He was a prolific author of Latin religious works, one of which, Dei immortalis in corpore mortali patientis historia, was widely popular, and was translated into many languages.
William was the younger son of the Dublin-born poet and historian Richard Stanyhurst and his second wife Helen Copley, who died during his infancy, and was born at Brussels on 15 June 1601.
[1] He went on to head a sodality for students and masters of the faculties of Law and Medicine at the University of Leuven, of which Ferdinand III and Wladislaw IV became honorary members.
His Dei Immortalis in corpore mortali patientis Historia, which appeared at Antwerp in 1660, was repeatedly reprinted, both in the original Latin and in French, Spanish, Flemish, Dutch, German, Polish, and Hungarian translations.
quatuor novissima metamorphosis et novi genesis, dedicated to James van Baerlant, Antwerp, 1661 (Prague, 1700; Vienna, 1766), was translated into Czech, French, German, Italian, and Spanish.