Paulus Buys, heer van

Lord of the Manor

The Lordship of a Manor is recognised today in England and Wales as a form of property and one of three elements of a manor that may exist separately or be combined and may be held in moieties...

 Zevenhoven

Zevenhoven

Zevenhoven is a town in the Dutch province of South Holland. It is a part of the municipality of Nieuwkoop, and lies about 9 km northeast of Alphen aan den Rijn.In 2001, the town of Zevenhoven had 1385 inhabitants...

 and (from 1592) Capelle ter Vliet (Amersfoort

Amersfoort

Amersfoort is a municipality and the second largest city of the province of Utrecht in central Netherlands. The city is growing quickly but has a well-preserved and protected medieval centre. Amersfoort is one of the largest railway junctions in the country, because of its location on two of the...

, 1531 – IJsselstein

IJsselstein

IJsselstein is a municipality and a town in the Netherlands, in the province of Utrecht. IJsselstein received city rights in 1331. IJsselstein owes its name to the river Hollandse IJssel which flows through the city....

, Manor house

Manor house

A manor house is a country house that historically formed the administrative centre of a manor, the lowest unit of territorial organisation in the feudal system in Europe. The term is applied to country houses that belonged to the gentry and other grand stately homes...

 Capelle ter Vliet, 4 May 1594 http://home.zonnet.nl/d.van.duijvenbode/geschmin.htm) was Grand Pensionary

Grand Pensionary

The Grand Pensionary was the most important Dutch official during the time of the United Provinces. In theory he was only a civil servant of the Estates of the dominant province among the Seven United Provinces: the county of Holland...

 of Holland between 1572 to 1584.

Life

Buys was born in a wealthy family in Amersfoort

Amersfoort

Amersfoort is a municipality and the second largest city of the province of Utrecht in central Netherlands. The city is growing quickly but has a well-preserved and protected medieval centre. Amersfoort is one of the largest railway junctions in the country, because of its location on two of the...

 in the province of Utrecht

Utrecht (province)

Utrecht is the smallest province of the Netherlands in terms of area, and is located in the centre of the country. It is bordered by the Eemmeer in the north, Gelderland in the east, the river Rhine in the south, South Holland in the west, and North Holland in the northwest...

. He studied law in France and worked as lawyer at the court of Holland for a few years. In 1561, he became pensionary of Leiden. Later on he also became 'hoogheemraad' (the chief official) of the 'Hoogheemraadschap van Rijnland

Hoogheemraadschap van Rijnland

The Hoogheemraadschap van Rijnland is the oldest Water board of the Netherlands, having received its first commission to protect the land from flooding back in 1248 from William II of Holland. It conducts water control activities in the general area known as Rijnland...

' (Dutch constitutional body for the security of dikes and polders against the sea and the rivers) of Rhineland

Rhineland

Historically, the Rhinelands refers to a loosely-defined region embracing the land on either bank of the River Rhine in central Europe....

 (the area around Leiden). Pensionaries were well paid. His task was to advise the city council on legal affairs and serve as the representative of Leiden at the estates of Holland.

Paulus Buys was appointed as land's advocate of Holland in 1572 before Calvinists took the county. As representative of Holland, he vetoed the decision of the duke of Alva

Fernando Álvarez de Toledo, 3rd Duke of Alba

Don Fernando Álvarez de Toledo y Pimentel, 3rd Duke of Alba was a Spanish general and governor of the Spanish Netherlands , nicknamed "the Iron Duke" in the Low Countries because of his harsh and cruel rule there and his role in the execution of his political opponents and the massacre of several...

 to raise taxes at the estates general of the Netherlands in Brussels

Brussels

Brussels , officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region , is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union...

. Because of this, he had to flee from the Netherlands and joined Prince William of Orange

William the Silent

William I, Prince of Orange , also widely known as William the Silent , or simply William of Orange , was the main leader of the Dutch revolt against the Spanish that set off the Eighty Years' War and resulted in the formal independence of the United Provinces in 1648. He was born in the House of...

 in Arnstadt

Arnstadt

Arnstadt is a town in Ilm-Kreis, Thuringia, Germany, situated on the Gera River. It is one of the oldest towns in Thuringia and is nicknamed Das Tor zum Thüringer Wald, The Gate to the Thuringian Forest....

. Paulus Buys was Roman Catholic, but he, like many moderate Catholics, joined the rebels (Protestantism was a minority faith in Holland at that time) and secretly helped raising armies for the cause of the prince when he came back to Leiden in the same year. He refused to admit a Spanish garrison in Leiden. Leiden became a part of rebel territory still in 1572. Buys became the head of the rebel 'Raad van State' (one of the constitutional bodies of the Netherlands) in 1573, which would make him the rebel leader if William of Orange died at the siege of Haarlem

Siege of Haarlem

The siege of Haarlem was an episode of the Eighty Years' War. From December 11, 1572 to July 13, 1573 an army of Philip II of Spain laid bloody siege to the city of Haarlem in the Netherlands, whose loyalties had begun wavering during the previous summer...

. The prince did not go to Haarlem, which fell to the Spanish.

Buys was the leader of the inundations (opening of dikes to let the water of the sea in) during the siege of Leiden

Siege of Leiden

The Siege of Leiden occurred during the Eighty Years' War in 1573 and 1574, when the Spanish attempted to capture the rebellious city of Leiden, South Holland, Netherlands, and ultimately failed.-Background:...

 in 1574. The water drowned the Spanish cannons, so the Spanish had to lift the siege. He was the leader of the reconstruction of Leiden and appealed to the prince of Orange to establish the Leiden University

Leiden University

Leiden University , located in the city of Leiden, is the oldest university in the Netherlands. The university was founded in 1575 by William, Prince of Orange, leader of the Dutch Revolt in the Eighty Years' War. The royal Dutch House of Orange-Nassau and Leiden University still have a close...

. He was curator

Curator

A curator is a manager or overseer. Traditionally, a curator or keeper of a cultural heritage institution is a content specialist responsible for an institution's collections and involved with the interpretation of heritage material...

 of the university. In 1575, he went to England to try to convince Elizabeth I of England

Elizabeth I of England

Elizabeth I was queen regnant of England and Ireland from 17 November 1558 until her death. Sometimes called The Virgin Queen, Gloriana, or Good Queen Bess, Elizabeth was the fifth and last monarch of the Tudor dynasty...

 to ally with rebel Holland and the prince of Orange. Elizabeth refused.

Paulus Buys was one of the founders of the Union of Utrecht

Union of Utrecht

The Union of Utrecht was a treaty signed on 23 January 1579 in Utrecht, the Netherlands, unifying the northern provinces of the Netherlands, until then under the control of Habsburg Spain....

 in 1579, which made an end to the Union of Brussels

Union of Brussels

There were two Unions of Brussels, both formed in the end of the 1570s, in the opening stages of the Eighty Years' War, the war of secession from Spanish control, which lasted from 1568 to 1648...

, which was founded by the prince of Orange. Prince William of Orange was killed in 1584. Paulus Buys lost his mainstay and left the estates of Holland, probably because he thought that they were overly supportive of France. Buys was an advocate of the English, and he became the chief adviser of the Earl of Leicester

Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester

Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester, KG was an English nobleman and the favourite and close friend of Elizabeth I from her first year on the throne until his death...

, when the latter was sent to the Netherlands to aid the rebels with an English army. Leicester first supported Buys against political rivals, but within two months fell out with him. As Elizabeth I seemed to drawback her support for the Dutch, Leicester was convinced that Buys intrigued against him behind his back. Buys was arrested in July 1586 by the town of Utrecht

Utrecht (city)

Utrecht city and municipality is the capital and most populous city of the Dutch province of Utrecht. It is located in the eastern corner of the Randstad conurbation, and is the fourth largest city of the Netherlands with a population of 312,634 on 1 Jan 2011.Utrecht's ancient city centre features...

, to Leicester's contentment. Many cities asked for his release, but he remained imprisoned for half a year and was released after the payment of a very large amount of money as ransom. This was the end of his political career. He lost his last profession as curator of Leiden university in 1591, because of his authoritarian behaviour. He sold his possessions in Leiden and moved to IJsselstein

IJsselstein

IJsselstein is a municipality and a town in the Netherlands, in the province of Utrecht. IJsselstein received city rights in 1331. IJsselstein owes its name to the river Hollandse IJssel which flows through the city....

, where he died in 1594.

Family

His son is most likely Cornelis Buys (*1559), who inherited the manors Capelle ter Vliet and Zevenhoven

Zevenhoven

Zevenhoven is a town in the Dutch province of South Holland. It is a part of the municipality of Nieuwkoop, and lies about 9 km northeast of Alphen aan den Rijn.In 2001, the town of Zevenhoven had 1385 inhabitants...

 in 1592 - the year Paulus Buys died. Cornelis Buys was a member of the General Chamber of Auditors of the County Holland and also a court clerk

Court clerk

A court clerk is an officer of the court whose responsibilities include maintaining the records of a court. Another duty is to administer oaths to witnesses, jurors, and grand jurors...

there. It is not known when Cornelis Buys died.