biography
| name: |
Werff, Pieter Adriaansz. van der
|
pronunciation:
[van der wairf]
| sex:
| male
|
| lived:
| (1529–1603)
|
| biography:
| Dutch administrator, born in Leiden, W Netherlands, the son of a Northern Netherlands regents' family. He became a Calvinist after his father, an Anabaptist, had been executed as a heretic in 1537. After the Iconoclasm in 1566 he fled the country. He was in close touch with Orange, collecting funds for him, and in 1572 returned to Leiden where he became burgomaster and led the defence of the town in 1574, when it was besieged by Spanish troops. He remained active as an administrator of the town until 1598. |
|
|
