation or return flow of seawater to account for the discharge of water in springs and rivers.

Perrault was not a scientist by profession but had been, in succession, a lawyer, a government administrator, and a writer. In his most significant scientific work, De l'origine des fontaines (1674; On the Origin of Springs), he presented a study of a substantial section of the Seine River, beginning at its source, northwest of the city of Dijon. His numerical estimates demonstrated that the annual river runoff was only one-sixth of the amount of water falling as rain or snow over the drainage basin in a year.