Siger van Gent and Oda Berthout van Grimbergen:

Progenitors of the van Broeckhuysen and van Swalmen Lineages

 

van Broeckhuysen-van Swalmen

Introduction

This is a long but important post. It's not as well organized as I'd prefer due to changes I made as I made new connections after writing much of it, but for now it'll have to do, and as a whole it should be coherent enough. 

In in the section on Jan Zweynen Willems in H. den Hertog's 1986 GENEALOGIE VAN DE FAMILIE HERTOCH, HARTOCH, DEVENTER UIT DE VIJFHEERENLANDEN, den Hertog said that Jan Zweynen Willems, the son of Willem Ottens, “belongs to the well-to-do trading class. In a few deeds it appears that he has contacts with Antwerp. Does this point to ancestors who come from Flanders? The Zweynen's name appears to be more common there.”

I'll give evidence here showing that den Hertog's supposition was probably true, and that it came through the van Broeckhuysen and van Swalmen lineages, meaningof course that those lines were also originally Flemish. The Rijswijk Sweym line was also Flemish, having come from the van Swalmen that moved to Holland in the early 1300's.

In my previous posts I've already speculated that the Rijswijk Sweym line and the Swaim/den Hartog line from the land of Arkel had branched from the van Swalmen line, but it was only after I reently determined that the van Broeckhuysen line was from Ghent and Grimbergen and Antwerp and Saint-Omer (then part of Flanders) that everything fell into place like missing puzzle pieces.

Here's my hypothesis in brief. The man who became known as Seger van Swalmen was born as Siger van Gent, the son of Siger III, burggraaf of Gent (Ghent) and Beatrix de Houdain (Houdain being the French form of Heusden, but this Heusden being the one on the easter side of Gent, inside the Highway 84 ring. Siger's wife was Oda van Grimbergen (north of Brussels), the daughter of Arnold III Berthout van Grimbergen and Sophia van Altena van Heusden (the Altena being the one in today's North Brabant just south of Gorinchem rather than the one in Germany, and this Heusden probably meaning the one in North Brabant).

Siger van Gent was the second of three known sons, was a knight, and moved his family to Broeckhuysen across the Maas from Arcen. This would likely have been sometime within the 1220's through the 1260's. I don't know how he obtained Broeckhuysen and I'm not even sure whether at that time Broeckhuysen was part of Gelderland, Brabant, or the County of Kessel, but probably the latter. This is something that needs more research. I also don't know if the place was already named Broeckhuysen or if it was an estate that came to be known as Broekchuysen only after Siger and Oda moved there. If that's the case, then my guess is that Siger and Oda's son Johan had probably married a daughter of Willem III van Bronckhorst. Gijsbert III van Bronckhorst (1183-1241) married Kunigunde van Oldenburg (1187-1260), and Bruchhausen was one of the names some of the the von Oldenburg family used. Possibly Broeckhuysen was a wedding gift to Johan. This part of the story is less certain than other parts, but it isn't as essentiall to the proof of the van Broekhuysen origin as I'd first assumed.

The lordship of Swalmen was obtained from Engelbert van Horne, lord of Goor (1196-1271), some time before his death, or possibly as a bequest on his death if Johan van Broeckhuysen's son Seger had married one of Engelbert's daughters. Seger's brothers were Johan van Broeckhuysen, Willem van Broeckhuysen and Giselbertum van Swalmen. Since their father Johan had probably been born in Gent, these brothers were the first of their lines to have been born in Limburg and they may have had strong ties to Gent and may have identified as Flemings as much or more than they did as Limburgers.

Giselbertum van Swalmen probably married a daughter of Jacques (Jacob) van de Werve, burgmeester of Antwerp, Jacob's father, and moved to Rijswijk to the “te Werve” estate and started the “Rijswijk Sweym” line. His son Gijsbert married Clementia van Foreest, whose brother Jan Herpertsz van Foreest (1289-1348) had married Aleid d'Avesnes; Aleid had previously been married to Wolfert II van Borselen, lord of Veere, Zeeland, and whose daughter Sybille had married Philip V van Maldegem, kastelein and lord of Maldegem (east of Brugge). So Flanders was well represented in the extended family with van de Werve (Antwerp), Sweym (Gent & Grimbergen) and Borselen (Maldegem).

Meanwhile the van Broeckhuysens and van Swalmens thrived in Limburg, The origin of Dirck van Oist is unclear, but he was at least related to the van Swalmens by marriage, Robijn van Swalmen calling him his neef, meaning either nephew or cousin. I think that Robijns characterization of Dirk van Oist was probably literal, and that Dirck van Oist was Robijn's nephew through being a son of Robiijn's brother Gerard Vosken van Swalmen (mentioned 1326-1368) and Gerard's wife Guda van Elmpt. Whether or not Dirck van Oist was a van Swalmen through his paternal line, he was somehow closely related to the van Swalmens and he bought the lordship of Swalmen from Robijn after Robijn had obtained it on the death of his brother Werner Vosken van Swalmen.

Otto Gerrits van Oist was probably a grandson of Dirck van Oist and Felicite d'Oupeye through an unknown son named Gerard/Gerrit, but this is definitely speculation. Unfortunately the evidence for the most critical person in the Swaim/den Hartog line is also the weakest (and this may have been intentional if the family had wanted to distance itself from Otto Gerrits' van Oist's shameful attack on Utrecht and his subsequent execution).

Otto Gerrits van Oist left Limburg and moved to the Land of Arkel, possibly to Utrecht to live with Willem van Gent (1380-1451), apparently a schepen in Utrecht, or possibly to Giessen-Oudkerk of which Arent (Arnout) van Gent was now lord (Arent was a 1^st cousin once removed of Willem). Arent had just become lord of Giessen-Oudkerk in 1434, and we can speculate that Otto Willems may have stayed there after leaving Limburg; Giessen-Oukerk is about 6 miles west of Gorinchem. Willem van Gent had in 1413 bought the 28-morgen property and had kept it until he sold in in 1451 to Jan Hendriksz Knobbout van Os.

Based on her name, her dates of birth and death, her father, and her position in the family tree, I believe that it's likely that the mother of Gerrit Ottens and Willem Ottens (and thus presumably the wife of Otto Gerrits van Oist) was probably Catharina de Hertoghe, vrouwe van Duyst (1410-1467). Obviously her name “de Hertoghe” would thus be the origin of the name “den Hertog” (in all its variations) for the many branches that now use that name. In the Geni tree she's shown as married to Simon IV van Dammartin, lord of Herbaix, Golart, Huy, and Morchoven (1400-1478. He was from Brussels, and if Catharina was first married to Otto Gerrits van Oist, she was probably happy to move with him to Brussels to get away from the gossip regarding her husband's execution in Utrecht. Did she take Gerrit and Willem with her, or leave her with a relative in the Land of Arkel? At this time Arent (Arnout) van Gent was lord of Giessen-Oudkerk, located 6 miles west of Gorinchem, but was he a close enough relative to take such a responsibility? They were very young, so most likely they would have gone with her to Brussels.

The first mention of Willem Ottens was in 1484, when he would have been close to 50 years old—thus, it's possible that he and his brother were living in Brussels for most of their childhood, and this would explain the lack of any records mentioning them or their mother. It apparently isn't known how Willem Ottens and his brother Gerrit had first obtained the land they owned in Lang Nieuwland, but it's probable that at least some of it had come from Willem van Gent, as he had owned the 28-morgen property until 1451.

This is my current hypothesis for the origin of the Swaim/den Hartog line. It builds on my earlier hypotheses that Otto Gerrits van Oist was the father of Gerrit and Willem Ottens, and that the Rijswijk Sweyms was a branch of the van Swalmen family. What's new is the discovery that Seger van Broeckhuysen was almost certainly Seger van Gent, and this discovery actually ties everything together very nicely. Of course it's possible that some of this will turn out to be incorrect, or even all of it, but at least the hypothesis that Seger van Swalmen was Siger van Gent provides a new angle from which we can look at the evidence. Almost forty years ago H. den Hertog suspected that the den Hertog family might have been Flemish, so it really shouldn't be surprising to discover that they actually were.

How I Came to Believe that Seger van Swalmen was Siger van Gent

I was looking at the Geni.com family tree for the supposed early ancestry of the van Broeckhuyen/van Swalmen line for a idea I was pursuing about potetential Hungarian ancestry not only in the Swaim/den Hartog line, but among the Dutch in general, particularly among the nobles families. This will the be the subject off a future post, but whlle I was looking at the family tree for this reason I became curious about the supposed marriage of Seger van Broeckhuysen to an unknown daughter of Dietrich von Ahr-Hochstaden and Luitgard von Dagsburg, and also to Johan van Broeckhuysen's supposed marriage to Jutta Praet von Randerath-Randerode. I couldn't find any sources to substantiate these supposed marriages. So I wondered if it was possible to discover the actual van Broeckhuysen ancestry.

To do this I first went back to the Roermond archive entries provided in Loe Giessen's website (loegiessen.nl) and paid closer attention to some of the entries that I had before paid less attention to. There were two entries that struck me as particularly important: a 1372 entry in which Werner Vosken van Swalmen was bequeathed a property called “zu Lipp” by the Archbishop of Cologne, and a 1381 entry in which Robijn van Swalmen, in order to sell the lordship of Swalmen to Dirck van Oist, had to obtain permission from the allodial title holder of Swalmen, who at that time was Johan, the “lord of Sevenborne van Kranendonck and Hoeps”

I also followed up on two other routes of inquiry: the source of the name Broeckhuysen and the symbolism of the van Broeckhuysen/van Swalmen coat of arms (wapenschild).

I used various sources of varying degrees of quality that varied from strong (transcriptions of primary sources) to good (secondary sources from serious researchers) to variable (crowd-source family trees such as hat of Geni.com). Although I assume that a serious genealogist would even consider a crowesource family tree as serious, in my experience they are extremely useful, although they have to be approached critically. The information in such tree was placed there by thousands of people of varying degrees of ability and thoroughness. Most entries in such a tree aren't properly sourced and usually can't be tracked back to the person who placed it there. However, much of the nformation is accurate and came from primary sources or sources such as the Foundation for Medieval Genealogy website (fmg.ac), which is very well sourced and of high quality. However, some entries are relationships are merely speculative and aren't supported by the quality of data that should required to be to be part of the tree, such as the purported marriage between Seger van Swalmen and NN von Ahr-Hochstaden. For a family tree to have this relationship, it should be supported by a specific document that states that the marriage took place, or at the very least by other overwhelming circumstantial evidence, or at the very least it should be labelled as speculative and uncertain. But despite the bad entries, the utility of such crowdsource trees is that they allow you easily to see relationships, and to alternate views between an ancestry view that shows only direct ancestors and the more general view that allows you to also see descendants and collateral relatives.

The dates that I use in this post were often taken from the Geni tree, and many or most of those dates are only approximations, particularly the years of birth. In dealing with so many people, I just use these dates without worrying about their exact accurarcy, but it should be understood that unless otherwise discussed, the dates might just be approximations.

The van Broeckhuysen-van Swalmen Genealogy

Neither the Geni.com genealogy nor the GenWiki Limburg genealogy is quite correct for the 3^rd generation, but taken in conjunction and with the Roermond archives, this is the first 3 generations of the van Broeckhuysen-van Swalmen genealogy:

                                                 Generation One

Seger van Broeckhuysen (mentioned 1228-1268), knight

                                                Generation Two

Johan van Broeckhuysen (mentioned 1246-1250), knight

                                                Generation Three

Willem van Broeckhuysen (mentioned 1270-1290) knight & lord of                          Broeckhuysen

Seger van Swalmen (mentioned 1271-1286) knight and 1^st lord of Swalmen

Johan van Broeckhuysen 

Gilselbertum van Swalmen (mentioned 1273)

There's an entry from Swolgen dated 6 July 1321 which states that the knights Wilhelm van Swalmen and Johan van Bruchusen were the brothers of Siger van Bruchusen. In this case, Siger van Bruchusen was probably the same person as Siger the “Sigerus miles de Swalmen” mentioned 5 September 1272, so likely Johan was the older brother and remained in residence in Broeckhuysen, while Wilhelm and Siger had moved to Swalmen.

Giselbertum van Swalmen isn't in the GenWiki Limburg genealogy, but in his Geni.com page a source is given for his existence: “Giselbertum wordt vermeld in 15-4-1273 als canonnicus leoddiensis akte van abdij van Thorn samen met Johannem de Renneberg.” I haven't seen this archive entry, but there's no reason to believe it's not valid.

The Geni.com tree also shows a Sophia van Broeckhuisen (1230-1300) who married Eustachius van Braeckel, but it's unsourced and I haven't researched this.

The Geni.com tree shows that Seger van Broeckhuysen was married to NN van Ahr, and that Johan van Broeckhuysen was married to Jutta Praet von Randerath-Randerode, but neither of these are given sources. Jutta Praet von Randerath is mentioned in the fmg.ac website, but there's no mention of a marriage to anyone. I suspect that there's no actual documentary source for either of these marriages.

The Lordship of Swalmen

A Roermond archive entry dated 18 October 1381 said: “Robijn van Swalmen, canon at Sint Servaes in Triecht, certifies that he inherits the goods belonging to the Huijs in Swalmen, and the fief called the Toll on the Meuse at Asselt located near Rurmunde that he had previously received from his lord Johan heer van Sevenborne van Kranendonck and van Hoeps, dedicated to his lord by means of this letter, with the request that he lends this to his [Robijn's] nephew Mr Didderich van Oijss, knight, and his wife Felicitas and their heirs.”

This formality of request-and-approval was required when the holder of a feudal loan property transferred it to someone else, the legal owner of the allodial estate being some superior lord. So what this entry tellls us is that the van Swalmen family had originally obtained the lordship of Swalmen from some ancestor of Johan van Sevenborne van Kranendonck.

The problem is that we don't know which ancestor. However, we do know that in 1272 there was a person named Siger van Swalmen, so we know that the purchase of Swalmen must have occurred some time in or before 1272.

Therefore, I searched the Geni tree for “cranendonck” since I was familiar with that name and knew it was usually spelled with a “C” rather than a “K.”

So I searched the Geni.com crowdsource family tree for “Cranendonck,” which is the more common spelling of the name. By the late 1300's it appears the Cranendoncks have moved to Dordrecht and Ridderkerk in Holland, but Roelof Cranendonck van Emmichoven ( -1388) was born in Cranendonck in Brabant and died in Maarheeze. Crananendocnk and Marheeze are located about 2 miles apart, both being located about 25 miles northwest of Swalmen and about 6 miles north of Hamont Achel.

(I'd mentioned in a previous post that Achel and Hamont were located in the land of Grevenbroeck in the Land of Loon, and that Robrecht van Arkel (1345-1412) was the Lord of Grevenboeck. This is later than the purchase of Swalmen, but it's intersting to note that Robrecht van Arkel was lord of Grevenbroeck at the same time that Robijn van Swalmen was selling Swalmen to Dirck van Oist. Thus, the Cranendonck family must have known Robrecht van Arkel, and probably quite well, and the Geni tree in fact shows that Jan Roelofs's son married married a great-granddaughter of Floris Laurensz van Dalem (van Heukelom)(1336-1375). Robrecht van Arkel was the bastard son of Robrecht van Arkel, the son of Jan III van Arkel, lord of Arkel (1275-1324). Robrecht the lord of Grevenbroeck's mother was Aleid van Heukelom and Asperen (1320-1366), the daughter of Otto I van Heukelom, lord of Asperen (1285-1345), so here we have a very strong potential connecion between the van Arkel van Heukelom family and the van Swalmen family at about the time period just before Otto Gerrits van Oist would have been born in the early 1400's. This was notable because it was one connection that might help explain Otto Gerrits van Oist's connection to Jan van Heukelom in van Heukelom's botched raid on Utrecht that ended in Otto Gerrits' death. That Jan van Heukelom was probably Jan van Heukelom III (1390-1465))

Here's what the Geni entry says about Roelof Jansz Cranendonck:

He was pastor of Maarheeze from 1368 to 1388. The name CRANENDONCK indicates an origin from Brabant, where the former barony Cranendock can be found. A seigneury that appears in the sources from the beginning of the 13th century as the possession of a branch of the family HOORNE. The barony Cranendonck is located near Soerendonk and Budel south of Eindhoven.

Maarheze is located in the heerlijkheid of Cranendonck, which also includes Eindhoven. There were large ecclesiastical possessions in the lordship of Cranendonck, so the pastor was an important partner for the secular lord. Seals in 1386 as council of the lord of Horne, Altena and Kurtersem.

According to sources on the internet, Roelof is said to be a bastard son of one of the sons of Willem II van Cranendonck by a daughter from the family of Emmichoven. His coat of arms (after him also used by the Cranendoncks of IJsselmonde) supports this theory: it is the coat of arms of Horne (Willem II's grandfather was Engelbert van Horne: 3 [...]horns) combined with the coat of arms of Emmichoven from the land of Altena (2 averted salmons). Given the date of death of Willem III van Cranendonck, Diederik van Cranendonck is the most likely father of Roelof....

Roelof had at least 3 sons, probably by 3 different women (he was not married as a pastor). His son Edmond was commander of the Order of Malta in 1455.

He was pastor of Maarheze from 1368 to 1388. The barony Cranendonck is located near Soerendonk and Budel south of Eindhoven. A seigniory that appears in the sources from the beginning of the 13th century as the property of a branch of the family of the count HOORNE.

The Geni.com tree shows Roeloff's father as Diederick van Horne, lord of Eindhoven and Cranendonck, who was the son of Willem II, lord of Cranendonck and Emmichoven, who was the son of Willem van Horne (bef. 1243-1289). The Geni entry for Willem van Horne says that he was the first to call himself “Cranendonck” and that the genealogy of the van Horne family is “verre van duidelijk” (“far from clear”).

The Geni tree shows Willem I van Horne as being married to Katharina van Kessel (1242-1306), and we know that later the van Broeckhuysen and van Swalmen families also married van Kessels. Katharina's father is named as Wilhelm van Kessel, Count of Kessel-Gravenbruch.

The Geni tree shows that Willem I van Horne's father was Engelbert van Horne, lord of Goor (1196-1271). Given the dates, it thus appears likely that it was Engelbert van Horne or his son Willem I who must have owned Swalmen and gave or sold it to Seger van Swalmen in fief.

In 1279 Count Hendrik V van Kessel sold his possessions west of the Maas to Count Reinald of Guelders, and after he died in 1304 his possession east of the Maas went to the Count of Jülich between 1304-1307. Whether or not Swalmen had once been within the jurisdiction of the County oof Kessel, it appears that by at least 1271 it was owned by Engelbert van Horne and then passed to his son Willem I.

We don't know the identity of the wife of Seger van Swalmen, but it likely wan't a van Kessel because two of Seger's children married van Kessels.

Margaretha van Altena

Hendrick van Horne's wife was Margaretha van Altena (1165-1207). Margaretha is the mother of Engelbert van Horne and grandmother of Willem I van Horne van Cranendonck.

Hendrick van Horne died in 1197 and Margaretha remarried to Otto von Ahr, heer van Wickrath (1145-1225). Otto von Ahr-Wickrath was the son of Otto II von Ahr-Wickrath (1120-1162) and Adelheid von Hochstaden (1120-1170).

Otto von Ahr-Wickrath and Margaretha van Altena had two children together, both daughters. They were:

Bertha van Wickerode (1202- ) married to Herbaren II Florisz van der Lede (1201-1248)

Elisabeth von Ahr-Hochstaden (?) married to Goswijn II van Born (1214-1288)

Herbaren II Florisz van der Lede was the great-great grandson of Jan III van Arkel (1065-1118), supposedly a crusader. He was also the 4x great-grandfather of Jan III van Arkel van Heukelom (1390-1465) who organized the military expedition against Utrecht for which Otto Gerrits van Oist was executed.

Goswijn II van Born was supposedly a Teutonic Knight who probably lived in Born, located 20 miles upstream (south) of Swalmen. Seger van Swalmen and Goswijn van Born were acquainted with each other, which we know from a Roermond archive entry dated 5 September 1272: “Sigerus miles de Swalmen and Goswinus lord of Born settled on behalf of the now deceased Count Otto II of Guelders a dispute concerning the right of forgiveness of the parish church in Venlo.” So they not only knew each other, but were acting as agents of Count Otto II of Guelders.

So thus far we know that the van Broeckhuysens had obtained Swalmen from either Engelbert van Horne, who was the half-brother of Herbaren II Forisz van der Lede and Goswijn II van Born, or from Englelbert's son Willem I. Most likely it was from Engelbert when he was alive or from Margaretha after he had died, while Willem I was still a childe.

But why would Engelbert van Horne or Margaretha van Altena want to help the van Broeckhuysens?

Margaretha van Altena's father was Boudewijn I van Altena en Brusthem (1142-1200), Brust(h)em being located in today's Belgian Limburg about 22 miles northwest of Oupeye.

Margaretha's mother was Margaretha van Viggezele (1141-1194), the daughter of Steppo Willem Philip II van Gent. Burggraaf of Gent.

Of course when I first saw that Margaretha van Altena's grandfather was named van Gent, it meant nothing to me. But then I looked at Margaretha's siblings, and her sister Sophia (Sophie) van Altena (-1247) was married to Arnold II Berthout van Grimbergen (1167-1240), and their daughter Oda van Grimbergen (1204-1237) was married to Siger van Gent (?). In other words, Oda van Grimbergen, Siger's wife, was Margaretha van Altena's niece. Not only that, but Siger himself was Margaretha's 1^st cousin once removed through Margaretha's father who was Siger's great-grandfather.

In other words, Siger and his wife Oda were both closely related to Margaretha van Altena, who was the wife of Engelbert van Horne, from whom the van Broeckhuysen family had obtained Swalmen. Furthermore, he and the other Sigers/Zegers in his family were the only Sigers I'd yet come across, even though by now I'd been looking through a great many German families looking for a Seger.

This also means that Siger van Gent was a half-1^st cousin to both Goswijn II van Born and Herbaren II Florisz van der Lede, the 4x great-grandfather of the Jan van Arkel van Heukelom who had teamed up with Otto Gerrits van Arkel to sent Otto Gerrits van

Now when I saw this, I got goosebumps. By this time I had been looking through a large swathe of German famlies looking for the surname Broeckhuysen and I hadn't seen a single Seger. But now here was a Siger who was the wife of Engelbert van Horne, from whom the van Broeckhuysens had obtained Swalmen.

The Geni family tree doesn't show any children from the marriage of Siger and Oda, but rather than being evidence that Siger van Gent wasn't Seger van Broeckhuysen, it more likely cuts the other way because if the information this portion of the family tree was based on came from Flemish sources, then they couldn't be expected to know that Siger had left Gent to begin a new life as Seger van Broeckhuysen in Limburg.

Oda is shown as having another husband, however, who must have been her first husband because the early dates of birth of two of those children. Another child's year of birth (1271) is impossibly old. That husband is Wouter van der Aa (1190-1235), One of those children, Imaine van der Aa, married Giselbert II van Zotteghem, whose family were the lords of Zottegem in Flanders. What makes this interesting is that Zottegem is located just 4 miles east of Zwalm, a short river that has been puzzling me for some time, as it was plausibly the source of the name Sweym/Swaim. I thought this might be true because one or two of my DNA matches has ancestors from nearby in their family trees. For me the evidence was always overwhelming that Swalmen in Limburg was the source of the name, but Zwalm was always there as a mysterious alternative that somehow kept showing up. Now that I'm almost positive that Siger van Gent was Seger van Broeckhuysen, the mystery is solved. Zwalm in Flanders was not the source of the Swaim name, but collateral ancestors did live there and nearby. It's possible, however, that there was some earlier connection between Swalmen and Zwalm, that one was named after the other, but right now I dont' know that.

Note: After I wrote the above I found a couple documents that, together with the knowledge that Seger van Broeckhuysen was Siger van Gent, now explain the probable relationship between Zwalm and Swalmen. I'll discuss this later.

                                                          Engelbrecht van Horne

The Engelbrecht van Horne who was Margaretha van Altena's son was also the Lord of Goor. In the immediatley preceding post I'd mentioned various van Goors; they all lead up to Engelbrecht van Goor and were thus cousins of the van Broeckhuysen/van Swalmen/van Gents.

Cranendoncks in Holland

I've previously mentioned the van der Ghiessen family and it's relationship to the Swaim/den Hartog line, but at that time although I also knew their connections to the Cranendonck family, I hadn't made the connection to the Cranendonck/van Horne line as the original owners of Swalmen. Therefore, I'm going to re-emphasize this connection between thevan er Ghiessen Swaim/den Hartog families.

As we've seen, at least one line of the Cranendoncks moved to Dordrecht/Ridderkerk in the late 1300's so that Jan Roelofs Cranendonck lived in Ridderkerk. His son Roeloff Jansz Cranendonck (1410-1482) married Ronilda Lodewijksdr van der Ghiessen (1410-1475). Ronilda van der Ghiessen had a brother Aernt, who had a son Lodewijk, who had a son Conelis Lodewijks van der Ghiessen (1485-1522) who married an unknown woman (Lodewijk also had a daughter Janneke who married Pieter Roelofsz Cranendonck (1450-1502).

Cornelis Lodewijksz van Ghiessen had a son Anthonis Cornelisz van der Ghiessen (1500-1562), who married an unkown woman. One of anthonis Cornelisz' granddaughters also married a Cranendonck, but what I'm interested in is that H. den Hertog in his genealogy of the den Hartog/Hertog line says about Geertgen, a daughter of Jan Zweym Willems, son of Willem Ottesn:

“Geertgen married Cornelis Cornelissen van der Giessen (the old), also called Peert cooper (widower of Adriaentgen Huygendr.). On 17-3-1561 they sell their child's share in the Jan Zweynenweer to their brother-in-law Anthonis Gerits Middach.”

The Geni tree shows Cornelis Lodewijksz van Ghiessen as having only one child, Anthony, but that's probably just an artifact of the fact that records were only kept for very specific reasons and therefore there would be no record for the vast majority of people alive at any given time in the 1500's. Most well-to-do families at that time had several children. Since Corneis Lodewijksz was born in about 1475, he was about the same age as Jan Zweym, and therefore a son Cornelis would have been the right age to have married Geertgen. Jan Zweym was wealthy and he worked for a van Brederode; he was not some peasant farmer mucking about the swampy polders in his wooden clogs.

Siger van Gent

So far we've looked only at the Geni.com family tree for information about Siger van gent. Now we'll look at the entry for Siger in the Medieval Lands section of The Foundation for Medieval Genealogy website (fmg.ac).

Siger was a common name in the van Gent family, so we have to be certain we're looking at the right one, who married Oda van Grimbergen. In this website he's listed as SIGER (-after 1218)(This website doesn't speculate with dates, so the “after 1218” means that the last certain document to mention his name was dated 1218. It doesn't mean that he died soon after 1218, and as we'll soon see he was probably mentioned in a later document). Siger doesn't have a full entry of his own, but is only discussed within his father's entry, so we'll start with his father's entry. Since the other Sigers are given Roman numerals after their names for clarity but “our” Siger is not, when I write “Siger” without a number, I mean the Siger who married Oda van Grimbergen.

Siger's father was Siger III van Gent, the son of Siger II. Siger III was “Chatelain de Gand” and his wife was Petronille de Courtrai (Kortricht). Most of the documents that mention these people aren't very interesting because their subject matter is the donation of property to the Church, which was of course of interest to the Church but not highly interesting to us except for the names and dates they provide. Siger III married Beatrix van Heusden, daughter of Hugo van Heusden and his unnamed wife (again, this is the Heusden near Gent, not the Heusden in Brabant).

Siger III had three sons: Hugo II, Siger and Gerard.

Hugo II

Hugo II was the oldest son, last mentioned in 1232. In 1230 he's mentioned in a document as having confirmed the donation made by “Giselbertus de Sottenghem miles.” This Giselbert was probbaly the father of the previously mentioned Giselbert van Zottegem who was married to a daughter of Oda van Grimbergen and Wouter V vand der Aa. Hugo married Eudette (Oda) de Champlitte, and they had two children: Hugo III, Chatelain de Gand, and Gauthier (AKA Vilain].

Gerard

Gerard was the youngest son and was in two documents called “Gerardus dictus Diabolus de Gandavo miles,” an odd nickname as it means “Gerard the Devil knight of Gent.” Presumably this is a compliment and a description of his fighting prowess; otherwise it must refer to his temperament. He married a woman named Elisabeth, last name unknown, last mentioned in 1264.

Siger

Siger is mentnioned in a 1218 document as “Sigerus castellanus Gandensis” and identified as the son of Sigerus and the younger brother of Hugo. The FMG website lists two more documents from 1237 that mention a Siger, one from 1237 that mentions an Oda, and one from 1267 that mentions a Siger. The FMG website is very meticulous and so doesn't commit to claiming these are the same Siger because the proof isn't absolute, but because it does include these documents in Siger's section but with a question mark, it's saying that these are most likely the same Siger. In my opionion there's really no question that they're the same Siger because there was only one family of that social position that these Sigers could have come from, and only one Siger of the right age.

1237: “Oda” donated property to Dendermond with the consent of “matris meoe Sophieoe et domini Leonii mariti eius et...Walteri domini de A martiti mei” This is saying that her mother is Sophie and her husband is Walter de A (i.e., Sophie van Altena and Wouter van Aa). This same document also confirmed a previous donation made by “germanus meus Arnoldus de Grimbergis,” meaning “my brother Arnold van Grimbergen,” which definitely identifies this Oda as Oda van Grimbergen.

May 1237: “Sigerus miles...de Gandavo et uxor ipsius Oda de Grimbergis” consented to a sale of property.

August 1237: “Sigerus de Gandalvo et Oda uxor sua” donated property to Grimbergen (but whether this was the city of Grimbergen or some Church entity there isn't clear).

December 1267

This entry gets its own section because of its importance. The text from the FMG website reads:

Hugo castellanus Gandensis confirmed that dominus Sygerus de Gant dictus de Burgundia avunculus meus miles had donated property infra terras de Stoppeldich to Cambron, in the presence of hominum meorum...domini Alexandri cognomento Vilain militum...

Translated in English: “Hugo the Chatelain of Gent confirmed that “Lord Siger of Gent, my uncle called the Burgundian knight” had donated property below the polder Stoppediike to the abbey Cambron in the presence of lord Alexander, knight, called Vilain.”

The Hugo mentioned here was Hugo II, the oldest son of Siger's older brother Hugo, and the Alexander Vilain mentioned here was the second son of Siger's younger brother Gauthier Vilain. Therefore, the uncle Siger of Hugo mentioned here was definitely the Siger van Gent married to Oda van Grimbergen.

Siger by 1267 must have been between 67-77 years old, and his older brother Hugo must be dead because the Hugo who is “castellanus” calls Siger his uncle. And the witness, Alexander, is Hugo's brother—Siger's nephew—which is confirmed by the fact that his alias is Vilain

What's most interesting about this document is that Hugo II called Siger “my Burgundian uncle.” This is important because it probably means that Hugo is saying that Siger doesn't live in Gent, but in Burgundy. But I don't think we have to take “Burgundy” literally here. As far as I can tell, neither Siger van Gent nor his wife Oda had any ties to Burgundy. which at that time hadn't expanded northward as it later did. Instead, I think that Hugo probably confused Burgundy with Brabant, where Oda's mother was from, or simply used the word Burgundy to stand for some distant foreign location. It's possible that Hugo had never seen a map of areas outside of Flanders or even Gent, and only had a vague idea of where various countries existed.

So when Hugo was called upon to describe his uncle, he called him his uncle the Burgundian knight to convey the conept that Siger was living in some distant land. And it's really quite remarkable that in one of the few documents from Gent to mention Siger, he's mentioned in relation to some foreign land, even if that land was mistakenly called Burgundy.

(8 April 2023 Note: It turns out that according to Wikipedia there was an order of knights called the Burgundian Knights. Fourteen are listed and at least a few were Flemish. However, most or all of the listed knights lived in the late 1300's through the 1400's, so this requires further investigation, which I haven't yet done. Possibly Hugo meant that he was a Knight Templar, or perhaps he dressed himself in the current Burgundian style.)

(11 April 2023 Note: Actually, I now think it's possible/likely that Hugo [II] meant exactly what he said about Siger being a Burgundian knight. I previously didn't think this likely because the Duchy of Burgundy was far to the south, but I've changed my mind now that I've learned that Oda de Champlitte, the wife of Hugo [I] van Gent (Siger's brother), was the daughter of Eudes de Champlitte, Vicomte de Dijon. Dijon was part of the Duchy of Burgundy, and as Dijon was 300 miles from Ghent, how would a marriage arrangement have come about between Hugo [I] and a daughter of the Vicomte of Dijon?

This is only speculation, but a possible explanation is that if Siger van Gent had participated in the 5th Crusade (1217-1221), then he might have met Champlitte there and become friends, later working as a knight for Champlitte in Burgundy. This would then explain why Siger van Gent was a knight of Burgundy and how Hugo [I] came to be married to a lady of Burgundy. However, I've seen no evidence that either Siger van Gent or Champlitte were actually participants in this or any other Crusade. Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence, but neither is it evidence of presence.

Another participant in the 5th Crusade was Odo III, Duke of Burgundy, so if Champlitte did participate in this Crusade, then he would have gone as a fief of Odo. 

This may also be how Siger came to be married to Oda van Grimbergen, because one of the crusaders listed in Wikipedia's article "Christians of the Fifth Crusade" is Gillis Berthout. Gillis Berthout was the son of Wouter Berthout, son of Wouter Berthout and Sophie van Loon. Wouter Berthout and Sophie van Loon were also the grandparents of Oda van Grimbergen, meaning that Oda and Gillis were first cousins. Gillis may have gone on crusade with Henry I, Duke of Brabant, Siger may have met him on crusade, and Gillis later arranged Oda's marriage to Siger when Oda's first husband died.

Another connection between the van Gent family and Odo of Burgundy is that of the Knights Templar order. In 1209 Odo of Burgundy had given to the Knights Templar a castle and a village, so this may have recommended Siger and/or Hugo [I] to Odo.

It's also possible that Siger van Gent participated in the 6th Crusade (1228-1229). On this crusade were William II, Count of Flanders and Hugh IV, Duke of Burgundy. 

I don't know if a complete list exists of particpants in the Crusades, but if such a list does exist it would be worth examining to see if Siger van Gent and Eudes de Champlitte were participants in either the 5th or 6th Crusades.

To sum up this hypothesis:

Hugo, Siger van Gent's nephew by Siger's brother Hugo, called Siger "my uncle, a knight of Burgundy." 

Siger's brother Hugo married a daughter of Eudes, Vicomte of Dijon, which was located in Burgundy.

As Burgundy was located far from Ghent and there appears to be little intermarriage between nobles of Flanders and Burgundy at this time, it is likely that Siger's connection to Burgundy is the same as his brother Hugo's connection to Burgundy. This connection is unknown but could have through participation in the Fifth Crusade as the crusades appear to have been an important platform for social networking.

Known participants in the Fifth Crusade were Gillis Berthout (van Grimbergen) and Odo, Duke of Burgundy. Gillis Berthout was Oda van Grimbergen's first cousin and if Siger van Gent had been a participant of the Fifth Crusade he may have met Gillis Berthout there, setting the stage for his later marriage to Oda van Grimberen.. Eudes de Camplitte may also have been a participant in the Fifth Crusade in the contingent of his liege lore Duke Odo; Siger may have met Champlitte on crusade, leading to Hugo's marriage to Champlitte's daughter.

I've seen no evidence that Siger van Gent was a participant in the Fifth Crusade, so Siger's participation in the Fifth Crusade is speculative only. However, the documents cited by the FMG.ac website indicate that Siger was a knight of Burgundy and that Siger's brother Hugo had married a Burgundian. Whether or not the connection was made through participation in a crusade or through some other means (e.g., trade between Ghent and Dijon), there was clearly a connection between Siger, Hugo, and the Burgundy, specifically the Champlitte family.)

It's also interesting to note that the GenWiki Limburg van Broeckhuysen genealogy says that the last mention of Siger van Broeckhuysen was in 1268, a year after Siger van Gent made his last (December 1267) donation to a church entity in Flanders.

Pending further research, my working hypothesis for Siger and Oda is the following. Oda van Grimbergen was first married to Walter van de Aa. Walter died young in 1235 or 1236. Oda then remarried to Siger van Gent. Oda's mother was Sophie van Altena, whose father Boudewijn I van Altena en Brusthem (1142-1200) had been lord of Brusthem. Brusthem is located in Limburg 24 miles west of Maastricht. Through this connection she was able to obtain Broeckhuysen for her and Siger if they moved there from Gent. In Broeckhuysen Siger would be lord, whereas if he remained in Gent he would always be second to his older brother. Thus, in 1237 they sold and donated some land they owned in Gent and moved to Broeckhuysen where Siger became known as Seger van Broeckhuysen. Their son Johan was probably born in Broeckhuysen some time shortly after 1236, and it's possible this was their only child since Oda was no longer young, or perhaps she died giving birth to Johan. In 1267 Siger donated the property in Stoppeldijk to the Abbey of Cambron, probably as he knew he was approacing death. Since Oda wasn't mentioned in that donation, she was probably already dead. Since the last mention of Seger van Broekhuysen was supposedly in 1268, he probably died either in 1268 or soon thereafter.

Digression: Cambron

Either Siger van Gent or Oda van Grimbergen had owned the Stoppedike property in Cambron. It was probably Siger because his family also in 1251 donated a property called Roggelhof to Cambron.

Cambron is located 10 miles northeast of Leuze-en-Hainaut. This is notable because according to the FMG website on the “Heren van Arkel,” the first documented mention of an Arkel is from 1180, and in it the “sire d'Arkel” was living in a castle by name of “Leuse toft.” Leuse toft is almost certainly Leuze-en-Hainaut, so this is an interesesting early possible connection between the Arkels and the van Gents.

Also, in 1143 suppsedly Jan III van Arkel, Jan IV van Arkel, and Hugo Botterman van Arkel all died in the Grimbergen Wars, in which Oda van Grimbergen's 3x great-grandfather also supposedly died in 1147.

Other than the 1180 entry regarding the sire d'Arkel from Leuze, I have no idea of the validity of any of these things, which requires further research. But it's possible that the van Grimbergens and possible the van Gents had been acquainted with the van Arkels for a very long time even before Siger an Gent and Oda van Grimbergen had moved to Broeckhuizen.

The Van Broeckhuysen-van Swalmen Coat of Arms

Another route to trying to determine the origin of the van Broeckhuysen family was through trying to decipher the van Broeckhuysen-van Swalmen coat of arms. The van Broeckhuysen coat of arms (the shield) is generally shown as below:

This shield is a “per fess ermine and vert,” meaning it's divided horizontally into ermine above and green below. In this case there are 9 ermine tails.

And the van Swalmen coat of arms:

This is essentially the same as that of the van Broeckhuysen line, which is of course expected as the van Swalmen family branched from the van Broeckhuysen family at an early generation.

When I began looking into the origin of the van Broeckhuysens, I came across an online copy of an 1884 book “De Navorscher,” H.M. Werner of Venlo wrote about the various van Broeckhuysen lines, of which he said there were three in the Netherlands and others in Germany. Of the first of the Netherlands ones he says:

“Broeckhuysen with the ermine tails...that—whether or not descended from the French House of Brittany—in any case derived its name from the lordship of Broeckhuysen in the Overquarter of Gelder, ambt of Kessel, which lordship was later added to the lineage van Rossem, van Malsen and Wittenhorst. This family includes the lords of Weerdenburg—completely the same coat of arms....”

This is obviously the same van Broeckhuysen family we're discussing, but what did he mean by the comment whether or not descended from the French House of Brittany”? What could Brittany have to do with the van Broeckhuysen lineage? As it turns out, the ermine tail motif in heraldry is generally associated with the Dukes of Brittany, and when a coat of arms has that motif in it, the family is generally claiming descent from the Dukes of Brittany.

Once I followed the lead that lead to Cranendonck-van Horne and Margeretha and Sophia van Altena, I immediately saw that many of the van Grimbergen entries in the family trees were illustrated with what appears to be the van Grimbergen coat of arms, which includes a quarter-shield of ermine tails. So the ermine-tail motif on the van Broeckhuysen coat of arms could have come from the Grimbergen line, but then why does the van Broeckhuysen shield have a full two quarters of the motif, double that of the Grimbergen?

In the Geni tree, despite several lines of Grimbergens and Berthouts, who are all very endogamous over the generations, I didn't find any ancestors from Brittany. However, I did Siger's ancestry. In both Siger's mother's ancestry and Siger's father's ancestry, one line traces back to Conan I “le Tort” de Rennes, Duc de Bretagne (940-992).

So this is probably why the van Broeckhuysen coat of arms has two quarters of ermine taills, because it descends from the Dukes of Brittany in two lines.

But the van Broeckhuysen ermine motif differs from the usual theme, which is a pattern of several ermine tails, the number of which might have no meaning. However, the van Broeckhuysen coat of arms specifically has 9 ermine tails only. And I think the reason for this is that when counting back from Siger van Gent's paternal line, the first Count of Brittany is 9 generations back. In the female line it's only 8 generations back, but coats of arms are a specifically male-line symbol, so 9 rather than 8 ermine tails were used.

Coat of Arms of the Kastelein of Gent

This was supposedly the coat of arms of the Kastelein of Gent, from the Geni entry for Willem Willemsen, Viscount van Gent (1090-1141). I have no idea of the source of the image, but if genuine it looks like it was taken from and old and faded book. The lower coloring of the shield could have been originally greenish, and there might be faded ermine tails on the upper, but that might just be in smudges. In any case, it's general form is similar to the van Broeckhuysen/van Swalmen coat of arms.

But the van Broeckhuysen coat of arms does bear some resemblance to some of the coats of arms presented as being those of “van Gent:”

The factor these things have in common with the van Broeckhuysen/van Swalmen coat of arms is the that the shield is per fess (horizontally divided) and that one side usually has ermine tails, although usually a whole field of them rather than only 9. There is usually no green in them, athough here are a couple photos of the shield of the town of Sas van Gent in Termeuzen in Zeeland near the Belgian border. “Sas van Gent” means “Sluice of Gent,” so the green actually appears to symbolize water rahter than, say, green grass.

Summary of the van Broeckhuysen Coat of Arms

I think that the van Broeckhuysen coat of arms is obviously derived from the van Gent coat of arms, but also with the addition of the ermine-tail motif probably borrowed from the van Grimbergen coat of arms, although referring to the descent of the van Gent line from the Dukes of Brittany. I think that this provides strong evidence, even apart from the evidence already presented, that Seger van Broeckhuysen was the same person as Siger van Gent. I also think because the coat of arms was also a break from the existing van Gent coat of arms in that it incorprated the Grimbergen ermine-tail motif, this indicates that Siger intended to found his own lineage, which he did.

Steppo de Viggezele

Siger van Gent's earliest known paternal line ancestor was Siger's great-grandfather who was first mentioned in 1164 in a document as Steppo de Viggesele, a name usually written as Steppo van Viggezele. Viggezel isn't a town, but was apparently a farm, probably located off a street that still exists today, Viggezelestraat outside of Tielt, Flanders.

The names of Steppo's father and mother are unknown. The only thing known about Steppo's father is that he was lord of Bornem, which is located 44 miles east and slightly north of Viggezele and 13 miles southwest of Antwerp.

The Geni.com family tree purports to show Steppo's father as Willem Ypers de Looz, but there appears to be no documentation to support that.

In his 1902 book The History of Belgium, (Full text of "The history of Belgium" (archive.org)) Aetius C. Boulger gave a list of "some of the leaders" of the Crusaders who won the first battle of the First Crusade, the Siege of Nicaea, a Muslim city in Anatolia: 

(Badwin) du Bourg

Baldwin II of Hainaut

John, Count of Namur

Philip, Viscount of Ypres

Warner, Count of Grez

Arnold of Oudenarde

THeodore of Dixuue,

Erenbaut of Bruges

Theomer of Bruges

Rudolf of Alost (Aalst)

Walter of Nivelles

Gontran of Brussels

Siger of Ghent

Steppo of Ghent

Gislebert of Ghent

William, Ludolph, and Everard of Tournai

Henry and Godfrey D'Assche

I included the full list, but for the moment the most important name is that of Steppo of Ghent, who we can probably presume to be related to Steppo Viggezele, as the name Steppo is quite rare, and when associated with Ghent must indicate a family relationship. If so, he was the right age to be Steppo Viggezele's grandfather, so I think this is good evidence that the Viggezele line had been in Ghent since at least the 1090's. 

The Siger listed here may have been a brother to Wenemar van Gent (1065-1122).

The Gislebert listed here may have been the Gislebert dit "le Grand" van Gent, baron de Folkingham (1048 Aalst - 1095 Folkingham), although if so obviously the date of his death would be wrong. In the Geni.com tree Gislebert van Gent is shown as the brother of Rudolf van Aalst, who is also on the list of Crusaders, so it's likely that Gislebert "le Grand" is the Gislebert on this list. However, in the family tree the father of Gislebert and Rudolf is given as Rudolf de  Boulogne (van Aalst) with no parents provided, though with a coat of arms implying that he was related to the Counst of Boulogne family. Three sons of Eustace van Boulogne, count of Boulogne (Godfrey, Baldwin, Eustace) did participate in this First Crusade, but it seems more likely that the father of Gislebert and Rudolf was a van Gent rather than a Boulogne, as they're from the line of van Gents that ended up in England  and are called van Gent and are shown with coats of arms similar to those of van Gent.

But in any case, the main point for this section is that a Steppo van Gent was also a Crusader in 1097, and from his name Steppo he was probably a Viggezele.

                                                         Italian Origin?

To me the name Viggezele sounds Italian. A Google search on “viggezele” returned a few dozen hits relating to Steppo, but nothing relating to Italy. When I altered the search to “viggezel” I got two hits, one relating to Steppo and one an Italian book from from 1894 called “La Reforma Medica,” which appears to be have copies of a magaine, but I could be wrong because I have no interest in the book for its content except that it did have this:

This was apparently from a list of contest winners, and again it has no meaning except that it proves the surname was used in Italy in the 1800's by someone living in Parma. Clearly, however, the name is not common because there was only this one guy.

But here's the interesting thing. Parma is located only 17 miles from Reggio Emilia, and Reggio Emilia is where Giacomo Prati was born in about 1550. And Giacomo Prati is the earliest known ancestor of a person who took FTDNA's Big Y test and tested as a Swaim/den Hartog paternal line ancestor.

This is from my Y-Full SNP matches page, which shows all my paternal ancestors in the E-FGC11450 branch or later sub-branches leading to me. All Swaims and den Hartogs/den Hertogs would be equally as closely related as am I. Prati's terminal haplogroup is E-Y257534, whereas the Swaim/den Hartog terminal haplogroup is currently E-FT388654. The column labeled “TMRCA 2800 CI 95% ypb” means that all members of this haplogroup and of all sub-haplogroups (including the Swaim/den Hartog E-FT388654) had a common ancestor who lived around 2800 years before present, but possibly as recent as 2000 years before present, or about 20 AD.

FTDNA lists Prati's terminal haplogroup as E-FT389281. You can see that in the column to the right of th E-FT389281 box that E-Y257234 is shown as a variant of E-FT389281. Essentially, they're considered equivalent SNPs. What's more important is that you can see that the Swaim/den Hartog haplogroup, E-FT388654, branches down from Prati's E-FT389281 haplogroup; this is also shown by thae fact that I'm positive for E-FT389281 and all its variants. If you are positive for a particular SNP, it means you have that SNP as part of your DNA and you and everyone else who has that SNP inherited it from a common ancestor.

FTDNA's estimate of the TMRCA (Time to Most Recent Common Ancestor) was somewhere between 1992 BC and 121 AD:

If we use the most recent time estimate, then Prati's line diverged from the Swaim/den Hartog line in 121 AD. In other words, the founder of Prati's paternal line was a brother of the founder of the Swaim/den Hartog paternal line. However, we don't know where the family lived at that time. My “extended DNA” match data indicates that the line was then living in Greece. However, my data could be off by a few hundred years or simply wrong. It's possible they were living in Italy at that time, and it's possible they already had the name Viggezel. Roman patrician families did have surname-like clan names, so Viggezel could have been one of such names. If they did have such a name in 121 AD and the lines split at that time, then one paternal line founded by one brother remained in Italy and at some point changed its surname to Prati, while another paternal line founded by a second brother left Italy at some point later and ended up in Flanders 900 years (27 generations) later and had kept the Viggezel surname.

This is certainly possible, but I'm not saying it's what happened. It's based on pretty thin evidence, and there's other information that hints that the Swaim/den Hartog paternal line could have been Hungarian. It's also possible that it was Hungarian, then Italian, then Flemish. But remember, all of this also hinges on the supposition that the Swaim/den Hartog line did descend from the van Gent line. I think the evidence is now strong that it did, but it's not certain.

In a future post I'll discuss the issues of possible Hungarian ancestry, both Y-DNA and autosomal, but just remember that as of right now the evidence for this, while interesting, is too sparse to be definite.

So where we stand right now on the paternal ancestry of Viggezele, whether or not he was a Swaim/den Hartog ancestor? The only thing we have solid evidence for is that Steppo de Viggezele's father lived in Flanders and was the lord of Bornem and thus was a nobleman rather than a peasant. The Geni tree is flawed at this point because it doesn't show his supposed father, Filips van Flanderen van Loo as being the lord of Bornem. We don't really know if he was an illegitimate son of Robert I, Count of Flanders. Possibly, but where's the evidence? I made a case that the line might have come from Italy, and that at least is based on some evidence, though very thin evidence—too thin to claim it's true. So at least for now we have to say that we just don't know. 

26 March 2023 Note: Actually, the FMG website states that Siger I van Gent, father of Alix van Gent who married Steppo van Viggenzele, was titled as "Chatelain de Gand, Seigneur de Bornhem." Bornhem is no doubt the same place as Bornem, and the FMG entry says that Siger I died on or after 1122. Steppo van Viggenzele would have been sometime around 1120, so FMG's claim that Steppo's father was the lord of BOrnem is probably incorrect. The FMG site says "Steppo van Viggezele, son of ---, Heer van Bornem." However, it doesn't cite any document that actually states that Steppo's father was the lord of Bornem, so designating him as the lord of Bornem must be incorrect. If it's correct, then it means that Steppo had a child with his sister. This is obviously possible and probably more common than sources admit, and such a birth would have been a scandal and would likely have been kept a secret. Since Steppo's parentage is unclear, this has to be considered a possibility but can probably never be confirmed or disproven.

Siger I's father, Wenemar, was apparently a knight in the First Crusade, as he was captured by Turks in 1098 and then freed also in 1098 or possibly 1099. At any rate he was freed by 1101 since in that year he "founded the abbey of Bornhem by charter dated 1101 which names 'avo me Fulcardo.;" (fmg.ac). "Avo meo Fulcardo" means "My grandfather Fulkard." Thus, Wenemar was probably the lord of Bornhem, as possibly also was his grandfather Fulkard, since he was for some reason mentioned in that the founding document." 

The upshot of all this is that Steppo's father was probably not the lord of Bornem, but rather that Bornem had been in this van Gent family for at least a since Wenemar, and probably passed to Steppo through his wife Alix, the daughter of Siger I. If this is the case, then Bornem is a dead end in the search for Steppo's ancestry. 

2 March 2023 Note: If it seems unlikely that someone from Italy had found his way to Flanders at this early time, consider the fact that Arnold II, Count of Flanders, had married Rozala of Italy, the daughter of Barenger of Ivrea, King of Italy and Willa of Tuscany. I'm not certain how Rozala moved from Italy to Ghent, Flanders, but she obviously would have had an entourage accompanying her on that journey, and some of that entrourage may have remained with her in Flanders. The marriage occurred in 976, about 150 years (5 paternal-line generations) before the birth of Steppo Viggezele. 

The Geni.com family tree shows that Rozala was the 4th great-grandmother of Steppo, but that would only be true if Steppo's father was Willem Ypres de Looz, which is probably not the case. But it appears to be true that Arnold I, Count of Flanders, was an ancestor of Siger van Gent, and it was Arnold I's son who marriaed Rozala of Italy. Thus, Rozala's son Baldwin and the later counts of Flanders were cousins to the van Gents.

                                         Norway: Viggenes/Viggen

Another possibility is that the name Viggezele came from Norway; if so, most likely with "Rollo" who came to own Normandy. As we'll see, one van Gent ancestor is in fact document to have come from Denmark, so this wouldn't be particularly unusual. It isn't known if Rollo the Viking came from Norway or Denmark, there are arguments either way, but certainly his companions could have come from either country. 

I have substantial Norwegian ancestry, and I have a handful of DNA matches from Norway who have people named Viggen or Viggenes, all of whom come from the towns Viggja, Børsa and Skaun, which are 18, 21 and 22 miles from Trondheim. Trondheim, originally called Kaupang and then Nidaros, was founded in 997 as a trading post and was the capital of Norway during the Viking Age until 1217. As a trading town there'd be people from many parts of Europe here, and it was probably also a place to have recruited Vikings for raids.

The name Viggen/Viggenes came from a farm of that name, as it was customary to use the name of the farm as a surname-like addition to the patronymic name. It isn't difficult to see how the name might have morphed in Flanders or Frances from Viggenes to Viggensele.

Now, these might simply be my Norwegian cousins and have nothing to do with Flanders, and that might be true. But consider this: the last screenshot, of Brynhild Sjursdatter Viggen (1666-1727) came from a DNA match named Larsen, and who also is a cousin of this particular Larsen? My Dutch DNA match Spies. Spies, Larsen and I don't share the same segment of DNA, but Spies and I each share DNA with Larsen. Why is Spies a cousin to a Norwegian?

There are other possibilities other than that this DNA comes from Steppo Viggezele, but this is definitely a possibility. Larsen also has a connection to a place in Norway called Norderhov keeps showing up in relation to Scandinavian matches of Dutch DNA matches, and is also related to a Y-DNA SNP match. 

I've previously mentioned Godfrid the Viking in relation to the 882 Siege of Asselt, but because I hadn't realized that the Ghent was important to the Swaim history, I hadn't paid much attention to the fact that Godfrid had also used Ghent as his base of operations. The Wikipedia article "Godfrid, Duke of Frisia" says "In 880, Godfrid ravaged Flanders using Ghent as his base. In 882, Godfrid ravaged Lotharingia and the cities of Maastricht, Liege, Stavelot, Prüm, Cologne, and Koblenz were devastated. After the Siege of Asselt forced him to come to terms, Godfrid was granted the Kennemereland, which had formerly been ruled by Rorik of Dorestad, as a vassal of Charles, according to the Annales Fuldensis...Godfrid accepted Christianity and baptism, at which Charles stood as his godfather. In return, Charles appointed him Duke of Frisia and gave him Gisela, daughter of Lothair II, as his wife." But in 885 Godfrid was murdered by Frisian and Saxon nobles to make way for the local Gerulf be count.

It's interesting that my hypothetical Swaim/den Hartog line recapitulates in slow motion Godfrid's travels in the Low Countries, moving from Gent to Asselt to Middelkoop (located just 16 miles from Dorestad). I don't know if that means anything, but it's not surprising that my Dutch DNA matches (i.e., distant cousins) average a moderately high level of Scandinavian ancestry (according to MyHeritage.com); some of them even supposedly have more Scandinavian ancestry than I do, and I have a Swedish grandmother and Norwegian great-grandfather. 

I'm not trying to sell this hypothesis of the origin of either the Scandinavian or the Italian origin of the name Viggezele, but I don't want to ignore them, either. In a later posts I'll show what the latest Y-DNA evidence indicates about the Swaim/den Hartog paternal ancestry, as well as the Scandinavian ancestry of my Dutch DNA matches and the partially separate issue of the Scandinavian DNA matches of my Dutch DNA matches.

The Other van Gent Lines

At least according to the Geni.com family tree, there was another line of van Gents who ended up in Guelders, and earlier than Siger van Gent's line. I have no idea whether this genealogy is correct, but I'll present it here anyway. I'll call this line the “Willem van Gent” line to distinguish it from the Siger van Gent line. I've named this line after the Willem van Gent who, as we will see, is the one I've mentioned in a previous post who had bought the van Arkel 28-morgen property that was later partially owned by a few of the Swaim/den Hartog line.

This Willem van Gent line is probably not from the same paternal line as the Siger van Gent line. Siger van Gent is only the 3^rd in his paternal line to use the “van Gent” name, which occurred the generation after Steppo Viggezele married Alix de Gent (1122-1154). Thus, Siger was a van Gent through his great-grandmother Alix, but not in his paternal line. The FMG website doesn't speculate on Steppo de Veggezele's ancestry, but does say that his father was NN, heer van Bornem. Bornem is in the middle of a triangle created by Ghent, Antwerp and Mechelen.

The Geni.com tree provides an ancestry for the de Viggezele lineage that goes back to the Counts of Flanders. Steppo's father was supposedly Willem de Ypres de Looz, the illegitimate son of Philip of Loo, who was the son of the Flemish count Robert the Frisian and younger brother of Robert II, Count of Flanders and a Crusader. But is this just a guess, or is it based on some evidence? Willem of Ypres was not likely the lord of Bornem, given his biography (Wikipedia “William of Ypres”), so I believe this ancestry is false. If it is false, then the paternal line would not be descended from Conan I, Count of Brittany. On the other hand, Siger van Gent/Seger van Broeckhuysen almost certainly believed he was descended from the Counts of Brittany, but that may have been in the maternal line only, so once again we don't know. Steppo de Viggezele may be the earliest named paternal ancestor likely to be found—and, again, we're stuck with possible broken links at a much later level, with the Willem Ottens' father.

Clearly, however, because of Steppo's status, the paternal line at this early time was noble, and probably did descend from a count or duke not too many generations before Steppo. And given what Y-DNA evidence we have, which I'm reevaluating in light of this newly discovered potential paternal ancestry from Flanders and Brittany, Brittany is a possibility for a specdific reason I'll discuss in a future post.

But this is a break in the Swaim/den Hartog paternal line, along with the second break with the unknown father of Willem Ottens and, if the father was Willem Ottens, there's another break because we don't know the identity of the father of Dirck van Oist, although I'll provide a hypothesis later. Dirck van Oist was a van Swalmen at least in a maternal line, but we don't know if he was a van Swalmen in his paternal line.

Willem van Gent Line

Jan van Gent (1000-) m. Berthat van Cuijck

Johan van Gent, count of Gent (1030- ) m. Marie van Cuijck (1030-)

Willem van Gent, heer van Gelderland en Gent (1060-) m. Marie van Berthout

Willem Jansz, Viscount van Gent (1090-1141) m. Antoinette Ottosdr van Diest (1090-)

Jan Willems van Gent, ridder (1120-1209) m. Elisabeth Danielsdr van Heusden (1120-)

The line must have left Gent permanently with this generation

Willem Jansz van Gent, ridder (1150-1189) m. Amelia Woutersdr van Rochefort (1155-)

Willem was born in Gerwen, Brabant, 29 miles west of Broeckhuizen. Amelia was born in Ohain, Flanders, 13 miles south of Brussels

Willem Willems van Gent, ridder (1172-1209) m. Barbara van Gennep (1180-)

Barbara van Gennep was born in Batenburg, 4 miles east of Megen

Willem Willems van Gent, ridder (1208-) m. Maria van Kerpen (1210-)

Maria van Kerpen was born in Kerpen, 15 miles southwest of Cologne

Willem Willems van Gent, ridder (1240-) m. Anna Marie van der Lecke

Willem Willms van Gent (1270-) m. Maria van Renneburg

Willem van Gent, ridder (1300-1366) m. Christine van Oyen

Willem was born in 's-Hertogenbosch, Brabant

Willem Willems van Gent, ridder, heer van Gendt (?) m. Agnes van Doornick

Willem Willems van Gent ( - >1451) m. Gerarda van Herlaer

Willem Willems van Gent married to Gerarda van Herlaer was the 8^th generation in his line to have been born outside of Flanders, and the marriages for 6 generations before him indicate that they had discontinued contact with Flanders, or at least were now more oriented toward eastern Brabant and Guelders. I haven't yet looked for evidence of any interaction between this Willem van Gent line and the van Broekhuysen-van Swalmen lines, but surely they knew of each other's existence. It's unlikely to be a coincidence that some of the Swaim/den Hartog line had ended up owning land in the 28-morgen van Arkel property that Willem van Gent had obtained from his father-in-law in 1423. However, in 1451 he had sold it to Jan Knobbout Hendriksz van Os, so the Swaim/den Hartogs may have obtained it through a Knobbout rather than Willem van Gent. But surely the van Swalmens and van Broeckhuysens and Sweyms at this time knew that they had descended from a van Gent line and that the Willem van Gents must be their distant cousins.

Act of Gent 1156

Diplomatum Belgicorum nova collectio sive supplementum ad opera diplomatica Auberti Miraei ... in quo continentur chartae fundationum ac donationum piarum, testamenta, privilegia, foedera principum, & alia tum sacrae tum profanae antiquitatis monimenta ... Tomus tertius (-quartus) cura et studio Francisci Foppens s.t.l. ... (googleusercontent.com)

Translation:

Theoderic of Alsace, Count of Flanders, granted in 1156 to the Abbots and Monks of St. Peter near Ghent, of the Order of St. Benedict,
immunity from all taxes.

I, Theodoric, Count of Flanders, by the grace of God, to all such futures, etc., that Sigerus, our beloved Abbot of St. Peter of Ghent, has come to us, complaining that he and his brothers in different parts of our county have known to pay the debts of the Theloneorum [tax collectors?] , which the Kings of France and Counts of Flanders have long ago known that it was canceled in regards to the Church.

We, therefore, having inspected their Privileges, in which the indulgences of the Theolonians were contained, including all the exactions of the Theolonians in all the places of our Kingdom, wherever and from wheresoever they are paid, have pardoned the aforesaid Church now and forever, and that the Church should not be subjected to any further harassment by these, to be noted in the Letter, and we command to finish with the impression of our seals, with the names of those who were interred.

[signatures:]

Theodorici Comitis

Rogeri Castellani Gandensis

Rogeri de Petinghem

Arnoldi de Aldenarde

Rassonia de Gavra

Stepponis Dapiferi de Alost [steward of the household of Aalst]

Eustachii de Grammina

Godefridi, Simonis, Isuini, Wasselini & Philippi, of the townspeople

act of Ghent 1156

So here we have three people probably from the same family:

Sigeris, Abbot of Saint Peter of Ghent

Rogeri Castennai Gandensis mean Roger, Castellan of Ghent

Stepponis, steward of the household of Aalst

Sigerus the abbot is not shown in the Geni tree, but is probably a son of Zeger I of Gent (1102-1132) and Petronella van Brakel or Alice Noemi van Kortijk (Courtrai). Thus, he should really be designated as Siger II instead of his nephew (or half-nephew), but these numerical designations anyway appear to be just an invention of the family tree rather than something that existed at the time, as in a document from the time they aren't labelled with numbers (in my limited experience).

Rogeri is Sigerus the abbot's brother or half-brother, the person in the Geni tree named as “Roger I “the Elder” of Courtrai, chatelain & vicomte of Courtrai and Gent (1120-1198). He was the son of Zeger van Gent (1102-1132) and Petronella van Brakel.

By the time (1156) of this act of Count Theodore, Rogeri's half-sister Alicia van Gent (1122-1154) had married Steppo Willem Philip van Viggezele (1122-1154), so that their children were from both the Viggezele and the de Gent families.

Stepponus, steward of the house of Alst, was probably a son or grandson of Steppo Willem Philip van Viggezele.

Siger van Gent Line

This is the van Gent line that Siger van Gent came from. Siger's Parents were:

Siger [III]van Gent, “castellanus de Gandavo [Ghent]” who was married to Beatrix van Heusden, daughter or Hugo van Heusden.

Thus, Siger van Gent should really be called Siger [IV] van Gent, but he's never given that numerical designation, perhaps because he left Gent and raised his family in Limburg (or so I hypothesize).

Siger [III] van Gent's parents were:

Siger [II] van Gent, Chatelain de Gand and Petronille de Courtrai (-1227 or after).

Siger II van Gent's parents were:

Steppo van Viggezele and Alix van Gent

These are Siger van Gent's great-grandparents. A crucial point to understand, especially in regard to Y-DNA, is that Siger van Gent's paternal line is not a van Gent line. The van Gent line entered into Siger van Gent's line with Steppo van Viggezele's wife Alix van Gent. Alix belonged to the “Chatelains de Gand” family from the FMG website, which then continues through Steppo and Alix in the “Chatelains de Gand (Viggezele)” family.

Thus, Siger van Gent was autosomally a van Gent, but not a van Gent in his paternal line.

Knowlege of the van Gent paternal line ends with Steppo van Viggezele. His father's name was unkown, but it is known that he was lord of Bornem. Before that the lineage is a unknown, despite what the Geni.com tree shows.

Alix van Gent Ancestry

Alix van Gent's parents were:

Siger [I] van Gent and NN.

Siger's parents were:

Wenemar van Gent (-1118 or after) and Gisela van Guines (Guisnes/Ghisnen)

Gisela (Ghislain) van Guines' Ancestry

Guines, also called Guisnes, was the County of Guines, a fief of Flanders located between Flanders and the County of Boulogne; Guines and Boulogne are now part of France.

From Wikipedia "County of Guines." Below shows Guines more closely:

Note the town called Oye, which I now suspect is the origin of the Oyen/Oijen towns in Limburg and Gelderland. 

Gisela's parents were:

Baudouin (Baldwin) I, Comte de Guines and Nomen Nescio (NN) (but possibly Adela (AKA Christina) of Holland

Thus, Baudouin was married to Adela, the daughter of Floris I, Count of Holland and presumably his wife, Gertrude of Saxony. This is what the Geni.com tree shows, probably based on the FMG website, but the FMG website is less certain that Adela was actually the daughter of the Count of Holland. That connection is based on one source, the Historia Comitum Ghisnensium (History of the Counts of Guines). I'm not certain I can adequately translate the meaning of the Latin passage from that History, but the FMG website says of it that although the passage, which says that the wife of Baldwin of Guines was named “Adelem” called “Cristiana” who was the daughter of “viri Lotharie et milicie ducis florigeri Florentini,” and that the text is “chronologically consistent with Count Floris I being her [Adela's] father,” that “this hypothesis assumes the text correctly names Adela's father in the first place. This is far from certain in light of the numerous inaccuracies and inconsistencies in the early parts of the Historia. In addition, none of the names typically associated with the family of the Counts of Holland are found among the couple's descendants.”

So the truth is that we don't really know if Baldwin of Guines really did marry the daughter of the Count of Holland. People are quick to add Counts and Dukes to their family trees on thin evidence, but I'm more interested in accuracy, and the truth is that we'll probably never know whether or not Adela was the daughter of Floris I. It's wrong to say that she is if a careful investigator who looked into the matter says that it's “far from certain.”

In any case, there's a different count a few generations further up the line. The parents of Baudouin I, Count of Guines were:

Eustache I, Comte de Guines (- before 1097) and Susanne de Grimmingen

The parents of Eustache I de Guines were:

Raoul de Guines and an unknown wife. This wife is in the Geni.com listed as Rosella de Saint Pol, but again the FMG website says it might not be true that Rosella de Saint Pol was actually Raoul de Guines' wife.

Raoul de Guines' parents were:

Ardolf de Guines (966-) and Mathilde de Boulogne.

The parents of Ardolf de Guines were:

Siegfried (-965) and Elstrude de Flandre.

Siegfried was a Dane who “was installed as Comte de Guines in 928. This is particularly interesting to me because I've been investigating the Scandinavian ancestry of my Dutch matches, which ancestry is higher than the Dutch average, and also the Scandinavian shared matches of my Dutch matches. Before I worked out the probability that Seger van Broeckhuysen was Siger van Gent, I of course had no idea that this Siegfried the Dane was probably an ancestor. However, I had already speculated that much of the Scandinavian ancestryof my Dutch matches was from Vikings who had raided Frisia, the Netherlands, and northern France in the 1800's. Flanders is of course very close to Normandy, whose nobility were Danes who had intermarried with French, also no doubt many illegitimate children were born Danish men in coastal regions of these areas, whether or not through willing relationships on the part of the woman.

Unfortunately the ancestry of Siegried is unknown, but it might be possible to discover generally who he might have been based on Scandinavian ancestors who are common to my DNA matches. This is something I'll look into in a future post.

According to the FMG website, a church chronicle says that Siegfried and Elstrude of Flanders were never married, and thus that their son Arnold de Guines was illegitimate. Elstrude's parents were:

Arnould [I “de Grand”] de Flandre, Count of Flanders (885-964) and Adela de Vermandois, daughter of the Heribert I, Count of Vermandois and Adela Capet.

The parents of Arnould de Flandre were:

Baudouin [II “le Chauve”] Count of Flanders (865-918) and Aelfthryf of Wessex (877-929).

Aelfthryf of Wessex was the daughter of:

Aelfred, King of Wessex and Ealswith, daughter of Aethelred “Mucil” Ealdorman of the Gainas and Eadburgh (of the royal line of Mercia).

So, finally a king in the ancestry, though a king in England whose ancestors came largely from saxony.

Summary of Siger van Gent's Acnestry

The earliest known paternal ancestor of Siger van Gent was Steppo Viggezele, who lived from about 1120-1154. His father's name is unknown but he was lord of Bornem in Flanders.

The van Gent line merged with Steppo Viggezele's line when Steppo married Alix de Gent.

Notable ancestors in Alix de Gent's line include:

Baldwin I, Count of Guines

Siegfried the Dane (~900 – 965)

Arnold I, Count of Flanders

Alfred, King of Wessex

Boulogne van Gent Line

The main problem in determining who Stepponius is, is that the Geni.com tree shows two separate families named “de Gent” or “van Gent.” The Siger van Gent family supposedly descends from Lambrecht, burggraaf of Gent (1000-1034) and Hermengarde von Vlanderen (1004-1071). The Geni tree shows Lambrecht having two sons: Reingot van Gent, heer van Dendermonde (1022-1066) and Volkaart, burggraf van Gent (1025-1074). Siger's line comes from Volkaart, whereas Reingot's son Wouter is called “van Aalst,” although Wouter's son is not, being called van Dendermonde. But here is a “van Aalst” who's also a van Gent, so perhaps the “Stepponius” was the steward for that family.

But the picture become murkier, because there's another and large family in the Geni tree also called “de Gent” and also “van Aalst” that supposedly descends from another rline entirely. This is a line that supposedly descends from Rudolph de Boulogne (van Aalst) (995-1056) and Gisele de Luxemburg (1010-1055). Their son is Boudewijn I van Gent, heer van Aalst (1042-1092) married to Oda van Peteghem (1055-).

Oda van Grimbergen is anyway a descendant of this Boulogne van Gent line, through her grandmother Mathilde Gerthout van Ninove (1137-1190), daughter of Gisele van Peteghem (1110-), who was a daughter of Engelbrecht van Peteghem Cysoing (1075-1136) and Elisabeth van Gent van Aalst (1091-1125). Elisabeth van Gent was a daughte rof the aforementioned Boudewijn and Oda van Peteghem.

This Boulogne van Gent line is worth further investigation because, according to the Geni tree, Boudewijn van Gent's oldest brother was Gislebert dit “le Grand” van Gent, baron de Folkingham, seigneur de Hunmanby (1048-1095), married to Alix de Montfort-sur-Risle (1050-1091). Alix de Montfort was born in Normandy and died in either Scotland or England, as did Gislebrecht van Gent. The Geni tree doesn't explain, but the implied reason they would have ended up in England or Scotland is because either Rudolph de Boulogne or his father was with William the Conquerer in his conquest of England, or Alix de Montfort's father Hugh de Montfort was with William the Conquerer. According to the Wikipedia aritcle “Companions of William the Conqueror,” Huge de Montfort of Normandy was definitately with William the Conqueror in 1066, as was Eustache, Count of Bolougne. Although the Geni tree doesn't show Rudolf de Boulogne as a son of Eustache de Boulogne, if he was a relative or if he was with William the conqueror, this is how he could have ended up in England. Gislebrecht van Gent may have been too young to take part in the battle, but even if he or his father waasn't a companion of William the Conqueror, Hugh de Montfort definitely was, so if Alix de Montfort truly was the daughter of Hugh, then this also is a way that this branch of the de Gent family could have ended up in England/Scotland.

William the conqueror made himself king of England and gave titles and properties to his companions, so the descendants of Gislebert and Alix ended up as nobles and marrying into other noble families.

Here's what the WappenWiki website (House of Vilain de Gand - WappenWiki) shows for the coat of arms of Hugues IV de Gand, Castellan of Ghent, supposedly from Matthew Paris's 1255 book Historia Anglorum:

I only found this a few days after I'd published this post because I hadn't been looking for English connections. Obviously, this coat of arms is the one that comes closest to matching the van Broeckhuysen-van Swalmen coat of arms. I haven't verified that this image is from the cited source, but if it is this needs to be further investigated. Hugues IV de Gand is shown in the Geni tree as a son of the previously mentioned Gislebert and Alix, born about 1075 in Folkingham, Lincolnshire and married to Adeline de Beaumont.

If this de Gent line is from the same paternal line as that of Siger van Gent and if the Swaim/den Hartog line is also from that same paternal line, then there should be now or in the future some English Y-DNA matches that branched from the Swaim/den Hartog line at about the year 1000 AD. And there is in fact such a match , the Y-DNA matchTudhope, a surname that's probably Scots, and whose line, according to the FTDNATiP report, separated from the Swaim line between 650 AD-1750 AD. I've previously tried to trace this line back to some source but failed, although this was just an internet search rather than a true search that would probably take hundreds of hours and then might well turn up nothing solid. If Tudhope truly did descend from this de Gent family in England, then the birth of his ancestor that was the son of a de Gand was likely illegitimate because otherwise he'd have the name de Gand and would probably be wealthy and know his ancestry well. 

FTDNA has a Gant-Gaunt-Gent surname project, and none of the people in that project matches the Swaim/den Hartog  haplogroup, but that isn't necessarily dispositive of anything, as the surname is a simple one-syllable name that probably has many unrelated but similar-sounding surnames. 

In any case, again, Siger van Gent's earliest known paternal ancestor isn't a van Gent, but rather Steppo van Viggezele. Although it's possible that Steppo was paternally a de Gent, there's no evidence for this. Thus, de Gent Y-DNA wouldn't be expected to be the same as Swaim/den Hartog Y-DNA.

Of course, the descendants of Siger van Gent and Oda Berthout van Grimbergen will have van Gent autosomal DNA as well as van Grimbergen autosomal DNA, and in multiple doses due to endogamy. Thus, the autosomal DNA signature in their descendants should be strong, and is probably the source of the DNA that I share with most of my Dutch DNA matches.

Zijdewind van Gent Line

And there appears to be a 4^th van Gent line that could be called the “van der Zijdewiden van Gent line. At least some of this line lived in 's-Herotgenbosch, but this appears to be a separate line from the Willem van Gent line. This line goes back to “Willem GXXI van Gent” (1230-1290).

As of now I haven't had the time to try to figure out the relationship between these lines, but assuming they all exist clearly they must be tied in together somehow to the same family.

Until I have a better understanding of the relationships between these lines, to avoid confusion I'll call the 4 van Gent lines;

Siger van Gent line

Boullogne van Gent line

Willem van Gent line

Zijdewind van Gent line

But if say merely the “van Gent line,” I mean the Siger van Gent line that married the de Viggezele line.

The Surname van Broeckhuysen

The name Broeckhuysen was not associated with the van Gent family. Rather, I think the van Broeckhuysen family proably took the name from the place already called Broeckhuysen, just as the van Swalmen family probably took their name from the place already called Swalmen, once they moved there.

Gijsbert III van Bronckhorst, lord Rekem (1183-1241) married Kunigunde von Oldenburg (1187 Oldenburg – 1260 Bronkhorst, Gelderland). Kunigunde's father was Moritz I von Oldenburg (1145-1209) and Salome von Ahr-Wickrath (1150-1215, the daughter of Otto von Ahr-Wickrath (1120-1162) and Adelheid von Hochstaden (1120-1170). Adelheid's brother was Otto von Ahr-Wickrath (1145-1225), who was married to Margaretha van Altena.

Margaretha van Altena's sister was Sophie van Altena van Heusden (1190-1274), the mother of Siger van Gent's wife Oda van Grimbergen. In other words, there was a relatively close in-law connection between Siger's wife Oda and Gijsbert III van Bronckhorst through Gijsbert's wife Kunigeunde von Oldenburg.

And one of the names repeatedly used in the von Oldenburg family was von Bruchhausen.

Although it appears that Gijsbert III lived in Bronkhorst, located about 50 miles north of Broekhuysen (and 7 south of Zutphen), but Gijsbert III was also the lord of Rekem, which is located on the Maas 6 miles north of Maastrict (50 miles south of Broekhuizen). So presumably Gijsbert III at least occasionally traveled between Bronkhorst and Rekem following the Maas, and knew the region well. I've mentioned a few Bronckhorsts in previous posts who were deeply involved in the affairs of Swalmen and other parts of Limburg (e.g., In 1379 “Mr. van Bronckhorst and Batenburg” who, along with Robijn van Swalmen, and Dirk van Oist, and in the physical presence of Duke Willem van Gelre and Duchess Maria of Jülich, was involved in mediating a settlement between various towns and villages in the region, including Swalmen and Asselt).

So we have Gijsbert III van Bronckhorst, born in 1187, probably a 10-20 years older than Siger van Gent, who was married to a woman from a family that used the name Bruchhausen, and Gijsbert III van Bornckhorst and Siger van Gent were related by marriage and therefore may have been well acquainted with each other. It's reasonable to believe that Siger van Gent may have settled in Broekhuizen on the Maas through this family to connection to Bronckhorst, and that Bronkhorst may have owned the property through his wife Kunigunde von Oldenburg.

And that property may have already been named Broekhuizen. However, this is only hypothetical, and needs further investigation. There doesn't seem to be any historical connection between the Oldenburgs and Limburg, so it seems dubious that they'd owned a property there they'd named Bruchhausen.

A stronger possibility is that Siger van Gent and Oda van Grimbergen's presumed son, Johan, had married a daughter of Gijsbert III van Bronckhorst, and that Gijsbert III had given the propert to Johan which he had named Bruchhausen after the Oldenburgs. According to the Geni.com tree, Johan had a son named Giselbertum, and his existence is referenced as mentioned in a 15 April 1273 document as the “canonincus leodiensis” of Thorn Abbey. I haven't seen a copy of that document, but if true this could strengthen the possibility that Johan had married a daughter of Gijsbert III van Bronckhorst, since Giselbertum van Swalmen may have been named after his grandfather Gijsbert (the two names being the same).

The Geni tree also shows that Gijsbert III had two daughters named Oda and Helena about which nothing is known, so these are possibilities.

I'm not saying that any of this is probable, but because there's a connection between Limburg with Gijsbert III van Bronckhorst and with the von Oldenburg family, it's possible that the name Bruchhausen (from a town south of Bremen) was transferred to an estate built by Broncknorst in Limburg.

There are other Bruchhausens closer to Limburg than one in Oldenburg, including one located just a couple miles north of Arnsberg, but I haven't seen any close connection to any of the families from that region.

Connections to the Rijswijk Sweyms

Van de Werve

Since I mentioned Giselbertum van Swalmen, son of Johan van Swalmen, I'll mention here that I think he may have been the Gijsbrecht Sweym, mentioned in various Holland leenkamers, including the Vlaardingen “de Tempel” property. In that leenkamer his son Gerard inherited the property from him on his death in 1335. This places him at the right age to have been Giselbertum. The earliest mention of Gijsbert Sweym was in 1309 when he bought the “de werve” property in Rijswijk from the van der Werve family with the help of Amelis uten Weerde.

Siger van Gent's mother was Oda van Grimbergen. One of Oda's 3x great grandfathers was Arnoud I Berthout van Mechelen-Grimbergen (1080-1147)(died in Grimbergen Wars). The Berthouts were the lords of Mechelen, which is 14 miles south of both Antwerp and Ranst. Here's a genealogy up from Sophie van Altena up to Arnoud I, then down one line:

Oda van Grimbergen (1204-1237)

Arnold III Berthout van Grimbergen (1167-1240)

Gerard II Berthout van Mechelen Grimbergen (1143-1186)

Wouter III Berthout van Mechenlen Grimbergen (1118-1201)

Wouter II Berthout van Mechenlen-Grimbergen (1098-1180) m.

Arnoud I Berthout van Mechelen-Grimbergen (1080-1147)(died in Grimbergen Wars)

Arnold van Ranst Berchem Cantecrode I (1101-1186)

Arnold II Berthout, heer van Ranst (?)

Wouter V Berthout, heer van Ranst en Berchem (1175-1256)

Arnold IV Berthout, heer van Ranst ( 1195-)

Gertrude Berthout van Ranst (1200's) m. Gunther (Wouter) van Werve (Pierrepont)

Jacques van de Werve, burgermeester van Antwerpen (1250-)

Guillaume van der Werve (1270 - )

Jean van der Werve (1300-1351)

Raimondt II van der Werve (-1374)

Jean II Raimonnssoone de Buyser Ruichrock van de Werve ( -1389) m. Katline van Wyneghem (1325-1378)

Thus, Oda van Grimbergen was a 4^th cousin to Gertrude Berthout van Ranst, who married Wouter van Werve. Oda and Gertrude might never have met because a 4^th cousin relationship is not very close (I don't personally know any of my 4^th cousins), and also because Ranst is a few miles southeast of Antwerp. But on the other hand, Gent and Antwerp are only 35 miles apart and connected by the river Scheldt, so it's possible the did meet.

Gijsbert Sweym would thus have been 6^th or 7^th cousin of the van de Werve he probably married, who was probably a daughter of Jacques (Jacob) van de Werve. If so, this name may have been preserved in the Rijswijk Sweym family, as a Jacob van de Werve in 1424 bought a 3.5 morgen property in the achterdijk in Arkel from Nikolaas Knobbout. This is likely the same Jacob van de Werve who in 1417 accompanied Willem van Arkel (son of Jan V van Arkel) on his doomed raid on Gorinchem in an attempt to retain/regain the van Arkel lordship. Willem van Arkel lost his life in that attempt, just as Otto Gerrits van Oist lost his life 12 years later in 1436 when fighting with Jan van Arkel van Heukelom, probably another doomed attempt to regain power for the van Arkel line.

As I stated in my post of 24 December 2021, Jacob van de Werve may have been a son of Gijsbert (II) Sweym or of his son Spronc van de Werve. However, this is unclear and it's something I'll probably revisit in light of this new knowledge about the Flemish ancestry of the van Swalmens and thus probably the Rijswijk Sweyms and the Swaim/den Hartogs.

So Arnoud I van Mechelen-Grimbergen was a common ancestor to both Siger van Gent's wife Oda van Grimberen and Jean Ruichrock van de Werve. It's almost a certainty that the van de Werve line in Holland came from the Antwerp van de Werve line, and this must certainly be true for the Ruichrock van de Werve line in Holland as the name Ruichrock is unique. Here's a review of the property transfers for the “de Werve” house in Rijswijk:

<1281 Dirk van de Werve mentioned.

1309: Gijsbert Sweym upon transfer by Amelis uten Weerde, who purchased from Floris van de Werve

1324 Life estate to Clementia, daughter of Herbaren van Foreest, married to Gijsbert Sweym, confirmed by his oldest son Gerard

-1390: Spronc van de Werve te Rijswijk met ledige hand

1429 Jan van de Werve by death of his father Spronc

1430 Life estate to Nikolaas van de Werve, brother of Jan van de Werve,

1434 Herbaren van de Werve by the death of his brother Jan.

1448 Jan Ruigrok, raad (court officer?), by transfer from Herbaren van de Werve

1451 Janna, daughter of Kerstant van den Berge, married to Herbaren van de Werve, transfer confirmed by Jan Ruigrok van de Werve.

So this property was first owned by Dirk van de Werve, then by Floris van de Werve, then by Gijsbert Sweym, Then by Spronc van de Werve by inheritance, then by Jan van de Werve, then by Herbaren van de Werve, then by Jan Ruigrok van de Werve. Whatever is going on here, it's clear that the Sweym and van de Werve families are closely related somehow. Most likely Gijsbert Sweym was married to a daughter of Jacques (Jacob) van de Werve, born about 1250 and a burgemeester of Antwerp in 1270.

If Gijsbert Sweym was in fact a son of Johan van Broeckhuysen, then Gijsbert would be the first generation of van Swalmens and only one or two generations removed from Gent, and the van Swelmen/Broeckhuysens may have maintained contact with its family in Gent. Gent was only 34 miles from Antwerp and they were connected by the Scheldt, so it's likely that the noble families f Gent were well acquainted with the noble families of Antwerp.

If Gijsbert Sweym was born as Gijsbert van Swalmen, and if his grandfather was Siger van Gent, then the two families must have been related through their common ancestor, and it was quite common for noble families to intermarry through the generations, so this wouldn't be unusual. Otherwise, we're left with a coincidence that the Sweym line, which I believed a year ago had probably come from the van Swalmen line, now turns out also to be related to Siger van Gent, who I've recently come to believe was the founder of the van Swalmen line.

But obvioulsy I don't think it's a coincidence. Gijsbert Sweym, if he was Gijsbert van Swalmen, was either the first or second generation born in Swalmen, and it's possible that the family had kept in contact with their family in Gent and Antwerp, including the Berthouts. If Gijsbert Sweym wasn't a van Swalmen, then how did he coincidentally come by the very same name as the van Swalmens? There is some possibility that he came from Zwalm in Flanders, because as we'll see, one of Oda van Grimbergen's daughters by her marriage to her other husband Wouter V van der Aa was married to Giselbert II van Zotteghem, heer van Massemen. Zottegem is located only about 4 miles from Zwalm (I've been looking for a link between Zwalm and Swalmen for awhile). If Zwalm is pronounced in Flanders as Swalmen is pronounced in Limburg, then someone from there would be called something sounding like Sweym. So that's a possibility, but I doubt it's true.

Van Foreest and St. Omer

Gijsbert Sweym, the first of the Rijswijk Sweyms, married Clementia van Foreest. 

The first known Foreests were probably W. de Foresto, ridder (knight) and his wife Mathildis. These were mentioned in a charter dated September 1241 that also mentioned two sons of this couple: H. de Foresto and Wilhelmus de Foresto. The father, W. de Foresto, was dead at the time the charter was written. The charter was apparently made in order to obtain a loan from someone, perhaps the “kappitel van Sint Ommars en de Abdij van Sint-Bertinus,” renouncing their rights to income and possibly ownership from that church and/or abbey. The Abbey of Saint Bertine was located in Saint-Omer in Flanders, hundreds of miles from the Foreest home in Frechen (AKA Vrechen) which is located today in Germany, a few miles west of Cologne and about 40 miles northeast of Aachen. In 1241 Frechen was probably controlled by the Archbishopric of Cologne. In 1240 William IV, Count of Jülich, came into conflict with the Archbishopric of Cologne on his eastern border, and perhaps W. de Foresto died in a conflict between the two rulers, but this is mere conjecture.

In any case, W. de Foresto was dead and his wife Mathilde had two children by him. A Geni.com genealogy shows her as being a daughter of Floris I Herbaren van der Lede and Jacomijn Hugo Bottersdr, making her an Arkel descendant on both sides, although I have no idea whether this relationship is supported by documentary evidence. But this could help explain why Mathilda would move to Holland and also how the family came by the given name Herbaren, but even if that genealogy is wrong, she did move her family to Holland. In Holland she remarried to Floris III Herbaren van der Woerde (1212-1250) and by him had more children who were surnamed van der Woert. Apparently once in Holland the surname de Foresto was now called van Foreest.

The Wikipedia article says that the name of the wife of Wilhelmus (Mathilda's son by W. Foresto) is unknown but that it was probably a daughter of Harberen van der Woert, the de Woert family being a “bastard branch of the powerful House of Voorne.” If so, she would also have been his new stepsister.

Wilhelmus died in 1278 leavivng three sons: Herpert (Herbaren), Joannus (Jan), and Wilhelmus (Willem). Herpert/Herbaren was the oldest and received lordship of the ambacht on the Rhine, still then called Terrarum de Foreest. It's clear that Wilhelmus the father was a powerful man because one of the witnesses to his will was the Viscount of Zeeland Albrecht van Voorne (the brother of Hendrick van Voorne, one of Jan V van Arkel's great-great grandfathers). According to Ridderschap in Holland Willem van Foreest was also the “ambachtsheer van het ambachtje Foreest in Reeuwijk [near Gouda].”

Herbaren van Foreest had four children, one of whom was Clymens (Clementia) van Foreest, who married Gijsbert Sweym.

In the 600's Omer, Bishop of Therouanne, established the Abbey of Saint Bertin in Saint-Omer. A town grew up around the abbey. In 860 and 880 Vikings plundered and pillaged Saint-Omer, causing the town and monastery to build walls and other defenses. In 932 Arnulf of Flanders conqured the County of Artois and Saint-Omer (Sint-Omaars) became part of the County of Flanders until 1214 when Philip II of France captured Saint-Omer and it became part of France, although for the next 170 Saint-Omer "remained part of the economic network of Flanders." (Wikipedia "Saint-Omer")

Siger van Gent's ancestors had intermarried twice with the lords of Saint-Omer: f

Ourri Rable Saint-Omer, comte de Saint-Omer (1000-1083) m. Ghislaine van Gent (1002-1059)

Lambert II, burggraaf van Gent (1045-1073) m. Mathilde de Saint-Omer (1047-1071)

Furthermore, since Oda van Grimbergen shared much of Siger's van Gent ancestry, she, too, had those Saint-Omer ancestors. 

Which means that their descendants had large doses of Saint-Omer DNA as well.

Although I don't know how the van Foreest family had made a connection with the Abbey of Saint Bertin in Saint-Omer, it's clear that they did have one. It's possible that a Foreest had fought in the Grimbergen Wars, but that's only a guess. In any case, it indicates a connection to the Siger van Gent-Seger van Broeckhuysen family. The van Foreest family also had a connection to the Rijswijk Sweym family through Clementia van Foreest's marriage to Gijsbert Sweym, but of course if Gijsbert Sweym was a van Swalmen, then that's no surprise because the van Swalmens were also van Gents and descendants of Saint-Omers.

Furthermore, the van Foreests had lived in Frechen, and in the Willem van Gent family:

Willem Willemsz van Gent (1208-) married Maria van Kerpen (1210-).

Kerpen is located 8 miles from Frechen. We don't know where Willem Willems van Gent lived or how he met his wife, but it seems highly unlikely that wasn't acquainted with Wilhelmus de Foresto (1202-1241). Both were knights, both were about the same age, and Willem's wife had been born and probably raised 8 miles from the Foresto/Foreest family. 

So Clementia van Foreest's marriage to Gijstbert Sweym is a nexus between the van Foreest family, the Willem van Gent family, the Rijswijk Sweym family, and the Siger van Gen-van Broeckhuysen-van Swalmen family. 

Catharina de Hertoghe, vrouwe van Duyst (~1410-1467)

I've identified Catharina de Hertoghe as possibly the wife of Otto Gerrits van Oist and mother of Gerrit Ottens and Willem Ottens. This was obviously partly because of her name “de Hertoghe,” but was also for Obviously her surname could explain the origin of the “den Hertog” surname, but was alos because of her connections in the family tree and because of the identity of her father. Here's a screenshot of her entry in the Geni.com tree:

I discovered Catharina de Hertoghe not by looking for someone with her “surname” but rather by following the Flemish van de Werve lineage through the tree and looking for women who could have been the wife of Otto Gerrits van Oist. There's nothing in this tree to indicate that she was ever married to anyone other than Simon van Dammartin or had any children other than with Dammartin, or had lived anywhere near the Land of Arkel, and it's of course possible that I've incorrectly identified her. But it's also possible that whoever entered her into the Geni tree simply didn't know about a previous husband and children. If whoever entered her into the tree had known only about her life in Brussels as a wife of Dammartin, then this this makes sense and it's not surprising that nobody has yet identified her as the mother of Gerrit and Willem Ottens.

Catharina de Hertoghe and Simon Dammartin Herbaix had two children, one son and one daughter. The daughter married Pieter van de Werve, whose father was Nicolaas I van de Werve, lord of Hoovorst (located a few miles southeast of Antwerp). Nicolaas' father was Jean II Raimonsz de Buyser Ruichrock van de Werve ( - 1389), apparently the first to use the specific double surname “Ruichrock van de Werve,” which we've encountered before in relation to the Rijswijk Sweyms (see my 24 December 2021 post). In 1448 Jan Ruigrok van de Werve obtained the Rijswijk “te Werve” estate from Herbaren van de Werve; Herbaren had obtained the estate from his brother Jan in 1434, Jan had obtained it from his father Spronc van de Werve; Spronc had inherited it Gijsbert Sweym, husband of Clementia van Foreest, with the approval of Gerard, Gijsbert's son. This most likely mean that Spronc van de Werve was a son of either Gerard or Gijsbert Sweym, and that the Rijswijk Sweyms had abandoned the use of the name Sweym in favor of van de Werve.

If Gijsbert Sweym was a son of Johan van Broeckhuysen (son of Seger van Broeckhuysen), and if Seger van Broeckhuysen was Siger van Gent, then Gijsbert Sweym was actually Gijsbert van Gent and he must have obtained “te Werve” through marriage to a van de Werve and his descendants reverted to the name van de Werve. I haven't tried to unravel which of the van de Werves used the double surname “Ruichrock/Ruigrock van de Werve,” but they must have been descendants of Jean II Ruichrock de Buyser van de Werve and his wife Katline van Wyneghem (1325-1378). They were thus either siblings or close cousins of the Rijswijk Sweyms and also of Catharina de Hertoghe's son Pieter, who was a grandson of Nicolaas van de Werve and great-grandson of Jean II de Buyser Ruichrock van de Werve.

So here we have a “de Hartoghe” whose daughter married a cousin to the Rijswijk Sweyms (Pieter van de Werve).

Also, Pieter van de Werve was an 11x great-grandson of Arnoud I Berthout van Mechelen-Grimbergen (1080-1147). And Arnoud I Berthout was a 3x great grandfather of Oda van Grimbergen, the wife of Siger van Gent. Thus, Pieter van de Werve was actuallly a distant cousin of the van Swalmens, and of the Rijswijk Sweyms if Gijsbert Sweym was the son of Johan van Broeckhuysen. These Flanders noble families were quite endogamous, so such a cousin marriage was something quite common. If the van Broeckhuysens/van Swalmens had kept in contact with their Flanders cousins, then of course everyone knew who everyone else was.

None of this necessarily means that Catharina de Hertoghe was the mother of Gerrit Ottens and Willem Ottens, but I think it makes it more likely.

Now let's look at Catharina's parents. Her mother was Margaretha van Wesel ( -1380). Nothing appears to be known about Margaretha van Wesel, but we can assume that her father was named “van Wesel” and had some connection to Wesel, which is a city now in Germany located on the east bank of the Rhine essentially opposite of Xanten. Wesel is located 27 miles northeast of Broekhuizen and 43 miles northeast of Swalmen where Otto Gerrits van Oist was presumably born. It doesn't appear that Margaretha van Wesel had any connection to Flanders.

Catharina de Hertoghe's father was Johan de Hertoghe van Osmael, heer van Valkenburg. I can't locate Osmael, but Valkenburg is in Limburg 30 miles south of Swalmen and 9 miles northeast of Oost. However, this didn't necessarily mean that Johan de Hertoghe lived anywhere near Valkenburg (although of course he may have). Many related people at this time appear to have used the name “van Valkenburg,” possibly all of them descendants of Dietrich I von Kleve, count of Heinsberg and Valkenburg (1170-1226). This title had come from his mother, Adelheid von Heinsburg-Valkenburg (1163-1217). If Johan van Valkenburg was a descendant of Dietrich von Kleve, he possibly took the name “de Hertoghe” in 1417 when the County of Cleves raised to a Duchy by Holy Roman Emperor Sigismund. This is just a guess, but it fits with the timeline and the name van Valkenburg.

Even if Osmael was in Flanders, it appears that both of Catharina de Hertoghe's parents were German rather than Flemish, which fits in with the van Broekhuysen and van Swalmen lines, where in Limburg they were essentially on the border between what became Germany and what became Netherland-Belgium. These families interacted with both of these regions, some of their descendants today being German and some Dutch-Belgian.

Ctharian de Hertoghe married married a Fleming from Brussels, her daughter married a Fleming from Antwerp, so it's somewhat anomalous that she was German. However, if she had married Otto Gerrits in Limburg and had then moved to Holland or Utrecht as part of Otto Gerrits' extended family that was heavily Flemish, it isn't surprising that her second husband would be Flemish.

However, I emphasize again that this is all just speculation. We don't really know anything about Catharian de Hertoghe. It's possible we'll never know anything else about her, but it's also possible that there's more about her but that hasn't been found because nobody's been looking for her in relation to the Swaim/den Hartog family. She might not have been the mother of Gerrit and Willem Ottens, but at this time she's my best guess.

Very Holy Swalmens

 “Diplomatum Belgicorum (1748 (Diplomatum Belgicorum nova collectio sive supplementum ad opera diplomatica Auberti Miraei ... in quo continentur chartae fundationum ac donationum piarum, testamenta, privilegia, foedera principum, & alia tum sacrae tum profanae antiquitatis monimenta ... Tomus tertius (-quartus) cura et studio Francisci Foppens s.t.l. ... (googleusercontent.com) is a compendium of various old Church documents from Belgium. Chapter LXI is the text of an “Agreement between Walter de Marvis, Bishop of Tornai, and The Abbey of St. Peter, the Monks of Benedict of Ghent...and Swalmæ Omnium SS. in the county of Aalst, in 1239.”

I haven't read the entire document, which appears to be a reorganization among various Church entities, but one of the entities involved in the following part of the agreement is interesting:

Translation:

"The patronage that was formerly attached to the Episcopal Church of Tournai is now attached to Ghent, as the Order of All Saints, commonly known as Very Holy Swalmen; Parish of the County of Aalst, Diocese of Mechelen, Deanery of Rothnac. The right of Patronage was formerly attached to the Bishop of Tournai, but it is now attached to the Archbishop of Mechelen, of ordinary law."

Of course what's interesting about this is that a church in the jurisdiction of Ghent was called “Very Holy Swalmen” (or possibly "Old Holy Swalmen"). This church was no doubt located in or near the town or river called the Zwalm. I've been trying to prove a connection between Zwalm in Belgium and Swalmen and Limburg, and now it turns out that Zwalm in 1239 was actually called Swalmen! And now we have Siger van Gent who left Ghent probably in about 1236 or 1237, who moved to Broeckhuysen but whose family also soon owned a lordship on the river Maas called Swalmen.

Not only that, but we also know from Chapter XXXVII of the same book that in 1156 the Abott of Saint Peter of the Abbot and Monks of Ghent was named Siger (Sigerus).

Translation: "Siger our beloved abbot of Saint Peter of Ghent"

Based on these documents and the near certainty that Seger van Broeckhuysen was Siger van Gent, the ephemeral connection between Zwalm and Swalmen that's bothered me for 3 years is now suddenly clear. Swalmen in Limburg was named after the Swalmen in Belgium, probably in honor of Abbot Siger. This is so obvious now that although I don't know the early history of Swalmen in Limburg, I'm almost certain that it was not called that until sometime after Siger van Gent moved to Broeckhuysen, probably about 1236.

Or, if it turns out that the Limburg Swalmen was named that earlier than the early 1200's, then there must have been some earlier connection between the two places. As I mentioned regarding the possibility that the Viggezele name was Norwegian in origin, another odd connection between Swalmen and Ghent is that both are places that the Danish Viking named Godfrid used as bases for his raiding: Asselt in Limburg and Ghent in Flanders.  

This also must mean that the Swalmen in Flanders was pronounced with a silent “l”, so that it sounded like “Sweym/Zweym.” This also opens up the possibility that the Rijswijk Sweyms did not come from Swalmen as I've hypothesized, but rather directly from Ghent to Holland.

And, as I've hypothesized, that the father of father of Gerrit Ottens and Willem Ottens was a Rijswijk Sweym, possible a van de Werve (Jacob van de Werve?). However, this wouldn't explain why the Ottens brothers failed to use the Sweym or van de Werve surname, and why Willem Ottens' descendants used various surnames rather than just the one from the father of Willem Ottens. Also, the name “Otto” wasn't used by the Rijswijk Sweyms or the van de Werves. Thus, I think that Otto Gerrits van Oist was the true father of Willem Ottens, and his sons used only their patronymic names to avoid association with their infamous father. Willem Ottens' son Jan Zweym did use the surname, but that died with him and his daughters on their marriage, and the other descendants of Willem Ottens used the surname of Willem Ottens's mother, de Hertoghe, and other names—until Thys Barentsen revived the surname in the 1600's.

21 March 2023: 

Siger's father was Zeger III van Gent, burggraaf of Gent. Zeger III's father, and thus Siger van Gent's paternal grandfather, was Zeger II van Gent. Zeger II van Gent's father was Steppo de Viggensele.

As it turns out, Zeger II van Gent was a member of the “Poor Fellow-Soldiers of Christ and of the Temple of Solomon,” also known as the “Order of Solomon's Temple,” more generally known as the “Knights Templar.” The Knights Templar was a Catholic military order founded in 1119 that was sanctioned by Pope Innocent II and was intended to support the Crusaders in their conquests in the Holy Land. The order became very wealthy and powerful, being well-funded and operating an international financial network that was an early form of banking. The order also operated a network of nearly 1,000 commanderies and fortifications across Europe and the Near East “arguably forming the world's first multinational corporation (Wikipedia “Knights Templar,” referencing Malcolm Barber 1994 The New Knighthood: A History of the Order of the Temple.

A commandery was the smallest administrative division of a European landed military order and was also the name of the house where the knights of the cammandery lived. The knight in charge of a commandery was called a commander. (Wikipedia “Commandery”).

From Dutch book De Tempeliers in de Lage Landen [The Knights Templar in the Low Countriies] by Jan Hosten:

“ In 1200 Zeger II, the castellan of Ghent, donated his allodium at Viggenseele to the Knights Templar on the occasion of his accession to the order, together with a farm on the Briel in Ghent and a piece of land in Zaamslag. The court in Viggenzele (Kanegem) was not part of the Donation, but two other important farms, the Groot-Vlaaght and the Klien-Vlaaght, were. In addition, large pieces of land, meadows and forest rents, known under the names Kerckyelet, Middelgheleet and Schalsghelecht, were donated...When Zeger II, the Viscount of Ghent, joined the Templar Order in 1200, he donated a piece of land with a house on the Briel in Ghent, together with a farm in Ghent, his allodium in Viggenzele near Kanegem and his garrisons in Zeeuws-Vlaanderen . The temple court of Ghent was completely walled and provided with a rampart. The main entrance was in the current Sint-Margrietstraat. Before 1288, the knights built a church there, which was dedicated to Onze-Lieve-Vrouw ter Zwalmen. Apparently the building was quite large, because it was taken care of in the iconoclasts. It was the start of a sad series of destruction in the city. In 1797 the building was completely demolished. The rest of the temple court disappeared underground until the end of the last century, during an emergency excavation, the remains were found...The Temple Court of Ghent enjoys a lot of interest because of the presence of Adelise, the only "temple nun" from the Low Countries that we know today. Although the Temple Rule did not allow women in the order, there are many examples, even of praeceptresses or women.”

So Siger II van Gent, Siger van Gent's grandfather, became a member of the Knights Templar and donated to the Templar order significant property, including the family's allodial property Viggensele, although the house/farm there was not part of the donation. In 1202, probably after his father's death, Siger III confirmed the donation. The donation was also confirmed in an undated document by Petronilla, wife of Zeger II and mother of Zeger III.

So in Ghent there was a Templar commandery probably called the Tempelhof, which was “quite large.” It was walled-in, had ramparts, and also had a Templar church called Our Dear Lady of Zwalmen.” This appears to be a different church than the one mentioned previously in the 1239 document as “Very Holy Swalmen.” The 1239 document doesn't appear to actually state where “Very Holy Swalmen” was located, but as it was originally controlled by the Episcopal Church of Tournai, it doesn't seem likely that it was located in Gent. Furthermore, it would seem likely that the Templar church “Our Dear Lady of Zwalmen” would be controlled by the Templars rather than through the regular Catholic structure.

But the existence of “Our Dear Lady of Zwalmen” as a church built by the Templars in Gent, along with Zeger II's membership as a Templar, is direct proof of a strong relationship between the van Gent family and the name Zwalmen/Swalmen. This is strong evidence that Siger van Gent, the grandson of Zeger II van Gent the Templar, was indeed the same person as Seger van Broeckhuysen.

Remember, the genesis of my hypothesis that Siger van Gent was Seger van Broeckhuysen occurred not because of this connection of the van Gent family to churches with “Swalmen” in their name, but rather through the familial connection of Oda Berthout van Grimbergen's mother Sophie van Altena's sister Margaretha van Altena to those related to her by marriages to Hendrick Engelbert van Horne and Otto von Ahr-Wickrath. It was those familial connections to people associated with the Limburg Swalmen family, as well as the similarity in the van Broekhuysen/van Swalmen and van Gent coats of arms, that caused me to focus on Siger van Gent; at the time I didn't know yet that Siger van Gent's family was closely associated with a church in Ghent named “Our Dear Lady of Zwalmen.” But once I knew that, I knew that it was extremely unlikely that this was simply a coincidence. Either Swalmen in Limburg was given that name by Siger van Gent/Broeckhuysen or his son or grandsons, or there was some previous and unknown connection between the two places so that one place had been named after the other.

An interesting question is whether or not Siger van Gent and/or any of his siblings were also Templars, and whether such a connection was somehow a motivation for Siger's move to Broeckhuysen. A Baudouin de Gand is listed 1176-1178 as a “Visitor of France and Poitou” in the Wikipedia article “List of Knights Templar,” but no other van Gent is listed, including Zeger II. There were thousands of knights and other associated with the Templars, so the Wikipedia list is nowhere near exhaustive.

Another interesting issue is how the demise of the Templars affected the van Gent family. In 1307 Pope Clement dissolved the Templar order and ordered Christian monarchs in Europe to arrest all Templars and seize their assets. This was done because King Philip IV of France was deeply indebted to the Templars and also feared the power of the order, so that he had many Templars in France arrested and tortured until they “confessed” to a variety of evils sins, essentially “proving” they worshipped Satan rather than Christ. Most of the European monarchs didn't believe these “confessions” obtained through torture and didn't arrest the Templars, but nonetheless that was the ignominous end of the Templars. After King Philip's smear campaign, it's likely that most people who'd been associated with the Templars felt it wisest to downplay that association.

DNA Evidence

Seger van Broeckhuysen was born around the year 1200 AD, which is about 760 years before I was born. Thus, between 22-30 generations have passed between Seger's birth and mine, using a figure of from 25-35 years per generation. In this post I'll discuss autosomal (“normal”) DNA only and not Y-DNA. Autosomal DNA is recombined at each generation between both parents, meaningn that about half of the DNA from any particular ancestor is lost to one's line with each generation. This means that I will have inherited none to very little DNA from any particular ancestor from 22 generations ago. And even if I do, it's likely to be a very small segment of DNA.

The same is true for any other descendant of any particular ancestor, of course, and so the odds of some other descendant having inherited te same small segment of DNA as I did from a particular ancestor is very small.

On the other hand, small segments of identifiable autosomal DNA do survive intact for many generations, and every person has many small segments of DNA from many generations ago. So very old identifiable segmenst of DNA do exist, but the odds of finding a match for a distannt ancestor is low

More importantly, it's even less likely that I'll have a cousin who also inherited the exact same small segment of DNA that I did. However, it's not impossibe, and in fact it's likely that all of my DNA matches from Belgium are succh cases. I have 14 DNA matches who live in Belgium, but 7 of these are actually Finns living in Belgium rather than being ancestrally Belgium. Of the 7 true Belgians, 4 only count as 2, because thre are two sets of close family, and I count close family as one match if they share the same DNA in common with me. Thus, I have 5 unique Belgian matches. One of these is Verstraeten, who I've preiously mentioned and will mention in a future post in relation to Scandinavian matches of Dutch DNA matches. Her ancestry as shown in her tree is entirely from Limburg. The rest of the matches except for one have trees to small to be usable.

The one Belgian match with an extensive tree is named de Clerck, whose father is also a match but didn't post a family tree. The triangulation of the two de Clerck matches and myself is interesting in that I share 1 segment on chromosome 12 in common with both de Clercks (slightly more DNA with Father de Clerck), but I separately share 1 segment on chromosome 20 in common with Father de Clerck than Son de Clerck doesn't have, and 1 segment on chromosome 19 with Son de Clerck that Father de Clerck doesn't have. This means that chromosome 12 and 20 came from Father de Clerck and chromosome 19 came from Mother de Clerck (who didn't test her DNA). 

Son de Clerck's mother's father and mother's mother both come from Antwerp, but his mother's father's line is not developed in the tree. However, the Grimbergen ancestry comes from his mother's mother's side; one of Son de Clerck's 3x great-grandmothers was Johanna van Grimbergen (1841-1919) of Kieldrecht. This Grimbergen line in the tree goes back to Jean van Grimbergen (1778-) of Kallo. Interestingly, Jean van Grimbergen was married to Barbara Verstraeten, who shares the same surname as one of my other Belgian matches, although not the same DNA segments. 

Son de Clerck's mother's mother's line also has a 4x great-grandmother named Joanna Cornelia van Ranst (1793 Doel - 1871 Kieldrecht). In the tree this line goes back to about 1565 in Temse. The van Ranst line is also a branch of the Berthout van Grimbergen line, as it began in the 100's with Arnold van Ranst Berchem Cantecrode (1101-1186), son of Arnoud I Berthout van Grimbergen (1080-1147), who was Oda van Grimbergen's 3x great-grandfather.

Son de Clerck's mother's mother's line also has a 5th great-grandmother Maria Catharina de Hertoghs (1800-1871) born in Woensdrecht in Brabant (south of Bergen op Zoon), died in Stabroek Antwerp. In the tree this goes back to Cornelius Matthijsen Hertoghs (1580-1660), married in Roosendaal Brabant, died in Essen Flanders. 

Son de Clerk's father's line has a 7th great-grandmother Anna de Gendt (1709-1774) from Bazel, which is located 5 miles from Bornem. Bornem, as I mentioned earlier, is was the town that Steppo de Viggezele's father was lord of. Bornem was also part of the name of Margaretha van Altena's mother: Margaretha van Gent van Bornem (1141-1194).

So it seems that the DNA from Son de Clerck's father's line might be van Gent DNA, while the DNA from his mother's side might be van Grimbergen DNA (an echo of Siger de Gent!). But for Son de Clerck's mother that DNA might instead be de Hertoghs (den Hartog) DNA. There is, however, another possibility in that line of both parents of Son de Clerck have ancestors with the name Cools (possibly from the town of Coolscamp, now spelled Koolskamp, 10 miles southwest of Ruiselede). If the Cool line from the Land of Arkel came from Flanders, which I now suspect, the segment of DNA that I share with both Father and Son de Clerck might be Cool DNA rather than Grimberen or de Gent DNA. But even if that segment of DNA from de Clerck is Cool DNA, there are still the other two segments, one from the father and one from the mother, which could be Grimbergen or de Gent DNA, or the one from his mother could be den Hertog DNA. 

Another interesting thing about this DNA match is that MyHeritage's "Genetic Groups" not only places de Clerck in "Flemish in Belgium (Flanders) and "Netherlands (North Brabant) and Belgium (Antwerpen)"groups, but also in the "Bretons in France (Brittany)" group, which is surprising evidence of the reality of a connection to Brittany that Seger van Broeckhuysen claimed in his coat of arms.

My shared DNA matches with Father de Clerck and son de Clerk are mostly the same and are mostly American, none of which has a large family tree publicly avaialable. However, in Son de Clerck's tree but not in his Father's, which means that it comes from Son de Clerck's mother, there are a few Scandinavian DNA matches. The subject of these shared Scandinavian DNA matches with my Dutch DNA matches will be the subject of a future post, so I won't discuss it here. 

I had in the past looked at Son de Clerck's family tree and had seen de Hertoghs in it, but I hadn't known what to do with it because I hadn't realized the importance of Flanders in the famly tree (despite knowing that Jan Vlaminc was one of the names used by a Rijswijk Sweym), but I had paid no attention to van Gent and van Grimbergen, except I had known that a couple van Arkels has supposedly been killed in the Grimbergen Wars. I only revisited Son de Clerck's family tree after I had figured out that Seger van Broeckhuysen was Siger van Gent. The de Clerck family tree in my opinion is strong evidence all of the elements of my hypothesis are probably true, because if even one is not true I probably wouldn't have de Clerck as a DNA match (possibly unless Cools = Cool). The elements are that Siger van Gent was Seger van Broeckhuysen and that Otto Gerrits van Oist was a van Broeckhuysen-van Swalmen and that Otto Gerrits van Oist was Willem Otten's father.  

Pennebaker

As I've discussed previously, a Pennebaker is a 12-STR DNA match to the Swaim/den Hartog paternal line. Although many 12-STR matches are only distantly related, I've determined that Pennebaker is a true Y-DNA match, which is also confirmed by the fact that the earliest known Pennebaker ancestor, who lived in the 1500's, was born in Gorinchem. That could be a coincidence, but the odds are strongly against it. Even more interesting, the Pennebaker family had a “family legend” that said that the Pennebaker family had migrated to Holland in the mid 1300's from “Gaul” due to plague and wars. Anywhere that French was commonly spoken could probably have been considered Gaul, so this is evidence that the early Swaim/den Hartog line did indeed come from France or somewhere in today's Belgium, Liege, etc.

                                        

Van Broeckhuysen van Ooijen

I noted in my 31 October 2022 post that 6 of my 104 Dutch DNA matches (5.7%) had someone in their family trees named Oyen/Oijen/Ooijen. Considering that most of my Dutch DNA matches have small trees or no trees at all, the percentage would probably be much larger if every match had a large tree.

I haven't been able to determine how I'm related to any of my Dutch matches, other than the few who have a den Hartog or a Cool in their family tree. I'm related to my Dutch matches through many different chromosomes, and most of my Dutch matches can be liked together as Dutch matches of other of my Dutch matches. This probably means that I'm related to most of my Dutch matches through one ancestor from whom I've inherited many different segments of DNA, although each DNA segment itself is small.

I don't know who that ancestor is, but most likely it's either a Cool or a Swaim/den Hartog (or both, since in Holland Cools and Swaim/den Harogs have intermarried, and in America my Swaim line in the late 1800's acquired New Netherland Cool ancestry through marriage).

The fact that 6 of my Dutch DNA matches have van Oijens in their family trees is probably evidence that the Swaim/den Hartog line did in fact descend from the van Broeckhuysen line, since the van Ooijens were a branch of the Broeckhuysen line.

Siger van Gent's 4x great-grandfather was Baudoin I, Count of Guines, and in Guines was the town of Oye. It's possible that the places along the Maas founded by the van Broeckhuysens were named after the Oye in the County of Guines. 

      Appendix: Miscellaneous Information From Before I                                   Discovered the Van Gent Connection 

Otto Gerrits van Oist

I believe it's likely that Otto Gerrits van Oist was the father of Willem Ottens and thus the entire Swaim/den Hartog line. However, there appears to be no documentation of his existence in Limburg, although this isn't highly problematic since if he was a younger son who had no prospect of inheriting land, he may never have been mentioned even if he'd remained in Limburg, and he may have left to find his fortune in Holland/Gelderland.

The first van Oist that we know of was first mentioned in 22 April 1348 as “Deddrich van Oest, recht burger van Reurmonde.” Werner van Swalmen, knight, was mentioned in 26 December 1350, so they were contemporaries. Werner van Swalmen was from Generation 6 in the above genealogy, and was a son of Seger Vosken van Broeckhuysen van Swalmen. Werner's siblings were Vosken, Gerard, Robijn, Guda, and Bela.

On 8 May 1381 Robijn van Swalmen sold the lordship of Swalmen and Hillenraad to “zijn neef Dirk van Oest en diens echtgenote Felicitias” (“his nephew Dirck van Oest and his wife Felicitas”). Neef apparently at the time also could mean cousin as well as nephew, but I now think in this context it did mean nephew. A nephew is a son of a sibling, so if Dirk van Oest was a nephew to Robijn van Swalmen, Dirk van Oest would have been a son of either Vosken, Gerard, Guda, or Bela.

We are trying to place both Dirk van Oist and Otto Gerrits van Oist within the van Swalmen family. Otto Gerrits van Oist died in 1436 as a soldier or soldier-of-fortune for Jan van Arkel van Heukelom, so we can assume that he was younger than 50 years old, and probably much closer to 30, or even in his 20's. Thus, he was probably born in 1386 ast the earliest, but more likely somewhere around 1406.

The father of Otto Gerrits van Oist must have been named Gerrit or it's equivalent Gerard, since the “Gerrits” in his name is the patronmyic for “son of Gerrit.” Gerrit was used more often in Holland; Gerard more in French-speaking regions, and Gerhard in Germany, but they are all just variations of the same name and a person moving from one place to another would likely be called with out objection by whichever of these local variations was most common where he'd moved. Thus, a Gerard in Limburg would be called Gerrit in Holland.

In the patronymic naming system, oldest sons were often named after their father's father, apparently the second son after the mother's father, and succeeding sons by some name already in the father's or mother's family. This naming convention wasn't always followed, but it was common. But this had the effect that for a few generations, or many gnerations, a father-oldest son string of names could occur, such as Gerrit-Otto-Gerrit-Otto. This is why we can assume that it would be likely that the father of Gerrit Ottens (older brother) and Willem Ottens (younger borther) would be Gerrit. Of course, this is for the given name; the surname-like patronymic (e.g., “Gerrits” in Otto Gerrits) was always named after the father except sometimes if the son was illegitimate.

Thus, in relation to Gerrit Ottens and Willem Ottens, we're definitely looking for a person named Otto. But also it's also quite likely that this Otto's patronym would have been “Gerrit,” since Gerrit Ottens was the oldes son and the Gerrit-Otto-Gerrit first-son patronymic pattern may have been followed.

Thus, the father of Gerrit Ottens and Willem Ottens may have been named Otto Gerrits, and this is one bit of evidence in favor of Otto Gerrits van Oist being the father of Gerrit Ottens and Willem Ottens.

So who, then, was the father of Otto Gerrits van Oist? His first name was definitely Gerrit/Gerard/Gerhard, but we can't really assume anything beyond that except that Gerrit might be a name the family had used previously.

The actual years of birth are not known for all the van Swalmens and van Oists who lived during the 1300's. Thus, their years of birth and ages at any given time have to be roughly estimated. Since it seems unlikely that the name of a minor would be named in an entry for having done something noteworthy in politics, we can assume that a person named in an archived entry would have been at least 21 years old. He may have been far older, but isn't likely to have been younger. To determine some kind of rough estimate for the birth years of these people from the 1300's, I'll use the date that each person was first mentioned in the Roermond archives, then subtract 25 from that and then round down to the nearst year ending in “0” or “5.” For some people this could obviously be far off the mark, but at least it gives something to work with. Then I'm going to place Dirk van Oist as the son of Gerard Vosken van Swalmen, which would mean that he was Robijn van Swalmen's nephew and was a Gerard/Gerrit. I'll also place Otto Gerrits van Oist as the son of Dirk van Oist because Otto Gerrits van Oist was a contemporary of Johan van Oist lord of Swalmen/Hillenraad, and Johan van Oist is stated by Genealogies and by Loe Giessen to be the son of Dirk van Oist.

1265 Seger Vosken van Broeckhuysen van Swalmen

1300 Gerard Vosken van Swalmen (m. Guda van Elmpt)

1320 Dirk van Oist (moved from Swalmen to Oost)

1405 Johan van Oist (died ~ 1453)

1430 Dirk (II) van Oist (1456 Kichen Master Guelders)

1407 Otto Gerrits van Oist (died 1436)

        Gerrit Ottens (1^st mentioned 1481)

        Willem Ottens (1^st mentionied 1481)

You can see a glaring problem with this hyothetical genealogy, which is the highly problematic 85-year gap between Dirk van Oist and his supposed son Johan van Oist. Dirk van Oist was first mentioned in 1348 and Johan last mentioned in 4 January 1453. This means that even if Dirk van Oist was only 21 years old when he was first mentioned in 1348, he would have been born in 1327, which is a 126 year span between Dirk's birth and Johan's death. If we use a 32-year generation for paternal lines, which has been shown in studies to be roughly the norm, then if Dirk was born in 1327 Johan would have been born in 1359 and at the age of his death Johan would have been about 96 years old. While this is possible, it isn't likely.

I think it's more likely that we're missing a generation in the van Oist line, and that Johan was actually a grandson of Dirk van Oist (and Felicite d'Oupeye) rather than a son. And if we assume that the name of Dirk's missing son was Gerard, named after Dirk's hypothetical father Gerard Vosken van Swalmen, then we get this revised hypothetical genealogy:

1265      Seger Vosken van Broeckhuysen van Swalmen

1300           Gerard Vosken van Swalmen (m. Guda van Elmpt)

1335                Dirk van Oist (moved from Swalmen to Oost)

1370                     Gerard van Oist

1405                          Johan van Oist (died ~ 1453)

1430                               Dirk (II) van Oist (1456 Kichen Master Guelders)

1407                          Otto Gerrits van Oist (died 1436)

                                         Gerrit Ottens

                                         Willem Ottens

This is much more likely. The gap between the births of Dirk van Oist and his hypothetical son Gerard and between the hypothetical Gerard and his hypothetical sons Johan and Otto Gerrits are still fairly long, but definitely possible—and, in any case, these dates are just rough approximations.

Here's another way to gauge the timing of all this, and whether or not it's likely there's a missing generation between Dirk van Oist and his supposed son Johan. This is by using line of descendants of Felicite d'Oupeye's brother Adam as a calendar to measure against the van Oist genealogy.

As I'll mention in the next section on the d'Oupeye family, Lambert d'Oupeye and Adelheid d'Oudenaard had among their children a daughter named Felicite and a son named Adam. We knw that Felicite married Dirck van Oist and supposedly had Johan as he son. Adam and his wife Cunegonde de Juppleu had a daughter named Aleydis. Aleydis married Hendrik III van Gronsveld, and Aleydis and Hendrik had two children named Kathariana and Johanna. Katharina (van Gronsveld) (1400-1451) married Dirk I van Bronkhorst-Batenburg (1395-1451).

In my post of 5-22-2022 I said that when I had cobbled together a possible family tree of various possible relatives of the Swaim/den Hartog family, the tree seemed to center on the van Bronckhorst family. I said that this was unexpected because I hadn't previously seen any Bronckhorst connection to the Swaim/den Hartog line. However, after I had made this hyothetical genealogy I then found an archive entry from 1492 that stated that Johan van Oist (supposed son of Dirk van Oist and Felicite d'Oupeye) was a leenstadhouder of Hendrik van Bronkhorst-Batenburg in Gronsveld, and also mentioned Willem van Vlodrop in connection to them. So this proved a close relationship between Johan van Oist and the Bronckhorst family.

This Hendrik van Bronkhorst-Batenburg who was mentioned with Johan van Oest was no doubt the same Hendrik I van Bronkhorst-Batenburg (1427-1496) listed in the Geni.com tree., and Dirk I (1395-1451), married to Katharina van Gronsveld, is shown as his father.

So what we have are two lines of descent from two children of Lambert d'Oupeye and his wife at a meeting in 1492. Johan van Oist and Hendrick van Bronckhorst-Batenburg were at that meeting. Here's a side-by-side comparison of the descedants of those d'Oupeye siblings:

Lambert d'Oupeye                                     Lambert d'Oupeye

Felicite d'Oupeye                                       Adam d'Oupeye

Johan van Oist (d. 1453)                           Aleydis d'Oupeye (d. 1447)

                                                                  Katharina van Gronsveld (d. 1451)

                                                                  Hendrik van Bronckhorst-Batenburg (d. 1496)

Again, Johan van Oist was alive at the same time as Hendrik van Bronckhorst, yet supposedly Johan van Oist was only 2 generations down from Lambert d'Oupeye whereas Hendrik van Bronckhorst was 4 generations down from Lambert d'Oupeye.

This is unlikely to be correct. But if we add a missing generation to the van Oist side of the comparison things look much better:

Lambert d'Oupeye                       Lambert d'Oupeye

Felicite d'Oupeye                        Adam d'Oupeye

                                                    Aleydis d'Oupeye (d. 1447)

Johan van Oist (d. 1453)             Katharina van Gronsveld (d. 1451)

                                                    Hendrik van Bronckhorst-Batenburg (d. 1496)

Now we can say that it's more likely Johan van Oist and Hendrik van Bronckhorst were contemporaries and could have had a meeting together to decide a matter important engough to have been chronicled. Johan van Oist was a generation old, but that makes sens.

Thus, I believe that Johan van Oist was not the son, but the grandson, of Dirk (I) van Oist. This is true even if Dirk (I) van Oist wasn't the son of Gerard Vosken van Swalmen. But if he was, then it wouldn't be surprising if Dirk's son, or one of his sons, was named Gerard. What happened to that son? Perhaps he left Limburg to make his home elsewhere, leaving his son Johan behind to inherit Hillenraad/Swalmen and taking his son Otto with him; or perhaps his son Otto followd him later.

It should also be noted that it was common in the van Broeckhuysen family to branch off and take a new surname from a place that branch had become lord of:

Seger van Broeckhuysen van Swalmen (mentioned 1271-1286) branched from his father Willem van Broekhuysen (1270-1290) and took the name van Swalmen.

Seger I van Broeckhuysen van Ooijen (mentioned 1311-1338) branched from his father Johan van Broeckhuysen (mentioned 1314-1321) and took the name van Ooijen.

Joan van Broeckhuysen van Wickrade (mentioned 1352-1375) branched from his father Johan van Broeckhuysen (mentionied (1314-1354) and took the name van Wickrade/Wickrath.

Thus, it wouldn't be surprising to hypothetically have:

Ghijsbert Sweym van Rijswijk branch from his father Seger van Broeckhuysen van Swalmen (mentioned 1271-1286) after a move to Rijswijk (Holland).

Dirck van Oist branch from his hypothetical father Gerard van Swalmen, son of Seger van Broeckhuysen van Swalmen (metioned 1271-1280) after a move to Oost.

But again, these are just hypothetical scenarios.

Maurits Jansen van Brockhuijsen

Maurits Jansen van Brockhuijsen was a cousin to Kiliaen van Rennselaer, the man who founded the New Netherland colony near today's Albany, The two men were related through Rennselaer's marriage to Hillegonda van Byler (1598-1626), daughter of Wolfert van Bijler (Geni.com).

Maurits Jansen van Brockhuijsen came to New Netherland in 1637 aboard the Rennselaerswyck, Van Rennselaer arranged for his cousin Maurits van Brockhuijsen to have a farm, and provided him with a competent foreman to oversee the farm. Maurits remained in America for about 5 years and then returned to the Netherlands where by 1655 he was a merchant in Rotterdam. I discovered that Maurits was a merchant in Rotterdam through a Google search on his name, which came up with an openarch.nl entry for “Registration on January 26, 1655” (Registration machtiging 26-jan-1655 on January 26, 1655 » Open Archives . Ths entry is regarding the estate distribution to Maurits, his brother Joannes van Broeckhuijse (wine buyer), and his sister Aeltgen van Broeckhuijsen, heirs of Joannes van Broeckhuijsen and Cornelia van Bijlaer. This entry also says that these the maternal grndmother of these Broeckhuysen siblings was named Elisabeth Beelij van Leeuwen. Also mentioned was Wijnant van Bijlaer, uncle of the siblings, and his widow Anna Noeste.

The reason we know that this 1655 merchant Maurits van Broeckhuijsen is the same person as the Maurits van Brockhuijsen who was cousin to Kiliaen van Rennselaer and who went to America for 5 years is from a letter written by Kilian van Rennselaer on 10 May 1638, where he wrote to him: “Honorable, discreet cousin Maurits Jansen: These few lines will serve to let you know that I duly receive your letters from England, as also those from the colony, and forwarded the enclosed to your uncle wynnant van bylaer but received no reply from him. In the expectation of good behavior I have procured your advancement, namely that you are to have a farm on the conditions of ail the other farmers...” Thus, this letter and the testamentary document together provide a nice little genealogy for Maurits van Broeckhuysen.

Kilian van Rennselaer never himself visited his colony in America, and it seems likely he sent his cousin there in part to act as a trusted set of “eyes and ears” in the colony, perhaps somewhat secretly as he called Maurits his “discreet” cousin, although that might simply be a formal address that was used then.

Okay, so why is this particular Broeckhuysen of any interest to us here at all? I can't connect him genealogically to his ancestors, but clearly his surname together with his high social status, as indicated by his familial relation to Rennselaer, indicates that he must descend from one of the formerly noble Broeckhuysen lineages.

Another passenger on the ship Rennselaerswyck, on which Maurits van Broeckhuijsen came to America, was also a passenger named Thys Barentsen Schoemaecker. This has been known for years and has been discussed by Swaims and others in America as to whether or not he was the same person as the Thys Barentsen who's the Swaim progenitor in America. Nobody has every proved the question one way or the other, and I won't be able to prove it here. I also remember a couple years ago reading somewhere that Maurits van Broeckhuijsen and this Thys Barentsen were both young and were friends and had perhas traveled together, but I can't recall where I read this to check for a source to try to determine if there's evidence for this or if it's just speculation.

I don't know if Thys Barentsen Schoenmaecker actually had the surname Schoenmaecker or if that was just an occupation description of this particular person. I took this name from a letter of Kiliean van Rennselaer to Arent van Curler, dated 4 August 1639. Van Rennselar addressed van Curler as “Mon Cousyn,” so it appears that he was another relative of van Rennselaer who was acting on behalf of van Rennselaer in the colony. In this letter, among other things (including a mention of a commission to “maurits Jansen van Broeckhuysen”), he says that “Thys barentsen Schoemaecker still owes me a good deal ; let him pay you in skins at a reasonable price.”

These New Netherland entries are from the book “New York State Library Van Rennselaer Bowier Manuscripts” translated and edited by A.J.F. Van Leer, 1908. Towards the end of the book are short compilations of the New Netherland history of varous settlers. Here are the entries for Maurits van Broeckhuijsen and Thys Barentsen

Thijs Barentsz, shoemaker; charged with supplies from June 5, 1637, to 1643, when he was indebted to the amount of f341 : 14. Jan. 18, 1652, he was ordered to pay his account within a month.

Maurits Jansz van Broeckhuysen; was a young relative of Kiliaen van Rensselaer and came out as farm hand by the Rensselaerswyck. May 12, 1639, he was authorized to establish himself as farmer on de Laets Burg, on the farm formerly occupied by Gerrit Theusz de Reux. In the accounts he is credited with four years' salary, at f110 a year, beginning April 3, 1637. One half year's wages are charged to Cornelis Teunisz, from Breuckelen. His account closes Sept. 7, 1641. Feb. 12, 1642, he is referred to by Kiliaen van Rensselaer as having lately returned from New Netherland.

It does appear as if Thijs Barentsen was not surnamed “Shoemaker” but rather that was his trade. He's only mentioned because he owes money. He was in the colony as of 18 January 1652, which was almost 15 years after he first arrived in 1637. As far as I can tell, he disappears from the record after this time, and if he was the same Thys Barentsen as the Swaim progenitor, then he must have returned back to the Netherlands after this date, to return again in 1661. I don't know of any source that provides a list of passengers of ships returning to Holland from New Netherland, but it there is such a source that should be checked to see if he did return.

Van Bijler

We know from the testamentary document that the mother of Maurits Jansen van Broeckhuysen was Cornelia van Bijlaer and that she had a brother named Wijnant van Bijlaer, whose widow was living in Wijk bij Duurstede.

We also know that Kiliaen van Rennselaer was a cousin to Maurits van Broeckhuysen. Here's a screenshot of the Geni.com tree showing that Rennselaer was married to a Hillegonda van Byler (1598-1626), and that Hillegonda's father was Wolfert van Bijler.

According the Wikipedia article “Kiliaen van Rennselaer (merchant),” Hilegonda van Bijler was the first of his two wives, and was also his cousin (which probably means that Maurits van Broeckhuysen was Rennselaer's cousin two different ways). A biography of Rennselaer by Nicolaas de Roever, located within the New York State Library volume, says that Kilian van Rennselaer began as an apprentice in the diamond and pearl trade to a relative named Wolfert van Bijler Wijnandsz. Wolfert van Bijler had previously lived and worked in London, but by then in Amserdam. Hillegonda was Wolfert van Bijler's daugther, and she and van Rennselaer married young. They had one child, Johan, who survived to adulthood, and Hillegonda died young in 1626. Van Rennselaer remarried to Anna van Wely, the daughter of Johan van Wely, a wealthy merchant who was a son of a sister of Wolfert van Bijler. Thus, all of Rennselaer's descendants would have van Bijler DNA.

The section of the Geni.com tree above doesn't show any ancestors of Wolfert van Bijler, but another part of a Geni.com tree has Wolfert Bijler again, and this one shows the names of his parents:

I showed part of the tree showing two people named van Wely to show that this must be the same Wolfert van Bijler. Those van Welys were a son and daughter of Wolfert's sister Geertruijd van Bijlaer (1553-1622), who was married to Jan van Wely Leeuwen (1553-1612). Jan van Wely Leuwen's grandmother's married name was named Elisabeth

van Leeuwen, so she was probably the van Elisabeth van Leeuwen mentioned in the testamentary document.

The most important relationship is that of Wolfert's parents, Wijnant van Bijler and Cornelia Sweers. When I first saw the surname Sweers I was quite interested because I'd already encountered that surname in connection with my investigation into the Scandinavian DNA matches of my Dutch DNA matches. In this case it was Judith Sweers (1663 Amsterdam – 1669 Norway), married to Ahasverus de Crequi dit la Roche (1620-1678). That investiagion had already turned up the interesting fact that Judith Sweers was an 8^th great-granddaughter of Dirk van Oist and Felicite d'Oupeye. Now here was another Sweers who was an ancestor or cousin of Maurits van Broeckhuysen and Kiliaen van Rennselaer (assuming the correctnes of the Geni.com tree). I'll discuss Judth Sweers below in the section on d'Oupeye.

Unfortunately I can't connect Cornelia Sweers to Judith Sweers' family, but I have little doubt that she was ancestor or collateral ancestor of Cornia Sweers. In Geni tree Judith Sweers' 2x great-grandparents were Dirck II Sweers (1508-1548) and Catharian Moreels (1508-). The tree shows this couple with 4 sons, the last two born in 1538 and 1540. Cornelia Sweers' daughter Geertruijdt van Bijlaer was born in 1555, so Cornelia would have likely been born in the 1530's and could have been their daughter, which would have made her a great aunt to Judith Sweers. Women were mentioned in documents less often then men, so her failure to be included in her immediate family in the tree isn't surprising.

The Geni.com tree also says that I'm Judth Sweer's 11^th cousin 10x removed through my van Couwenhoven line. This supposed lien of ancestry also 4 generations of van Bronckhorst-Batenburgs, and it's at one of these, Jacob van Bronckhorst-Batenburg, that the van Oist-d'Oupeye line merges to go down to Judith Sweers.

The Sweers paternal line supposedly goes up to Amauri de Landas, count of Valenciennes in France (925-973), who's also supposedly a direct ancestor of Jan V van Arkel. Whether or not this distant part of the family tree is true, I have no opinion.

But a few of Judith Sweers xth great-grandmothers married to the xth great-grandfathers in her paternal line are interesting:

Her 7^th great-grandfather Jan IV Sweers (1360-) was married to Catharina van Eyl/Eijl (1332-), In a previous post I've discussed the van Eyl family, although I haven't tried to place this van Eyl within that family.

Her 10^th great-grandfather Hendrik Sweers (1314-) was married to Johanna van Goor. I've also previously discussed the van Goor family, a branch of the van Horne family, but again I haven't tried to place this van Goor within that family.

Sweers Spithoven Famliy Tree

To review, the mother of Maurits van Broeckhuysen was Cornelia van Bijler. The wife of Kiliaen van Rennselaer was Hillegonda van Bijler, probably Cornelia's sister since Maurits and Kiliaen were cousins. The father of Hillegonda and probably Cornelia was Wolfert van Bijler. Wolfert van Bijler's father was Wijnant van Bijler and his Wolfert's mother was Cornelia Sweers.

I found a family tree on Geneanet.org by a man named Spithoven. Wolfert van Bijler is in that family tree, and this is definitely the same Wolfert van Byler, whose daughter Rennselaer married, because because the tree says that he was a “Koopman in diamanten en zijdelakens te Amsterdam. However, in his tree the mother of Wolftert van Bijler is not Cornelia Sweers as is shown in the Geni tree, but Geertje Loef (1495-1540). This would of course destroy the nice Sweers connection to Judtith Sweers just discussed if true.

However, elswhere in the tree there'a a Cornelia Sweer Loeffs (<1527) whose father was Sweer Loeff (1500-). Cornelia's brother is Jan Sweers van Spithoven (1518-1558), so somehow the name Sweer in this tree is also associated with van Loeff and Splithoven. Thus, one or the other of the trees might have the wrong wife for Wolfert van Bijler's mother.

One of my Dutch DNA matches has the surname van der Loeff, so it's possible she's a descendant of Loeff line in this family tree.

I don't have a DNA match named Spithoven or Sweers, or any with those surnames in their family trees, but the van Os-Vroegh family tree that I've referred to in recent posts doe has 2 people surnamed Spithoven, 3 named Sweers, and 19 named Loef.

In the Spithoven family tree is a Conan Spithoven, who may be the father of the owner of the tree. Conan Spithoven's mother's mother was named Elly van Pelt, and her line goes up to Maerte Wessels van Pelt, (1621-1668, born in Schiedam. Maerte's parents were Wessel Jansz and Aeltge Jans, but no other information is given about them.

I've mentioned before that my Ancestry.com speculative tree shows that my 7^th great-grandfather Cornelius Swaim was married to Elizabeth Ann van Pelt. This connection came from the Ancestry crowdsource tree and I haven't been able to verify it. I do have one DNA match on Ancestry with the birth surname van Pelt, and 27 matches who have a van Pelt in their family tree, so it's possible. The matches with the name in their family trees could be victims of bad information, but it's hard to argue that about the match with the name van Pelt. But even that match doesn't prove that I had a van Pelt ancestor.

The story with my supposed van Pelt family is that they had lived in Overpelt in Limburg in today's Belgium and had the surname Laen or Laenen. In the early 1600's the family moved from Limburg, perhaps due to flooding, and had moved from there to Tuil (just next to Waardenburg) and from there to New Netherland. My supposed ancestor Theuenis Jans Laenen van Pelt was born in 1621, which is interestingly the same year that Spithoven's ancestor Maerte Wessels van Pelt was supposed to have been born in Schiedam. It's possible that Spithoven's van Pelts and mine were branches of the same family, and that his remained in Holland and the reason he has no information on Maerte van Pelt's ancestors is that they'd moved from Limburg and thus had nad no presence in Holland until the 1600's.

Also, somewhere in the Spithoven family tree is a Cunera van Spithoven (1667) married to Ott Dircksenn van Couwenhoven (1663-). They lived in Veenendaal. I've previously noted that I supposedly have van Couwenhoven ancestors from Amersfoort, and that I have them as ancestors 3x due to endogamy.

There are thus four possible connections between Spithoven and myself: van Broeckhuysen, van Pelt, van Couwenhoven, and van Oist-d'Oupeye-Sweers.

I want to make one last point about this tree in anticipation of my upcoming post regarding the Scandinavian ancestry of many of my Dutch DNA matches and also about the Scandinvian DNA matches (i.e., cousins) of most of my Dutch DNA matches (those are two different things, and I'll explain in that post). Splithoven isn't a DNA match but his famliy tree provides an instance in which Scandinavian DNA entered into Holland. Pieter Michelsen Rosenberg was born about 1650 in Copenhagen, Denmark. In 1676 in Zuidland, Holland, he married Trijntje Ariens Tuinzaat (1644-1693) and had 5 children by her, and then in 1693 in Zuidland he married Anna Velerius and had 4 children by her. They all apparently remained in Holland and their descedants thus spread Scandinavian DNA through Holland. Any Netherlands descendant of Rosenberg from Denmark, including Spithovens, will have not only some Scandinavian DNA, but also DNA matches from Denmark and probably from Sweden as well

23 December 2023: For whatever it's worth, I also just noticed that I have in my Ancestry.com family tree a 14th great-grandmother named Machteld Cornelia van Spitshoven (1498-1545) married to Aert Huiberts Verkerk (1475-1518)(schepen of Beusichem). The Verkerk line in America then married into the van der Grift line, which married into the van Pelt line.

D'Oupeye

In previous posts I've identified Otto Gerrits van Oist ( -1436) as the possible father of Gerrit Ottens and Willem Ottens. I identified him as such becauce his patronymic name is correct to be the father of his first son Gerrit, because he was present in the Land of Arkel at the proper time, and most of all because the van Oist family during his lifetime were the lords of Swalmen in Limburg. As I've discussed more than once, the name Swalmen in the Limburg dialect is pronounced very much like Swaim. I also think Otto Gerrits van Oist fits into what we know of the Swaim/den Hartog family of the 1400's and 1500's, which at that time was relatively wealthy yet the source of that wealth is unknown, and one has the impression that the identity of the father of Gerrit Ottens and Willem Ottens had been suppressed; since Otto Gerrits van Oist was executed by the city of Utrecht for his part in an unprovoked and undelcared military action by its van Arkel leader, the immediately following gnerations of his family may well have wanted to suppress knowledge of that fact.

However, I haven't been able to place Otto Gerrits van Oist into what is known of the van Oist family of the early 1400's. This isn't too problematic, however, because not much is known about the family of and before that time. We know that Dirck van Oist (AKA Dietrich van Oest, Dedderick van Oost, etc.) was married to Felicite d'Oupeye and that this couple in the late 1300's moved from the town of Oost (today part of Oost-Maarland) to the castle Hillenraad in Swalmen, which they had bought from Dirck van Oist's cousin or unce Robijn van Swalmen. We also know that Dirck van Oist and his wife Felicite d'Oupey had a son named Johann (1423- ) who became lord of Swalmen, followed by his son Dirk. Dirk apparently had no son, so his first daughter Isabelle van Oye van Oest (1465-1502) inherited the estate and married Arnold Shenck van Nydeggen (1452-1526). Arnold Shenck van Nydeggen is supposedly my 1^st cousin 16x removed through my Schenck immigrant ancestors, but I don't know if this is true because I don't know that a definite connection has truly been established between my Schenck ancestors and the Schenk van Nydeggen family.

The father of Otto Gerrits van Oist would of course have been named Gerrit or Gerard, and there appears to be no trace of such a name in any documents. This isn't surprising given the time period, but it makes it impossible to place Otto Gerrits within a family framework.

Dirk van Oist died sometime in or after 1402. His son Johan was first mentioned in 1423 and was possibly married by this time, so Johan was possibly born in sometime in the 1370's. We can estimate that Otto Gerrits van Oist was born sometime between 1400 and 1410, so it's quite possible that Dirck van Oist and Ffelicite d'Oupeye had a son named Gerrit who had a son named Otto Gerrits. As a younger son, Gerrit would not necessarily ahve inherited any real estate and thus his name might never have been recorded (or records could have been lost in one the many wars that occurred in the intervening centuries).

I haven't looked very deeply into the d'Oupeye family because of the uncertainty that Otto Gerrits van Oist was even a d'Oupeye descendant, but lately I've been doing research to try to determine why so many of my Dutch DNA matches have a large number of shared DNA matches (cousins) from Scandinavia, and in the course of this research the d'Oupeye family has come up twice and so I've decided to first post a something about these d'Oupeye connections before I post the results of my larger Scandinavian shared matches investigation.

Although I would be related to Felicite d'Oupeye if it's true that my Schenck ancesctry is Schenck van Nydeggen, then I'm related to Felicite d'Oupeye through Schenck not only because Arnold Schenck van Nydeggen married Isabelle van Oest, but also because I'd be related through Felicite d'Oupeye's 2x great-grandparents Lodewijk II van Lummen (1260-1312) and Jolanda van Diest (1280-1336) (daughter of Arnold VI van Diest, burggraaf of Antwerp). Van Lummen and van Diest are ancestors of both the Schecnk and van Couwenhoven lines.

I can't have d'Oupeye DNA through either the Schenck or van Couwenhoven lines, but I could have van Lummen and/or van Diest DNA through either or both of those lines.

Digression: van Born

It's worth pointing out that Felicite's mother's side were the lords of Oudenaarde going back to at least 1060. In this line, Felcitie's 3^rd great-grandparents were Lodewijck I van Oudenaarde and de Marck (1205-1255) and Mathilde van Limburg (1205-1261), granddaughter of Henry III, duke of Limburg. One of the sons of Lodewuijck and Mathilde was Arnold van Lummen in Felicite d'Oupeyes's line. One of their daughters (thus Arnold van Lummen's sister) was Mathilde van Lummen who married Teutonic Knight Goswijn II, lord of Born (1214-1288).

The reason I mention Goswijn van Born is because this establishes a social connection with Felicite's d'Oupeye's line and the van Swalmen line. As I mentioned previously. Goswijn van Born and Seger van Swalmen may both have married daugthers or granddaughters of Margaretha van Altena, one sired by a Engelbert of Willem van Horne and the other by Otto von Ahr-Wickrath. But even if that wasn't true, we still know that they were acquainted with each other from the Roeromond archive entry of 1272, previously referred to.

This Seger van Broeckhuysen van Swalmen was the first van Swalmen from whom all the rest descended (Generation 3 in the above van Swaalmen ancestry).

The van Born family no doubt took its name from the town of Born on the Maas, located 20 miles southwest of Swalmen. As the van Born and van Swalmen families were both noble families living in such close proximity, of course they would have known each other.

According to the Geni.com tree, a brother of Goswijn II van Born was Otto van Born (1220-1288). Otto's son was Goswijn III, lord of Born (1240-), and one of his sons was named Oyst I van Born (-1296). His son was Oyst II van Born van Elsloo (-1337) and his son was Oyst III van Born van Elsloo (-1374). Elsloo is located about 7 miles south of Born.

I'm mentioning the van Born family for two reasons. The firs is simply because of the similarity of the given name Oyst to that of the surname van Oist. In the Geni.com tree, Oyst III's line ends with him. It's possible that Dirck van Oist was a son of this Oyst and that he was only coincidentally lord of the similar-sounding Oost about 12 miles south of Elsloo. In that case he would have been Dirck Oysts van Oost, the Oyst name being the patronymic of his father's name. This is just speculation and I don't think it's true, but it's possible. Goswijn III's mother is unknown, so she could have been a van Swalmen and in this hypothetical scenario that would have made Drick van Oist a cousin to Robijn van Swalmen.

The second reason I have an interest in this family is that there was a supposedly person named Johanna de Borne (1400- ) who was an ancestor of one of a person in a group of emigrants from the Principality of Liege (organized by a man named de Geer) that I'll discuss in more detail in an upcoming post exploring why so many of my Dutch DNA matches have Scandinavian cousins. An arm of the Principality of Liege extended north of Maastricht (Maastricht itself was controlled jointy by Liege and Brabant), so it's possible that the van Born and de Borne families were the same family.

Digression: Oudenaarde

I'll repeat that Felicite d'Oupeye's mother's line were the lords of Oudenaarde going back to at least 1060. Oudenaarde is located in Flanders 98 miles west of Oupeye and 106 miles southwest of Born.

Oudenaarde is also located 8 miles southwest of the town of Zwalm in Flanders (today's Belgium). Zwalm is located on the river Zwalm, a short river that empties into the Scheldt. I've mentioned Zwalm in a couple of previous posts because it's name resembles that of Swalmen and Swaim, and so I've considered it a possibe source of the name Swaim. I've also wondered if there might be a connection between the Flanders Zwalm and the Limburg Swalmen, perhaps one being named after the other, but I haven't been able to find any connection at all. However, the van Born family, related to the d'Oupeye family, is such a connection. It's a pretty close connection, too, because Seger van Broekhuysen van Swalmen was associated with Goswijn van Born, and Goswijn's wife was Mathilde van Lummen, daughter of Lodewijk I (1205-1255), the lord of Oudenaarde. Thus, Goswijn van Born lived close to Swalmen in Limburg while his wife's family was at one time from Oudenaarde near Zwalm in Flanders.

Also, Goswijn van Born's wife was named “van Lummen.” Lummen is today located in the Belgian province of Limburg, about 31 miles northwest of Oupeye. In Lummen there's a castle named Burg (or de Burg). According to the Wikipedia article “Lummen,” sometime after 1203 this castle was given in fief from the Prince-Bishop of Liege to Lodewijck van Walcourt and then in 1350 it came into the possession of the “Huis van Mark-Arenberg” and remained in the possession of that family until 1794. I can't find anything on Lodewijk van Walcourt, but possible he was a brother of Thierry II de Walmcourt (1230-1276), who was the great-great grandfather of Jean II de Walcourt (1358-1377).

As it turns out, Felicite d'Oupeye was married first to Jean II de Walcourt before she was married to Dirck van Oist. She had one child by Jean II de Walcourt, a son named Jean III, and Jean III had two daughters, one of whom married Everhard II van der Mark-Arenberg. Thus, it's very likely that the castle Burg in Lummen passed from Lodewijck van Walcourt eventually to Felcite d'Oupeye's husband Jean II de Walcourt, and then to their son Jean III, and then to Everhard II van de Mark-Arenberg through Jean III's daughter.

The only reason I mention this is for one of the the same reasons I mentioned the de Born family: because the name Burg appears in an emigrant from somewhere in today's Belgium to Sweden, which I'll discuss in a future post. This person was named Peter Burg and in Finland, to which he moved from Sweden, his name became Peter Porkka, “Porkka” supposedly being a Finlandization of the name Burg. If Peter Burg came from the castle Burg in Lummen, he may have been called Peter de Burg or Peter van Burg, and if he was a descendant of Felicite d'Oupeye and if the Swaim/den Hartog line also descends from Felicite d'Oupeye through Otto Gerrits van Oist, then this could explain why several of my Dutch DNA matches have Swedish and Norwegian DNA matches who are descendants of Peter Porkka.

It's a fact that several of my Dutch DNA matches (cousins) have Scandinavian DNA matches (cousins) with Peter Porkka in their family trees (I'm probably one of them, in fact). It's also probable that Peter Porkka came from somewhere in Belgium, and so it's also probable that he's the link between the cousins in the Netherlands and the cousins in Belgium. What's unknown, however, is how the Dutch DNA matches are linked to Peter Porkka (AKA Peter Burk/Burg). It's possible that it was through the descendants of Felicite d'Oupeye and Dirck van Oist whose ancesors ended up in the Land of Arkel and vicinity. However, it's also possible that it's through someone else.

However, if the Geni.com tree is correct, it's also a fact that d'Oupeye DNA ended up in Norway through another route, which I'll detail below. I don't think that this lineage is related to Peter Porkka, but there's a chance that a few Netherlands-Scandinavia cousin relationships are due to it.

D'Oupeye DNA Goes to Norway

In the Geni.com tree for Lambert IV d'Oupeye (1310-1376) and his wife Adelheid van Oudenaarde (1325-1379) the tree shows three children:

Marie d'Oupeye (1345-) married to Johan I Mascherel, heer van Wijnansrode

Felicite d'Oupeye (b. 1326-1366) married to 3 men:

     Dietrich van Oest

     Jean II de Walcourt, seigneur de Rochefort (1358-1377)

     Thierry d'Oye

   Adam d'Oupeye

Descendants are shown for Marie d'Oupeye and her husband and for Felicite d'Oupeye and her husband Dietrich van Oest but not for her husband Thierry d'Oye. No wife or descendants are shown for Adam d'Oupeye.

This section of the Geni tree needs some editing, because “Theirry d'Oye” is simply a French version of the name “Dietrich van Oest.” Thierry is the French word for Dietrich or Dirk, and “Oye” is just one of the many ways of writing Oist/Oest/Oost/Oyst/Oyss, etc. Thus, these apparently two separate people should be merged into one.

Furthermore, although there's not information on Adam d'Oupeye in this section of the tree, there's a different section of the tree that has another Adam d'Oupeye with a wife and descendants:

These two Adams d'Oupeye are clearly the same person. The dates are within the proper range and Adam's daughter Aleydis married Hendrik III van Gronsveld; Gronsveld is located 2 miles north of Oost, the original home of the van Oist family. Adam married Cunegonde de Juppleu, and the Juppleu family appears to be from further away in Boneffe or Brumagne near Namur, but even so Boneffe is only 34 miles from Oupeye. Cunegonde wasn't shown as part of that family, but in that famliy we find that a Bauduin de Juppleu (1345-1402) married a Julienne de Boulant (1355-1432) whose mother was Maria van Lummen. And Maria van Lummen was the sister of Lambert IV d'Oupeye, the father of Felicite d'Oupeye! In other words, Maria van Lummen was Felicite's aunt, Julienne de Bouland was Felicite's 1^st cousin, and Jeanne de Juppleu was Felicite's 2^nd cousin and thus Cundegonde was probably Adam's 3^rd cousin or perhaps 4^th cousin. At any rate, this is unlikely to be a coincidence, so we're pretty safe in assuming that the two Adams d'Oupeye are the same person.

Both were descendants of Felicite the son of Dirk I van Bronkhorst-Batenburg. In other words,

I hadn't seen this Geni.com entry for the second Adam d'Oupeye, but now it turns out that Adam's daughter Aleydis was married to a Hendrik van Gronsveld, Gronsveld being the town in which Hendrik van Bronckhorst lived. Gronsveld is located less than 2 miles north of Oost, the town from which the van Oist family took its name. The below map shows Oost and Gronsveld, with Oupeye at the bottom left:

This is a pretty close-in view, because Oupeye is only 8 miles from Oost.

And, of course, we also see that Katherina van Gronsveld, the great-granddaughter of Dirck van Oist and Felicite d'Oupeye's married Dirk I van Bronckhorst-Batenburg. I haven't yet worked out the exact relationship of Dirk van Bronckhorst-Batenburg to the Henrik van Bronckhorst-Batenburg of Gronsveld, but obviously they were cousins to some degree.

Here's one line descending from Dirck van Oist and Felicite d'Oupeye:

Lambert IV d'Oupeye (1310-1376) m. Adelheid van Oudenaarde

Adam d'Oupeye

Aleydis d'Oupeye m. Hendrik van Gronsveld

Katharina van Gronsveld m. Dirk I van Bronckhorst-Batenburg (3^rd great-grandson of

                   Jutta Praet's cousin Irmgard van Randerode)

Gijsbert VIII van Bronckhorst-Batenburg m. Agnes van Wisch

Jacob van Bronckhorst-Batenburg m. Agnes von Benheim

Johannes Noviomagus van Bronckhorst (1494-1570) m. Clara Koster

Willem van Bronckhorst (1560-1629) m. Catrijna van Walbeck (1559-)

Alida van Bronckhorst (1583-1365) m. Aerndt Sweers (1575-1635)

Jean Sweers (1610-1639) m. Alida de Vinck (1611-1634)

Judith Sweers (1633-1669) m. Ahasverus de Crequi dit la Roche (1620-1678)

Juith Sweers is thus the 8^th great-granddaughter of Dirck van Oist and Felicitee d'Oupeye. According to her Geni.com entry, dieJudith Sweers was born in Amsterdam and died in Norway. Her husband, Ahasverus de Crequi dit la Roche, was born in the Hague and died in Sweden after his wife Judith had died, but was buried in Stavanger, Norway, so Norway must have been considered is home. Ahasverus's father was born and died in the Hague, and his grandfather was born in France in 1560 and died in the Hague, so he was probably a Protestant refugee who fled to Holland.

So now we have descendants of Dirck van Oist and Felicite d'Oupeye living in Norway. Ahasverus de Crequi dit la Roche and Judith Sweers had at least 3 daughters and 2 sons. The Geni tree has no information on the 2 sons except their names and dates, so we can ignore them. The three daughters and their husbands are:

Jeanne de Crequi dit la Roche (1650-1734) m Christian Claussen Jæger (1606-1695)

Alida de Crequi dit la Roche (1651-) m. Herman Hermansen Garmann (1648-1710)

Catharina de Crequi dit la Roche (1654-1703) m. Peder Pedersen Lem (1660-1703)

The ancestry of Christian Jæger, the husband to Jeanne de Crequi, is Danish from a well-to-do family.

The ancestry of Herman Garmann is Danish; his paternal great-grandfather was Frederick II, king of Denmark and Norway (1534-1588). Frederick II's ancestry included many kings, queens, and high nobility from all over German-speaking lands and Slavic-speaking lands. It also included Henry II, duke of Limburg (1112-1167) and Willem II van Bronckhorst Reckheim (1221-1291), who would be a distant cousin to Judith Sweers through her own Bronckhorst ancestry.

Although Ahasverus de Crequi dit la Roche died in Marstrand, Sweden, he was buried in Stavanger, Norway. At this time, Norway was a part of Denmark and Sweden was a foreign country. In fact, given that Ahasverus died in Marsland in January of 1678, it's likely that he died as a participant in the “Battle of Marstrand” and possibly died as a result of that battle, or at least was present in Marstrand because of that battle. The Wikipedia article “Battle of Marstrand” says that the battle was a “successful Dano-Norwegian siege of the harbor town of Marstrand, Sweden, which took place between 6-23 July 1677” as a part of the larger Scanian War between Sweden and Denmark-Norway that ended in 1679. The campaigns in Norway during the Scanaian War are called “the Gyldenløve War” after Governor-General Ulrik Frederick Gyldenløve who was commander-in-chief of the Norwegian offensive. Gyldenløve was born in Bremen, Germany, the illegitimate son of then-prince but later King Frederick III of Denmark. This means that he, like Herman Garmann, was a great-grandson of Frederick II, King of Denmark. Thus, Ahusverus propbably served in the military and personally knew Gyldenløve, and through him probably knew Herman Garmann, who married Ahusverus' daughter Alida.

Peder Lem's paternal great-grandfather was possibly Peder Lem, born about 1550 in Ghent, Flanders, and died about 1610 in Bergen, Norway ( Geni - Niels Pedersen Lem (1585-1638)- Larvik ). The rest of his ancestry is Danish, and if both our trees are correct I'm related to him more than once through distant Danish ancestry, the most recent through his mother's line:

My intent was to follow the potential flow of d'Oupeye DNA to Norway to determine if my Dutch DNA matches or I might be related to any Norwegian descendants through that DNA, but it doesn't look that that would be posible for the descendants of two of Judith Sweers' daughters because their husbands Garmann and Lem could have “contaminated” their descendants DNA with DNA that I might share through the lines of those husbands. Thus, there's no point in checking for DNA matches. Peder Lem is interesting, however, because since he emigrated from Ghent in Flanders to Norway, his line is obviously another potential source of some of the Scandinavian shared matches of my Dutch matches, if some of Peder Lem's family left Ghent and moved to Holland.

But before I'd thought to check the ancestry of the husbands of Judith Sweers' daughters, I'd already used a matches of matches technique to look for a Dutch link to the Garmann descendants, so I'm going to include that here anyway.

Daughter of Judith Sweers

Alida de Crequi de la Roche (1651-)

married

Herman Hermansen Garmann (1648-1710)- Bergen, Norway

None of my Dtuch DNA matches (nor I) have a Scandinavian shared match surnamed Garmann.

However, I do have a Norwegian match named Grude 16.0 who has a person named Garmann in her family tree—however, that family tree is private. But even though the tree is private, MH still allows someone to check for surnames in that tree. I found a probably Grude relative on Geni.com and checked unique surnames from the Geni tree against the private Grude tree, and because many surnames matche, I'm confident that this is the same Grude family in both trees. Therefore, it's likely that the Garmann in Grude's tree is likely from the same family that Alida de Crequi dit la Roche married into.

Having established that, I used a technique I thought to use to check to see if it's likely that a particular Dutch match is connected to a particular Scandinavian match. My Norwegian match Grude has a Garmann in her family tree, and thus potentially has Garmann DNA. We don't really care about Garmann DNA, but descendants of Garmann and Alida de Crequi will also potentially have d'Oupeye DNA, which we do care about. So if we can show that one or more of my Dutch matches are DNA matches to Garmann, we can show that it's possible that this DNA was d'Oupeye DNA. Since my Norwegian match Grude has a Garmann in her family tree, a match to Grude could indicate this possible link if there's no other plausible reason why a Dutch match would be related to a random Norwegian.

The problem is that none of my Dutch matches show as matches to Grude. Even if a Dutch match is genealogically related to Grude through Garmann, the odds are probably against the two of them sharing common Garmann DNA. However, if we can somehow find other matches related to Grude, those other matches could also potentially have Garmann DNA, and could act essentially as proxy for Grude. The shared matches of Grude could be connected to the Dutch matches through DNA that Garmann himself doesn't have.

In other words, through comparing Scandinavian DNA matches of Dutch DNA matches to Scandinavian DNA matches of Grude DNA matches, the only way there should be a DNA match common to both a Dutch DNA match and to Grude is if there was a common ancestor to both The Dutch DNA match and to Grude. These matches will also be common to me, but that isn't necessary except that I wouldn't see those matches unless I was also a match to both of them. They may have more matches that I can't see because I can only see such matches of matches if I'm also a match.

A list of Grude's Scandinavian matches already exists in Grude's MyHeritage page, and from MyHeritage I made a list of all the Scandinavian matches for 91 of the 104 of my Dutch matches. Thus, I went through Grude's shared matches and compared them to the Scandinavian shared matches of my Dutch matches. The results are that the Norwegian Grude has 13 Scandinavian matches who are also matches to one or more of my Dutch matches.

Each of these 13 “matches of matches” (cousins of cousins) is a match to three people: Grude, the Dutch match, and me. The DNA connecting the 4 matches is not necessarily the same segment of DNA, and is in fact almost never the same DNA. This means that the four matches involved don't necessarily share a common ancestor (i.e., a non-triangulated DNA match could be through a related through marriage rather than through a common ancestor). But because producing a child requires extreme geographical proximitty, a distant non-triangulated match between a person from Norway and a person from the Netherlands probably indicates that they shared a common ancestor. It's just very, very low odds that a match of the Norwegian Grude is also a match of, e.g., the Dutch Remery unless they had a common ancestor.

In each of these cases I am also necessarily a shared match of the other three matches, because that's the only way I know they exist as I only have access to my own matches. Even though I have a good deal of Scandinavian ancestry and thus it's possible that I'm related to, e.g., Grude through my Norwegian ancestry, the odds are against that and in most cases I should be related to Grude in the same way that, e.g., Remery is related to Grude—through a common ancestor of the Dutch match, Grude, the Scandinavian match of a match, and me.

I used the Dutch match Remery because he is connected to Grude through a Scandinavian shared match named Skaret. So here's how it should work:

Dutch Remery is a match to Norwegian Skaret

Norwegian match Grude is a match to Norwegian match Skaret

Norwegian Match Skaret is a match to both Dutch match Remery and to Norwegian match Grude. Thus, Remery links to Grude through Skaret. Grude is a descendant of Garmann, and Garmann is a descendant of Felicite d'Oupeye and Dirck van Oist.

Remery should only be related to Skaret if Skaret has DNA from Felicite d'Oupeye or Dirck van Oist that he inherited from a common ancestor that he has with his cousin Grude, presumably through Garmann.

I'm incidentally a match to Remery, Skaret and Grude, but that's only necessary because if I wan't a cousin to all of them I wouldn't be able to see their relationships. I might be related to any or all of them through my Scandinavian ancestry or through my Dutch ancestry, or a combination of both, but that shouldn't matter for this to work because we're only looking at the relationships of the three of them to each other, not to me.

Also, I could be wrong about this method, which is something that I came up with on my own. I could be missing something important, but I just don't see how any Dutch match could be related to Grude unless he Grude was related Garmann (who descended from d'Oupeye and van Oist). The exception is if Grude is somehow related to some other Dutch person, which is possible but seems pretty unlikely.

Here are the results:

Grude shared match Flodin 56.6 is a shared match of Dutch (Belgian) match Swanepoel

Grude shared match Grøndahl 14.6N is a shared match of Dutch match Meindertsma

Grude shared match Hasle 14.3N is a shared match of Dtuch match Pieters

Grude shared match Olsson 31.6 is a shared match of Dutch shared match Boersma

Grude shared match Eriksson 18.5 is a shared match Dutch shared match AMA Jansen

Grude shared match Sævold 15.2N is a shared match of Dutch shared match Muilwijk

Grude shared match Axelsson 19.9 is a shared match of Dutch match Muilwijk

Grude shared match Dedorsson 20.5 is a shared match of Dutch match Oste

Grude shared match Axelsson 18.2 is a shared match of Dutch match Muilwijk

Grude shared match Øverland 20.8N is a shared match of Dutch match van der Oost

Grude shared match Falk 9.0 is a shared match of Dutch match Buwalda

Grude shared match Rolander 16.0 is a shared match of Dutch match Visser & Pieters

Grude shared match Fjellin 15.4 is a shared match of Dutch match van der Schoor

Grude shared match Skaret 14.9N is a shared match of Dutch mat Remery

These Dutch matches were on that list:

Boersma

Buwalda

AMA Jansen

Meinderstsma

Muilwijk (x3)

Oste

Pieters (x2)

Remery

Swanepoel

van der Oost

van der Schoor

Visser

In other words, each of these Dutch matches had one or more Scandinavian matches (cousins) and these Scandinavian matches are also matches to me and matches to my Norwegian match Grude.

So what does this mean?

We followed a genealogical path of potential DNA from Felicite d'Oupeye to Judith Sweers, who emigrated from Amsterdam to Bergen, Norway. One of the daughters of Judith Sweers married a man surnamed Garmann. I have a Norwegian match named Grude, who has someone named Garmann in his family tree. Based on that, I checked MH's list of shared Scandinavian DNA matches with Grube against a list I'd compiled of my Dutch DNA matches along with the shared Scandinavian DNA matches for each of those Dutch matches.

The problem is, as I've mentioned before, Garmann's DNA is not purely Scandinavian DNA, so we can't just assume that the common ancestor involved here is d'Oupeye DNA. But Garmann is not the only potential source of non-d'Oupeye DNA. It could be Bronckhorst DNA. It could also be DNA from Judith Sweers' husband Ahasverus de Crequi dit la Roche.

The de Crequi dit la Roche family came from France and isn't likely to have any DNA in comon with DNA from several of my Dutch matches, except very remotely. However, Ahusverus' father was born and died in Holland, and he married a woman named Gjertrud de Leys Rengers (1590-1654) who also lived in the Hague. Her father was Rengers Rengersen and her mother was NN van Voorthuijsen (1545-).

So we see that one of these connections could be the actual common ancestor connecting the Norwegian Grude to the Dutch matches. I think some of these connections, and Judith Sweers herself, are possibly connected to a larger group of people who emigrated from areas from today's Netherlands and Belgium to Sweden, and although I'll leave the main discussion of this group for a future post, in this post I'll touch on it.