Career
He established a large trading house, based in Amsterdam and Hamburg, with connections to several royal houses in Europe. Marselis may have been born in Antwerp to a family who escaped to the Northern Netherlands before or during the siege of that city by the Spanish in 1584/5. Around 1597 and probably in Rotterdam, Marselis married Anna L"Hermite (c1577-1652), who was definitely from Antwerp and was related to the contemporary merchant Jacques L"Hermite.