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Early life

Born in Delft during the Dutch Revolt, Grotius was the first child of Jan Cornets de Groot and Alida van Overschie. His father was a man of learning, once having studied with the eminent Justus Lipsius at Leiden University, as well as of political distinction. His family was considered Delft patrician as his ancestors played an important role in local government since the 13th century.

Jan de Groot was also translator of Archimedes and friend of Ludolph van Ceulen. He groomed his son from an early age in a traditional humanist and Aristotelian education. A prodigious learner, Grotius entered Leiden University when he was just eleven years old. There he studied with some of the most acclaimed intellectuals in northern Europe, including Franciscus Junius, Joseph Justus Scaliger, and Rudolph Snellius. At age 16 (1599), he published his first book: a scholarly edition of the late antique author Martianus Capella 's work on the seven liberal arts, Martiani Minei Felicis Capellæ Carthaginiensis viri proconsularis Satyricon. It remained a reference for several centuries.

In 1598, at the age of 15 years, he accompanied Johan van Oldenbarnevelt to a diplomatic mission in Paris. On this occasion, the King Henri IV of France would have presented Grotius to his court as "the miracle of Holland ". During his stay in France, he passed or bought a law degree from the University of Orleans. In Holland, Grotius earned an appointment as advocate to The Hague in 1599 and then as official historiographer for the States of Holland in 1601. It was on this date that the States of Holland requested from Grotius an account of the United Provinces’ revolt against Spain; Grotius is indeed contemporary with the Eighty Years' War between Spain and the Netherlands. The resulting work, entitled Annales et Historiae de rebus Belgicis, describing the period from 1559 to 1609, was written in the style of the Roman historian Tacitus and was first finished in 1612. The States however did not publish it, possibly because of the way the work resonated with the politico-religious tensions within the Dutch Republic (see below).

His first occasion to write systematically on issues of international justice came in 1604, when he became involved in the legal proceedings following the seizure by Dutch merchants of a Portuguese carrack and its cargo in the Singapore Strait. Throughout his life Grotius wrote a variety of philological, theological and politico-theological works.

In 1608, he married Maria van Reigersberch; they had three daughters and four sons.