Michiel de Swaen

Michiel de Swaen
Michiel de Swaen
Born	(1654-01-20)20 January 1654 Dunkirk
Died	3 May 1707(1707-05-03) (aged 53) Dunkirk
Occupation	Poet, rederijker, surgeon
Period	17th century
Genre	drama, poetry

Michiel de Swaen (Dutch: [miˈxil də ˈzʋaːn]; 20 January 1654 – 3 May 1707) was a surgeon and a rhetorician from the Southern Netherlands.

Michiel de Swaen studied at the college of the Jesuits in his native town, where he probably got a humanist education, acquired chiefly through theatre, as in those days theatre was the foundation of a pedagogical education. After six years of schooling - three of which with a surgeon and three at an unknown place - De Swaen settled in Dunkirk (Duinkerke) as a surgeon and barber, at the same time being committed to the literary life in this city. Although in those days there were already 14 surgeons active in Dunkirk, De Swaen must have found enough patients as he complained in an occasional poem about the limited time he could spend on poetry.

The 17th century was a decisive period in the history of the Low Countries and the events of that time also considerably affected De Swaen’s own life. While the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands witnessed its Golden Age, the Southern Netherlands suffered economic decline and the miseries of war. The once prospering port town of Antwerp started to decline as a metropolis and this to the benefit of towns and cities in the Dutch Republic, like Amsterdam, The Hague, Rotterdam and Utrecht.