Abraham Jacob van der Aa

After a short stay at the Latin school in Leiden, where his parents lived at that time, he was sent to the Seminarium in Lingen, Germany to study the "dead languages".

[citation needed] After his return in 1810, he went to medical school in Leiden, but had to leave after his father's death.

After 1839, he moved to Gorinchem, where he wrote several reference works, including a gazetteer and a biographical dictionary, Biographisch woordenboek der Nederlanden.

[1] The Aardrijkskundig Woordenboek der Nederlanden (Geographical dictionary of the Netherlands) was a 14-volume gazetteer, published between 1839 and 1851.

Until his death in 1857 from undisclosed causes at age 64 in Gorinchem he continued working on his "biographic dictionary".