As a historian Van Meteren was special in that he was not merely a chronicler of the events of his time, but also a powerful and wealthy man who influenced those events: The van Meteren family...had fled the Netherlands for religious reasons. Van Meteren’s father, Jacob, played a key role in the publication of the first English Bible in the 1530s, and the family established itself as a pillar of the Protestant refugee community in London. As an adult, Emmanuel lived on
Lime Street, became the consul for the Dutch merchants in London, and occupied the all-important office of postmaster. Reliable mail service was an essential component of any natural history network, since specimens ranging from tulip bulbs to rhinoceros horns needed to circulate between interested naturalists. Accompanying these specimens, of course, were the letters on which the European natural history community in particular, and the Republic of Letters more generally, depended in order to thrive...[V]an Meteren’s skillful management of the post...made him indispensable. When the artist
Marcus Gheeraerts wanted to send smoked herring to
Antwerp, or
Ortelius wanted gifts to arrive at his sister’s house in London, they inevitably went through Emmanuel van Meteren and his formidable network of middlemen, merchants, sailors, and travelers to ensure that precious messages and gifts reached their destination. In 1581 he was the Consul representing Dutch merchants in London. In that year,
William the Silent, Prince of Orange, enlisted van Meteren's help in a bit of subterfuge in a larger effort to undermine the plots of
Bernardino de Mendoza,
Spain's Ambassador at the Court of Queen
Elizabeth. William enlisted a ship's captain, Willem Janszoon van Hoorn, to pretend to accept a bribe from de Mendoza; to avoid trickery, de Mendoza held van Hoorn's son as a hostage. Since trickery was indeed intended, William sent his fourth secretary, Christiaen, to sneak the boy out of the Spanish Embassy in London, at which point van Meteren concealed them and helped effect their escape. In 1599 van Meteren wrote a book titled
Belgische ofte Nederlandsche Historie van onzen Tijden, detailing the events of the first part of the
Eighty Years' War between the
Netherlands and
Spain. Some of the accounts detail events that van Meteren actually witnessed. For instance he was with
Maurice of Orange during the
siege of Zaltbommel by the Spaniards. After
Henry Hudson returned from his second voyage he related to van Meteren that there had been a mutiny in 1609, originating in quarrels between Dutch and English sailors. Van Meteren had access to Hudson's journals, charts and logbooks, and recorded these events in
Historie der Nederlanden. He also chronicled the adventures and demise of the French merchant
François Le Fort. Van Meteren is also the author of
Historia Belgica. ==Publications==