He was born in Aarle, near Helmond, (although some accounts say 's-Hertogenbosch),[1] North Brabant, in the Netherlands, at that time part of the possessions of the Habsburgs.
He studied under Macropedius and later travelled to Paris, and Ferrara and studied at the University of Bologna for five years, becoming a first-rate Greek scholar and supporting himself by bookselling and acting as a scout for the printers of Basel, arranging the publication of books such as Caelius Rhodiginus's Lectiones antiquae.
This was published by Hieronymus Froben in Basel, and for many years was the basis of all existing translations from the Greek.
He later worked as a corrector for the printer Lorenzo Torrentino and obtained books and manuscripts for Johann Jakob Fugger.
This edition is described by the classicist Myles Burnyeat as "one of the most barbarously ligatured ever put into print.