Gerard Boate (also Gérard de Boot, Bootius or Botius) (1604, Gorinchem – 1650, Dublin) was a Dutch physician, known for his Natural History of Ireland.
[2] Boate became a contributor to the fund under the English act of parliament of 1642, which admitted the Dutch to subscribe money for the reduction of the Irish, to be subsequently repaid by grant of forfeited lands in Ireland.
Among their descendants was the High Court judge Godfrey Boate,[3] who is chiefly remembered for the mocking elegy on his death by Jonathan Swift.
With the assent of Arnold Boate, then in Paris, the 'Natural History' was published in London in 1652 by Hartlib, with a dedication to Oliver Cromwell and Charles Fleetwood, commander-in-chief in Ireland.
[4] In his dedication, Hartlib observed: I lookt also somewhat upon the hopefull appearance of replanting Ireland shortly, not only by the adventurers, but happily by the calling in of exiled Bohemians and other Protestants also, and happily by the invitation of some well affected out of the Low Countries, which to advance are thoughts suitable to your noble genius, and to further the settlement thereof, the Natural History of that countrie will not be unfit, but very subservient.The 'Natural History' is divided into twenty-four chapters.
In a letter, dated Paris, 10 August, prefixed to the volume and addressed to Hartlib, Arnold Boate stated that his brother had contemplated three more books on the plants, 'living creatures,’ and natives of Ireland respectively.
It was again published in the first volume of a 'Collection of Tracts and Treatises illustrative of the Natural History, Antiquities, and Political and Social State of Ireland,’ Dublin, 1860.