Bartholomeus van der Helst - Portrait of Petrus Scriverius

Petrus Scriverius, the latinised form of Peter Schrijver or Schryver (12 January 1576 – 30 April 1660), was a Dutch writer and scholar on the history of the

Low Countries The term Low Countries, also known as the Low Lands ( nl, de Lage Landen, french: les Pays-Bas, lb, déi Niddereg Lännereien) and historically called the Netherlands ( nl, de Nederlanden), Flanders, or Belgica, is a coastal lowland region in N ...

. He was born at Haarlem and was educated by Cornelis Schoneus at the

University of Leiden Leiden University (abbreviated as ''LEI''; nl, Universiteit Leiden) is a public research university in Leiden, Netherlands. The university was founded as a Protestant university in 1575 by William, Prince of Orange, as a reward to the city of L ...

, where he formed a close intimacy with Daniel Heinsius. In 1599 he married Anna van der Aar, and from 1611 to 1613, he was the headmaster of the Latin School in Duisburg, now

Landfermann-Gymnasium Landfermann-Gymnasium (LfG) is situated in the city centre of Duisburg, Germany. It is a municipal grammar school for boys and girls, and is one of the oldest schools in Germany. Founded before 1280 as Schola Duisburgensis, the school was tra ...

. He belonged to the party of Oldenbarnevelt and

Grotius Hugo Grotius (; 10 April 1583 – 28 August 1645), also known as Huig de Groot () and Hugo de Groot (), was a Dutch humanist, diplomat, lawyer, theologian, jurist, poet and playwright. A teenage intellectual prodigy, he was born in Delf ...

and brought down the displeasure of the government by a copy of Latin verses to honour of their friend, the Remonstrant Leiden pensionaris Rombout Hoogerbeets. Scriverius' poems were considered libelous and he was fined 200 guilders, but when the councilmen came to collect, Scriverius directed them to the kitchen to collect pots and pans, which were not worth enough money. His wife then directed the gentlemen to the books in the library by claiming that it was the books that caused her husband to write the poems and so proceeds from a book sale should pay for the fine on them.Anna van der Aar
on historici.nl Scriverius and his wife enjoyed a long marriage of 57 years and had at least 8 children. Their portraits were painted on the occasion of their 25th wedding anniversary by

Frans Hals Frans Hals the Elder (, , ; – 26 August 1666) was a Dutch Golden Age painter, chiefly of individual and group portraits and of genre works, who lived and worked in Haarlem. Hals played an important role in the evolution of 17th-century gro ...

. Most of his life was passed in

Leiden Leiden (; in English and archaic Dutch also Leyden) is a city and municipality in the province of South Holland, Netherlands. The municipality of Leiden has a population of 119,713, but the city forms one densely connected agglomeration wit ...

, but in 1650 he became blind, and the last years of his life were spent in his son's house at

Oudewater Oudewater () is a municipality and a town in the Netherlands. History The origin of the town of Oudewater is obscure and no information has been found concerning the first settlement of citizens. It is also difficult to recover the name of Oud ...

, where he died in 1660. He is best known as a scholar by his notes on

Martial Marcus Valerius Martialis (known in English as Martial ; March, between 38 and 41 AD – between 102 and 104 AD) was a Roman poet from Hispania (modern Spain) best known for his twelve books of ''Epigrams'', published in Rome between AD 86 an ...

Ausonius Decimius Magnus Ausonius (; – c. 395) was a Roman poet and teacher of rhetoric from Burdigala in Aquitaine, modern Bordeaux, France. For a time he was tutor to the future emperor Gratian, who afterwards bestowed the consulship on him ...

, the ''

Pervigilium Veneris ''Pervigilium Veneris'' (or ''The Vigil of Venus'') is a Latin poem of uncertain date, variously assigned to the 2nd, 4th or 5th centuries. It is sometimes thought to have been by the poet Tiberianus, because of strong similarities with his po ...

''; editions of the poems of

Joseph Justus Scaliger Joseph Justus Scaliger (; 5 August 1540 – 21 January 1609) was a French Calvinist religious leader and scholar, known for expanding the notion of classical history from Greek and Ancient Roman history to include Persian, Babylonian, Jewish ...

(Leiden, 1615), of the ''De re militari'' of

Vegetius Renatus Publius (or Flavius) Vegetius Renatus, known as Vegetius (), was a writer of the Later Roman Empire (late 4th century). Nothing is known of his life or station beyond what is contained in his two surviving works: ''Epitoma rei militaris'' (also r ...

, the tragedies of Seneca (''P. Scriverii collectanea veterum tragicorum'', 1621), &c. His ''Opera anecdota, philologica, et poetica'' (Utrecht, 1738) was edited by A. H. Westerhovius, and his ''Nederduitsche Gedichten'' (1738) by S. Dockes. He made many valuable contributions to the history of Holland: ''Batavia Illustrata'' (4 parts, Leiden, 1609); ''Corte historische Beschryvinghe der Nederlandscher Oorlogen'' (1612); ''Inferioris Germaniae . . . historia'' (1611, 4 parts); ''Beschryvinghe van Out Batavien'' (Arnheim, 1612); ''Het oude Goutsche chronycxken van Hollandt'', as editor, and printed at Amsterdam in 1663; and ''Principes Hollandiae Zelandiae et Frisiae'' (Haarlem, 1650), translated (1678) into Dutch by

Pieter Brugman Pieter is a male given name, the Dutch form of Peter. The name has been one of the most common names in the Netherlands for centuries, but since the mid-twentieth century its popularity has dropped steadily, from almost 3000 per year in 1947 to ...

. See also Peerlkamp, ''Vitae Belgarum qui latina carmina scripserunt'' (Brussels, 1822), and J. H. Hoeufft, ''Parnassus latino-belgicus'' (Amsterdam, 1819).

Marriage pendant portraits by Frans Hals

File:Frans Hals - Petrus Scriverius.jpg, Portrait of Petrus Scriverius File:Frans Hals - Anna van der Aar.jpg, Portrait of Anna van der Aar

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Scriverius 1576 births 1660 deaths 17th-century Latin-language writers Blind people from the Netherlands 17th-century Dutch historians Writers from Haarlem Writers from Amsterdam New Latin-language poets Dutch Golden Age writers Frans Hals Historians of the Netherlands