Background
His father, January Baptist van Boisschot, was a member of the Council of Brabant and was killed in the early stages of the Dutch Revolt. His mother took refuge in Cologne, where Ferdinand was raised.
His father, January Baptist van Boisschot, was a member of the Council of Brabant and was killed in the early stages of the Dutch Revolt. His mother took refuge in Cologne, where Ferdinand was raised.
He studied law at the University of Cologne and at the University of Leuven.
In 1592 he was appointed auditor general of the Army of Flanders, a post he held until 1611. From the beginning of 1611 to the end of 1615 he was the diplomatic representative in London of the Sovereign Archdukes Albert and Isabella. In 1615 Philip III of Spain made him a knight in the order of Santiago.
He spent a further four years as resident ambassador of the Archdukes in Paris, and was appointed to the Privy Council and the Council of State in Brussels.
In 1621 he was raised to the peerage, being awarded the lordship of Zaventem, and he went on to acquire Fontaine Castle and Groot-Bijgaarden Castle, and the lordships of Nossegem, Sterrebeek and Sint-Stevens-Woluwe. In 1644 he became count of Erps.
He was appointed Chancellor of Brabant, the highest civilian function in the duchy, in October 1625, succeeding Petrus Peckius the Younger. He died in Brussels on 24 November 1649 and was buried in the Church of Our Lady on the Zavel (Notre Dame on the Sablon).
Anthony van Dyck painted a portrait of Boisschot’s wife, Anna Maria de Camudio, and is thought to have painted a now-lost portrait of Ferdinand de Boisschot himself.
A copy of the Van Dyck portrait of Boisschot is on loan to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York from the Earl of Warwick. Boisschot also commissioned from Van Dyck a painting of Saint Martin and the Beggar, a painting which he donated to the parish church of Zaventem.
