Joachim Chreptowicz

Joachim Litawor Chreptowicz (4 January 1729 – 4 March 1812), of Odrowąż Coat of Arms, was a Polish-Lithuanian nobleman, writer, poet, politician of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, marshal of the Lithuanian Tribunal, and the last Grand Chancellor of Lithuania. He was a member of the Permanent Council, activist of the Commission of National Education, physiocrat and a vivid supporter of the Targowica Confederation. He also founded the library of the Counts of Chreptowicz in Szczorsy (now in Belarus), which was augmented by his son and contained over 10,000 volumes, including valuable collections of Polish histories from the 16th to 18th centuries.

Chreptowicz was also known in Polish apicultural circles. He expressed what were then new ideas, such as the idea that the queen bee is the only fertile female in a bee colony, that worker bees are infertile females, and that drone bees are male.