Pieter Lodewijk Muller (9 November 1842 – 25 December 1904) was a Dutch historian. He published numerous works of history and also contributed nearly two hundred entries to the German Allgemeine Deutsche Biographie (''German Dictionary of Universal Biography'').

Life

Pieter Lodewijk Muller was born in

Koog aan de Zaan Koog aan de Zaan () is a town in the Dutch province of North Holland. It is a part of the municipality of Zaanstad, and lies about 11 km northwest of Amsterdam. History Koog aan de Zaan developed in the 16th century on the western bank of ...

(now in

Zaanstad Zaanstad () is a Dutch municipality in the province of North Holland, situated northwest of Amsterdam. Its main city is Zaandam. It is part of the conurbation and metropolitan area of Amsterdam. It had a population of in . Topography Popul ...

), the third son of Christiaan Muller (1813–1896) and Isabella Muller de Cercq (1814–1844). Christiaan Muller was a

Mennonite Mennonites are groups of Anabaptist Christian church communities of denominations. The name is derived from the founder of the movement, Menno Simons (1496–1561) of Friesland. Through his writings about Reformed Christianity during the Radi ...

preacher in Koog aan de Zaan and

Zaandijk Zaandijk () is a town in the municipality of Zaanstad, province of North Holland, Netherlands. It lies about 11 kilometres (6.8 miles) northwest of Amsterdam and had a population of 8,686 in 2017.Statistics Netherlands (CBS), ''Statline: Kern ...

. His mother, who came from a prosperous Dutch family, died when he was only two. The Muller name, written in older documents as Müller, reflected the family's German provenance. Pieter's grandfather, Samuel, and his great uncle, Johannes, had relocated around 1800 from

Krefeld Krefeld ( , ; li, Krieëvel ), also spelled Crefeld until 1925 (though the spelling was still being used in British papers throughout the Second World War), is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located northwest of Düsseldorf, i ...

Amsterdam Amsterdam ( , , , lit. ''The Dam on the River Amstel'') is the capital and most populous city of the Netherlands, with The Hague being the seat of government. It has a population of 907,976 within the city proper, 1,558,755 in the urban ar ...

to set up a bookshop. Pieter's uncle, Frederik Muller (1817–1881) had by 1842 taken over the business and became celebrated as an Amsterdam book dealer and publisher. A sickly child, he attended the nearby village school in Koog for as long as possible, but switched when he was nine to the French School in

. Between 1861 and 1867 he studied

philology Philology () is the study of language in oral and written historical sources; it is the intersection of textual criticism, literary criticism, history, and linguistics (with especially strong ties to etymology). Philology is also defined as th ...

and history as a student at

Leiden Leiden (; in English and archaic Dutch also Leyden) is a city and municipality in the province of South Holland, Netherlands. The municipality of Leiden has a population of 119,713, but the city forms one densely connected agglomeration wi ...

, with a particular focus on Dutch history in the 17th century, known to Dutch scholars as the country's Golden Age (''"Gouden Eeuw"''). This would remain the core of his work as an historian for the rest of his life. He received his doctorate in December 1867 for a piece of work on the history of government in the Netherlands between 1579 and 1585, which was critical period in the Eighty Years' War, After receiving his doctorate he went to Brussels where he was employed for several months gathering information for the Spanish ambassador. This was followed by a study tour lasting nearly a year which took in Berlin, Dresden, Vienna and Heidelberg. Returning home in April 1869 he settled in Haarlem, to where his father, having remarried, had moved while Pieter was away. He then took a teaching job at the Gymnasium (school) in

. In 1874 he married Dorothea (Dora) Bohn (1846–1930), daughter of the publisher Pieter François Bohn (1800–1873) and the Haarlem writer (1812–1864). That same year he enrolled temporarily in the Civil Service and took a position at the National Archives in

The Hague The Hague ( ; nl, Den Haag or ) is a city and municipality of the Netherlands, situated on the west coast facing the North Sea. The Hague is the country's administrative centre and its seat of government, and while the official capital o ...

, staying till 1877. In 1878 he was given a teaching chair in Dutch History at Groningen, which he held till 1883, which was when he switched to his alma mater,

. In 1902 he was forced by serious lung illness to give up teaching, and spent the winter by

Lake Garda Lake Garda ( it, Lago di Garda or ; lmo, label= Eastern Lombard, Lach de Garda; vec, Ƚago de Garda; la, Benacus; grc, Βήνακος) is the largest lake in Italy. It is a popular holiday location in northern Italy, about halfway between ...

. By early 1903 he appeared to have recovered sufficiently to resume his work, but the disease then came back and he returned south. He died aged 62 at

Gardone Riviera Gardone Riviera ( Gardesano: ) is a town and ''comune'' in the province of Brescia, in Lombardy. It is situated on the western shore of Lake Garda. Twin towns Gardone Riviera is twinned with: * Arcachon, France, since 1980 * Pescara, Italy, s ...

, by this time in Italy, on Christmas Day, 1904.

Evaluation

Muller's academic contribution was above all to the history of the Netherlands since independence: his various books on the Dutch Golden Age became standard works.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Muller, Pieter Lodewijk 1842 births 1904 deaths 19th-century Dutch historians Academic staff of Leiden University Academic staff of the University of Groningen People from Zaanstad