Karel van Mander I

Karel van Mander the Elder (1548 to 1606) was a Flemish painter, playwright, poet, art historian and art theorist, born into a noble family in Meulebeke in the County of Flanders, who established himself in the Dutch Republic in the later part of his life. His earliest works were biblical plays written while he was still in Flanders. He had at some point become a Mennonite, which made him a possible target of Catholic zealots when religious troubles drove him from Meulebeke to Kortrijk in 1580. He is chiefly remembered for the Schilder-boeck, a biographical work on Early Netherlandish painters and painters of the Northern Renaissance, and his spiritual songs, published in 1613 after his death as Bethlehem dat is het Broodhuys, extended his religious writing beyond the stage.