Boreel is a well-known Dutch noble family, who also hold an English baronetcy. The family originally comes from the County of Flanders. History The family's recorded lineage begins with Ruffin Bourell or Rufino Borelli who lived in Lille in 1401. A trader of Italian descent, he became one of the first bankers in Ghent. He lived near St Bavo's Church (later St Bavo's Cathedral) in a stone house that still exists. Bourell died in 1443 and was buried with his wife Peronne the Senecael in the crypt of that church. Pieter Boreel (1524–1568), a merchant of oil and candles, fled to Norwich (Norfolk, England) in 1567 after participating in the Iconoclastic Fury. He tried in vain to buy his freedom of religion for three million guilders from the Governor of the Netherlands, Fernando Álvarez de Toledo, 3rd Duke of Alba. After Middelburg chose the side of William I, Prince of Orange, the Boreel family returned. Sir Jacob Boreel (1552–1636) was mayor of Middelburg and one of the founders of the Dutch East India Company (VOC). He was knighted by King James I of England in 1613. His brother Johan (or Jan?) Boreel (1557–1629) was a negotiator at the Twelve Years' Truce and was a friend of Hugo Grotius. Boreel was married to Maria Gremminck; they were the parents of Pieter and William Boreel. Pieter Boreel was until 1642 a member of the Council of the Indies, a central organ of the Dutch Empire in Asia. He left as a commissioner to Dutch Malacca, and negotiated the extradition of Ceylon from the Portuguese. Sir William Boreel (1591–1668) was appointed a lawyer for the Dutch East India Company in 1618. Since the conflicts between the British East India Company and the Dutch East India Company threatened to poison the good relations between the States General of the Netherlands and the English king James I, the two companies concluded a Treaty of Defence in London in 1619, in which the companies promised to work together and to share their trading posts peacefully. For this, he was knighted by King James I in 1622. He was Pensionary of Amsterdam from 1627 to 1649. In 1643/44, he again travelled to England, together with Johan van Reede van Renswouden, in an attempt to mediate in the First English Civil War. In 1644, he was named Baron of Vreendijk and Vreenhove in Oxford by King Charles I