Abraham Gorlaeus

Abraham van Goorle, aged 52, copper engraving by J. de Gheijn

Abraham van Goorle or, Latinized, Abraham Gorlaeus (ca. 1549 – 1608) was a Dutch antiquary of Flemish origin.

Gorlaeus was born in Antwerp as the son of Jacob Godevaertsz van Ghoorle and Willemken Heijmolen, but fled as a teenager with his brother David to the Dutch Republic. He lived in Utrecht and already in 1570 held an influential position under the employment of stadtholder Adolf van Nieuwenaar. He married Susanna Patersson, with whom he had three children in the 1580s. In 1595 he moved to Delft where he remained until his death on 11 October 1608 and where he was buried in the Oude Kerk. The philosopher and theologian David van Goorle Jr. was the son of his brother David.^[1]

Importance

Gorlaeus published Dactyliotheca, the catalog of engraved gems in his cabinet of curiosities.^[2] It was the first extensive repertory of Greco-Roman intaglio gems. Such gems had been avidly collected for the previous century, at first in Italy.^[3]

In 1609, the cabinet was purchased on behalf of Henry, Prince of Wales, an isolated early example of English interest in engraved gems.^[4] Gorlaeus' Dactyliotheca remained useful for the rest of the century; it was republished by Jakob Gronovius in 1695, as part of his Thesaurus Graecarum antiquitatum.^[5]

In his cabinet of curiosities, Gorlaeus had a collection of rare shells, which was of sufficient interest to be purchased by the States-General of the Dutch Republic as a present for Marie de' Medici, for 9000 guilders.^[6]

Works

• Dactyliotheca seu annulorum sigillarium quorum apud Priscos tam Graecos quam Romanos usus…, 1601 (Latin)
• Thesaurus numismatum Romanorum. Sive numi aurei, argentei, aerei ad familias Romanas spectantes usque ad obitum Augusti, 1607 (Latin)

Notes

1. Frans Maurits de Jaeger, Goorle, Abraham van in Nieuw Nederlandsch biografisch woordenboek, Vol. 5 (1921), pp. 209-210
2. Notably published at Antwerp by Plantin in 1609: .
3. David Jaffé, "Aspects of Gem Collecting in the Early Seventeenth Century, Nicolas-Claude Peiresc and Lelio Pasqualini", The Burlington Magazine 135 No. 1079 (February 1993:103-120).
4. Roy Strong, Henry Prince of Wales and England's Lost Renaissance (1986:199).
5. Noted in Campbell Bonner, "A Miscellany of Engraved Stones" Hesperia 23.2 (April - June 1954:138-157) p. 154; 1695 title page. Online
6. J.J. Dodt van Flensburg, "Resolutien der Generalen Staten uit de XVII eeuw", in Archief voor kerkelijke en wereldsche geschiedenissen... (Utrecht, 1839-48), vol. v, p. 8, noted in J. G. van Gelder, "Notes on the Royal Collection - IV: The 'Dutch Gift' of 1610 to Henry, Prince of 'Whalis'..." The Burlington Magazine 105 No. 729 (December 1963: 541-545) p. 542 note 7.