Nicasius Hesius (Nicasius Joannis Adrianus/Nicasius van Heeze/Nicasius Jans Adriaensz., ca, 1515-1572)

Nicasius Hesius (Nicasius Joannis Adrianus/Nicasius van Heeze/Nicasius Jans Adriaensz., ca, 1515-1572) OFM. Dutch friar. One of the so-called 19 martyrs of Gorcum, hanged by the Protestant Gueux in July 1572 in Gorcum (Gorinchem), with ten other Friars Minor, four secular priests and other religious. He had been born in Heeze (Northern Brabant) in a relatively well-to-do family, either in or around 1515, or about seven years later, in 1522. His oncle was Dirk van heeze, secretary of Pope Adrian VI and later canon in Liège. Nicasius studied from August 1530 onwards at the University of Louvain. Following a two/three years artes course, he studied theology at the Pope Adrian college until 1539 or after. Was ordained priest and probably afterwards entered the Friars Minor in Louvain. Worked for a while in Leiden and Haarlem, where he became confessor of teriary sisters in 1561. In 1572, he worked in Gorkum (Gorinchem), which in that year was attacked by the Protestant Gueux. two weeks later, in the night of 8-9 July, Nicasius and the others were hanged slowly, after much additional mistreatment. He was beatified by Pope Clemens X and canonized by Pius IX on June 29 1867. Nicasius was apparently an overly refined preacher with a mystical bend and translator of Latin devotional texts. A number of these texts circulated in the later sixteenth and early seventeenth centuery. Gulielmus Estius, author of tyhe Historiae Martyrum Gorcomiensium libri quatuor (Antwerp: J. Moerentorf, 1604) suggested that he had in his possession a number of sermons and other booklets (vele boeckskens). Most of these works were apparently destroyed with the bombardment of Brussels in 1695, The only known published translation of his hand is the Heymelicke Spraecke , which is a close translation of the Soliloquium of the Windesheim canon Gerlach Peters.

Works

• Sermons & other edificatory booklets. Lost? Gulielmus Estius, author of tyhe Historiae Martyrum Gorcomiensium libri quatuor (Antwerp: J. Moerentorf, 1604) suggested that he had in his possession a number of sermons and other booklets (vele boeckskens). Most of these works were apparently destroyed with the bombardment of Brussels in 1695.

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• De heymelicke Spraecke van den Eer. Gerlacus Peterssen (Utrecht: Coenraet Heericx, 1580). Subsequently, Jan van Gorcum amended this translation to make it more readable. This new version was issued for the first time in 1613 (and possibly as early as 1597 and repeatedly thereafter as: De innighe alleensprake ('s Hertogenbosch: Anthoni Scheffer, 1613/1621 2x/Antwerp: Hieronymus Verdussen/Ghent: Jan vanden Kerckhove, 1633

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• Antwerp: Arnout van Brakel, 1644/Ghent: Michiel Maes, 1700).

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Literature