Johannes Narssius

Johannes Narssius[1] (9 November 1580, Dordrecht – 1637, Batavia, Dutch East Indies)[2] was a Dutch physician and Neo-Latin poet, initially a Remonstrant minister.

Life

He was born Johan van Naars(s)en in Dordrecht, and studied philosophy and theology at the University of Leiden.[3] He may have lived in the house of Gerardus Vossius in 1602.[4] A disciple of Jacobus Arminius, his theological beliefs came into question in 1605.[5] In one of the early Leiden debates involving Arminius, he responded to Johannes Kuchlinus.[6]

Narssius was a subscriber to the Confessio orthodoxa of Conrad Vorstius, successor to Arminius at Leiden, and was strongly reprimanded for that by the Synod of Harderwijk.[3] He was pastor at Grave and then Zaltbommel, but lost his posts because of his combative Remonstrant approach.[4] He reportedly travelled to England to present Arminian documents to Archbishop George Abbot, meeting a very hostile reception.[7] After the general exile of Remonstrants from the Netherland he was at the Arminian colony of Friedrichstadt in Holstein.[8]

He spent time in Poland, and Sweden, where he was court poet.[9] In Riga he knew Rütger Hemsing (1604–1643), another physician-poet, and an associate of Galileo.[10] He corresponded with Ole Worm on archaeology.[11] Under the name Hans van der Ast he took letters from Frederick V, Elector Palatine in Germany to his wife Elizabeth of Bohemia, who was in The Hague.[12]

Returning to the Netherlands, he took a position with the Dutch East India Company. He travelled to the Indies, where he died.[3]

Works

Narssius belonged to the "Dordrecht School" of Latin poets, which included also the Remonstrant Samuel Naeranus.[13] He is remembered for Gustavidos sive de bello Sueco-austriaco libri tres 1632) and Gustavidos liber quartus (1634), published in Hamburg, which were Latin epic poems.[14] He also wrote a tragedy Gustavus saucius (1629 and 1632) on Gustavus Adolphus, for whom he was physician and historiographer, from 1625 or 1626.[15][16][17]

Other poetical works were:

An epitaph of his was collected in Robert Monro, Monro his Expedition with the Worthy Scots Regiment.[20] It was for John Sinclair, third son of George Sinclair, 5th Earl of Caithness, killed at Newmarke in the Palatinate, in 1632.[21]

Notes

  1. ↑ Narssius or Narsius is a latinized version of Van Naarsen, also spelled (Van) Naarssen, Naersen, or Naerssen. Forename variants include Johann, Johan, Joann, Joannes.
  2. ↑ Collection of biographies
  3. 1 2 3 4 (German) de:s:ADB:Narsius, Johannes
  4. 1 2 Gerardus Joannes Vossius (1577-1649) by C. S. M. Rademaker (1967).
  5. ↑ The works of James Arminius, D. D., formerly professor of divinity in the University of Leyden vol. 1 (1825), p. 264, footnote; Google Books.
  6. ↑ Keith D. Stanglin, Arminius on the Assurance of Salvation: the context, roots, and shape of the Leiden debate, 1603-1609 (2007), p. 123; Google Books.
  7. ↑ James Nichols citing Gerard Brandt's History of the Reformation, Calvinism and Arminianism Compared in their Principles and Tendency (1824), p. clvii; archive.org.
  8. ↑ Johann Lorenz Mosheim, Institutes of Ecclesiastical History: ancient and modern (1832 translation by James Murdock), p. 507; Google Books.
  9. ↑ Kenneth E. Hall, Stonewall Jackson and Religious Faith in Military Command (2005), p. 87; Google Books.
  10. 1 2 (German) Gero von Wilpert, Deutschbaltische Literaturgeschichte (2005), p. 79; Google Books.
  11. ↑ Bjarne Stoklund, Ethnologia Europaea, Volume 33 (2001), p. 17; Google Books.
  12. ↑ Nadine Akkerman, The Letters of Elizabeth Stuart, Queen of Bohemia, Volume II (2011), pp. 39–40 note 6; Google Books.
  13. ↑ Sibbe Jan Visser, Samuel Naeranus (1582-1641) en Johannes Naeranus (1608-1679): twee remonstrantse theologen op de bres voor godsdienstige verdraagzaamheid (2011), pp. 201–2; Google Books.
  14. ↑ Hans Helander, The Gustavis of Venceslaus Clemens
  15. ↑ Geschiedenis van het drama en van het tooneel in Nederland. Deel 1 (1903), by J. A. Worp; note 1 on p. 236.
  16. ↑ Briefwisseling van Hugo Grotius. Deel 3 (1961) (ed. P. C. Molhuysen and B. L. Meulenbroek), p. 34 note 2.
  17. ↑ Karen Skovgaard-Petersen, Historiography at the Court of Christian IV (1588-1648): studies in the Latin histories of Denmark by Johannes Pontanus and Johannes Meursius (2002), p. 440; Google Books.
  18. ↑ (Polish) Catalogue entry.
  19. ↑ Yale catalogue entry.
  20. ↑ History of Caithness , notes by James Traill Calder.
  21. ↑ Scotsmen Serving the Swede (PDF), p. 51.

External links

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