Govert Bidloo

Antony's: 
fellow anatomist and correspondent
Birth or Baptism date: 
March 12, 1649
Death or Burial date: 
March 30, 1713

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1670 Bidloo was a student of anatomist Frederik Ruysch.

1685 Bidloo's anatomical atlas was published: Anatomia Hvmani Corporis (Ontleding des menschelyken lichaams). The portrait on the left, by Gerard de Lairesse, is from that book.

1694 Bidloo was appointed professor of anatomy and medicine at the University of Leiden, where Herman Boerhaave succeeded him after Bidloo's death in 1713.

1695 - 1702 He was the personal physician to William III, Dutch stadholder and king of England.

1696 Bidloo was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society.

1698 He wrote a letter to Leeuwenhoek that was printed separately by Henrik Kroonevelt, Leeuwenhoek's printer and bookseller, who lived next door.

1706 Bidloo visited Leeuwenhoek. Later that evening, Leeuwenhoek wrote a letter to him and later excerpted it in a letter to the Royal Society.

Bidloo was also a poet and playwright. In 1686, Bidloo wrote the libretto for the first-ever Dutch opera, Johan Schenck’s Ceres, Venus en Bacchus.

It seems clear that Bidloo and Leeuwenhoek knew each other. Perhaps Bidloo was one of those unnamed gentlemen who often visited Leeuwenhoek and looked through his lenses.