MAERLANT, JACOB VAN (c. 1235–c. 1300), Flemish poet, was born in the Franc de Burges (tradition says at Damme) between 123o and 1240. He was sacristan of Maerlant, in the island of Ost-Voorne, and afterwards clerk to the magistrates at Damme. His early works are free translations of French romances. Maerlant's most serious work in the field of romance was his Ystorien van Troyen (c. 1264), a poem of some forty thousand lines, translated and amplified from the Roman de Troie of Benoit de Sainte-More. From this time Maerlant rejected romance as idle, and devoted himself to writing scientific and historical works for the education and enlightenment of the Flemish people. These include translations of the Secreta Secretorum; a metrical paraphrase of Josephus; a translation of the natural history of Thomas de Cantimpre; and other works. In 1284 he began his magnum opus, the Spiegel historiael, a history of the world, de rived chiefly from the third part of the Speculum majus of Vincent de Beauvais. This work was completed by two other writers, Philipp Utenbroeke and Lodowijk van Velthem. Maerlant died in the closing years of the 13th century, his last poem, Van den laude van oversee, dating from 1291. His original poems include:
Die Clausule van der Bible, Der Kerken Clage, imitated from the Complaintes of Rutebeuf, and the three dialogues entitled Martijn in which the fundamental questions of theology and ethics were discussed. Maerlant was one of the most learned men of his age. and for two centuries was the most celebrated of Flemish poets.
See monographs by J. van Beers (Ghent, 186o) ; C. A. Serrure (Ghent, 1860 ; K. Versnaeyen (Ghent, 1860 ; J. te Winkel (Leiden, 1877, znd ed., Ghent, 1892) ; and editions of Torec (Leiden, 1875) by J. te Winkel; of Naturen Bloeme, by Eelco Verwijs; of Alexanders Geesten (Groningen, 1882), by J. Franck ; Merlijn (Leiden, 188o-82), by J. van Bloten; Heimelicheit der Heimelicheden (Dordrecht, 1838), by Clarisse; Der Naturen Bloeme (Groningen, 1878), by Verwijs; of Rijmbijbel (Brussels, 5858-69), by David; Spiegel historiael (Leiden 1857-63), by Verwijs and de Vries ; selections from the Ystorien van Troyen (1873), by J. Verdam.