Albert Burgh

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Albert Coenraadsz. Burgh (1593–December 24, 1647) was a Dutch physician who served also as mayor of Amsterdam.

Albert Burgh was born in rich brewers family. He studied medicine in Leiden in 1614 and became a doctor in 1618 in Amsterdam. In the same year he entered the city council as a strict Calvinist. He changed his view within a couple of years when he paid a fine for the famous dutch poet Vondel. (Joost van den Vondel got into trouble because of a playwright Palamedes, in which he was reminding to the beheading of Johan van Oldenbarneveldt. Oldenbarneveldt pleaded for peace with Spain and shrinking the state army). In 1629 Albert Burgh owned land in Rensselaerwyck, Albany, which he sold to the main investor Kiliaen van Rensselaer. He helped Caspar Barlaeus, a famous dutch scholar with a teaching job at the Atheneum Illustre, after he was fired in Leiden in 1619. In 1638 as one of the four burgomasters of the city he offered Marie de' Medici an Indonesian rice table and sold her a famous silver rosary, captured in Brazil.

During his life time he visited Russia twice, in order to improve trade relations. Grain was extremely important for the city's wealth and influence. Burgh died on X-mas eve in Novgorod. The corpse was moved back to Amsterdam. Dirck Tulp, who accompanied him on his trip to Moscow and married his daughter Anna, was the son of the famous surgeon Nicolaes Tulp. His grandson, a franciscan in Rome, argued with his former teacher Baruch Spinoza in a couple of curious and famous letters [1].