Jean-Baptiste Christyn

Joannes Baptista or Jean-Baptiste Christyn (1622–1690), baron of Meerbeek, was a jurist and diplomat in the Spanish Netherlands, and Chancellor of Brabant from 1687 to 1690.

Life

Christyn was born in Brussels in 1622, the son of Pierre Christyn and Marie Van den Hove. He was educated at the Augustinian college in Brussels and at the University of Douai, graduating Licentiate of Laws in 1651. He practiced as an advocate before the Council of Brabant. Between 1660 and 1667 he worked as assessor to the Drossard of Brabant. He was appointed master of requests to the Great Council of Mechelen in 1667, and privy councillor in 1671.

He was one of the representatives of Charles II of Spain at the Congress of Nijmegen in 1678, and at follow-up negotiations on the implementation of the treaty with France, held in Cambrai in 1681. In 1684 he drafted a treatise against French claims in Flanders, La Flandre défendue des fausses prétentions de la France.

In 1685 he was appointed first intendant of the supreme council of the army, and the lordship of Meerbeek that he had purchased was elevated to the status of a barony. In 1687 he was appointed Chancellor of Brabant, the highest position in the civilian administration of the Duchy of Brabant. He died in Brussels on 25 October 1690 and was buried in the Augustinian church (demolished 1893).

Christyn wrote a number of works on jurisprudence, genealogy and heraldry. Les délices des Pays-Bas: ou Description géographique et historique des XVII. provinces belgiques, a historical chorography of the Low Countries that was published after his death, has been attributed to him, but also to his nephew, Jean-Baptiste Christyn the Younger.

Works

• Tabula chronologica sive ducum Lοtharingiae , Brabantiae , Limburgi, etc. (Mechelen, 1669)
• Les tombeaux des hommes illustres qui ont paru au conseil privé du roi catholique aux Pays-Bas, depuis son institution de l'an 1517, jusqu'aujourd'hui (Leiden, 1672)
• Senatus populique antverpiensis notitia, sive septem tribus patricice antverpienses (Leuven, 1672)
• Βelgii et Burgundii gubernatores ac archistrategi (Cologne, 1675; emended edition 1677)
• Basilica Bruxellensis sive monumenta antiqua, inscriptiones et cenotaphia (Amsterdam, 1677)
• Observationes genealogica et heroicae, sive materiem nobilitatis gentilititae, jus insignium et heraldicum complectentes (Cologne, 1678), in-4°, publié sans nom d'auteur.
• Jurisprudentia heroica, sive de jure Bélgarum circa nobililatem et insignia, etc. (2 vols., Brussels, 1689)