Franciscus Sonnius was a theologian during the time of the contrareformation, an advisor of the pope and the first bishop of Bois-Le-Duc and later of Antwerp. His real name was Van de Velde, but in later years he called himself after his native place, Zon

Zon

Żoń is a village in the administrative district of Gmina Margonin, within Chodzież County, Greater Poland Voivodeship, in west-central Poland. It lies approximately south-east of Margonin, south-east of Chodzież, and north of the regional capital Poznań....

 in Brabant

Duchy of Brabant

The Duchy of Brabant was a historical region in the Low Countries. Its territory consisted essentially of the three modern-day Belgian provinces of Flemish Brabant, Walloon Brabant and Antwerp, the Brussels-Capital Region and most of the present-day Dutch province of North Brabant.The Flag of...

. He came from the same noble family as philosopher Heymeric de Campo. It has three golden mill-irons in their coat-of-arms, a sign that is depicted on the chair of the first bishop in the cathedral of Antwerp.
He went to school in 's-Hertogenbosch and Leuven

Leuven

Leuven is the capital of the province of Flemish Brabant in the Flemish Region, Belgium...

, and afterwards studied medicine for a time, then theology; in 1536 he received the licentiate and in 1539 the doctorate in theology.