Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category
Freedom Of Speech
Wednesday, January 18th, 2012
Liberty leading the people, by Delacroix.
Photograph Wikimedia Commons
If there is one thing the Dutch deeply cherish it is freedom of speech. We like to speak our mind and don’t worry about being seen as utterly blunt by non-Dutch. It’s a right so dear to us that through history we have gone through great lengths to obtain and protect that right. Because freedom of speech is the driving force behind social evolution. The possibility to ponder new thoughts aloud without fear of being burned at the stakes makes it possible to find new and better ways to live our lives. The problem is however, that any new thought is usually is some way insulting because it questions the status quo.
If everybody “knows” that the Earth is flat and the sun and planets all circle around it, suggesting that in fact the Earth is round and that it revolves around the Sun along with the other planets challenges the status quo. It offends. Tell Galileo Galilei about it. The Church condemned his brilliant ideas, prohibited their publication, and sentenced Galileo to lifetime house arrest in 1633. And yet, Galileo was right. It took the Church 360 years to apologize and admit that Galileo was right after all.
Martin Luther run into trouble with the authorities as well, because he had a different view about the relationship between man and God. His ideas challenges about everything the power of the Church at that time was based on. His ideas were seen as highly offensive and he was banned by the Church. However, today his ideas are much appreciated by a large worldwide Protestant community.
The suffragettes dared to speak out loud about the right to vote for women. They were ridiculed at first, but as their ideas took hold among women in society they were imprisoned. Fierce action was taken to make them shut up, literally. Why? Because their ideas were offensive to men. It was though to be ridiculous and dangerous for women to pretend being as smart as men. Some women even died for the cause. And yet, because they spoke out, women can now vote, work and do all those things their great-grandmothers could not.
These are just a few examples of how ideas that were thought to be offensive at first, changed our society in positive ways, made us move forward as mankind. Censorship puts social evolution on hold or even shuts it down. We may not always like to hear about ideas that very much do not coincide with our own. Nevertheless, as a society we need them. We need these new ideas, we need to discuss them out and aloud, where everybody can hear them and freely put them against their own judgment. That is why we need freedom of speech and that is why we need to cherish it.
Today many websites are going black to protest against the so-called SOPA/PIPA act that many fear will give the American Authorities far too much power to block content on the Internet. Although Internet piracy needs to be addressed, giving the State the power to play censor is probably the worst way to accomplish that. Taking sites off line will not stop piracy, but it does pave the way to censor the Internet to stop free voices that are considered inconveniently offensive to certain groups. Shutting these voices down will eventually do more damage than letting them debate out in the open. So history learns us.
On a more day-to-day basis if this bill passes the following could happen:
I always take a picture from Wikimedia to illustrate this blog, since these are copyright free images. Now if something went wrong and somebody accidentally (or intentionally) posted copyrighted material on Wikimedia whitout saying it is, and I would include that copyrighted material into this newsletter by accident, theoretically my website could get blocked, as would my business PayPal account. This would mean the end of my business since most of my readers and clients are based in the United States. The really scary thing is that they could have me blocked without ever setting foot in a court room. All the copyright owner has to do is write a letter and prove I linked to their material without paying for it. This gives room for very nasty practices to get foreign competition shut down with a little bit of creativity.
So if you are an American reading this consider to speak out against this bill so they can come up with a better, more effective and more just way to fight Internet piracy. You can do so at: http://americancensorship.org/. If you support this bill, take no offense by me worrying about it. I’m just speaking my mind and do respect you speaking yours ;o).
A Farm Name As Surname
Friday, July 1st, 2011
Typical farm from the eastern Netherlands
Photograph Wikimedia Commons
Inspired by a family tree I recently completed for a client, I’d like to share with you a special kind of surname you may come across and that is both a blessing and a curse: surnames based on farm names. If you have been researching your roots for some time, then you may be familiar with the shift from “fixed surnames” to “patronymics”, usually as you step back from the 1800s into the 1700s. All of a sudden —it seems— your ancestors shift surnames with each generation. In the Netherlands, after 1811, all Dutch adopted a fixed surname, as imposed by Napoleon in that year. Before that, many people were named after their father. And so Pieter, son of Willem was called Pieter Willems and Jan, son of Pieter Jan Pieters, etcetera. A bit confusing when first researching such patronymics, once you get the hang of it they are pretty straightforward and often a great tool when doing research in a time when records are less informative.
However, in certain parts of the Netherlands, especially in what is now called Twente and the Achterhoek (the easternmost parts of the provinces of Overijssel and Gelderland), people preferred farm names over patronymics. This means that people were not named after their father, but after the farm they were somehow associated with. “Somehow associated with” sounds a bit vague, and thas is exactly what it is. People adopted the name of the farm they were born at, worked at, married into, owned, used to own, founded, or whatever other plausible association you can think of. Moreover, people used to changes surnames upon a change of farm and so changed surnames several times during their lifetime.
To clarify this, a little example. Let’s say you have an ancestor Hendrik who was born on a farm called “Boerhoeve”. At his birth, he will be registered as Hendrik Boerhoeve. Little Hendrik grows up and gets his first job as a farm hand at the “Dennenhoeve”. He meets a nice girl called Greetje and they marry. On the marriage record he is registered as Hendrik Dennenhoeve. Greetje was the daughter of a wealthy farmer without sons that owned the “Eikenhoeve”. Hendrik and Greetje move in with Greetje’s parents. When their first child is born, Hendrik is registered on the birth record as Hendrik Eikenhoeve and their son as Jan Eikenhoeve. Greetje’s parents die and Hendrik inherits the farm. However, he decides to sell it and found his own farm which he calls “Hendrikshoeve”. By the time their son Jan gets married Hendrik is registered on the marriage record as Hendrik Hendrikshoeve. Hendrik becomes a wealthy man and when Napoleon summons him to choose a fixed surname he boldly decides to call himself “Rijkman” (lit. “rich man”). When Hendrik dies, he is registered on his death record as Hendrik Rijkman. All his descendants will be called Rijkman from this point on. However, if they wish to trace their roots back they will have to search for the names Boerhoeve, Dennenhoeve, Eikenhoeve and Hendrikshoeve as well. To add to the confusion, not all people called after these farms are necessarily related, the only thing they obviously share is that at some point in time they were associated with those farms in one way or another.
Though farm names may seem a pain at first glance (and they are!) they also provide invaluable information about the whereabouts of these ancestors. Before the 1850s, addresses were not –or only sporadically– kept in the Netherlands. Unless your ancestors had property to sell or inherit, or they show up in one of the early censuses, it is unlikely that you will be able to pinpoint exactly where they lived. With farm names, however, you can. Most farms in the Twente and Achterhoek areas can be found on old maps. Furthermore, as most farms were leased, some lease contracts survived and can still be found in the notarial archives. And if you get really lucky, there may be pictures of the farm, or it might even still be standing where it stood 300 years ago!
Further reading:
Finding old maps on Watwaswaar.nl: http://magazine.dutchancestrycoach.com/wat-was-waar-what-was-where-in-the-netherlands.
On the origin of Dutch surnames: http://magazine.dutchancestrycoach.com/making-sense-o…-dutch-surname.
Got stuck with your own research? Ask for help here: http://magazine.dutchancestrycoach.com/free-help.php.
Dutch Sayings: Water And Sea
Tuesday, May 10th, 2011
Looking out to sea, George Hitchcock
Photograph Wikimedia Commons
The Dutch are famous because of their relationship with the sea and water in general. We reclaimed land from the sea, used water to drive our economy, sailed the seven seas, and conquered nations far away. Nowadays, we are still fighting the flood every day by keeping our dikes up-to-date. A people that intertwined with the sea and water cannot but reveal that special bond in its language. Today I’ll share with you some of the literally hundreds of Dutch sayings involving water.
Water bij de wijn doen (to add water to the wine): lowering demands to accomplish a compromise.
Een storm in een glas water (a storm in a glass of water): much to do about nothing, not as severe as it seemed at first.
Stille wateren hebben diepe gronden (still waters have deep grounds): he who does not talk much often has deep thoughts, there is more to this person than meets the eye.
Ze zijn als water en vuur (they are as water and fire): they cannot stand each other.
Het hoofd boven water houden (keeping one’s head above the water): barely getting by, financially.
Een steek onder water (a punch below the water): insulting someone with a smile, using indirect speech.
Het water loopt altijd naar de zee (water always flows towards the sea): the rich always get richer.
Met hoog water lopen (walking with high water): wearing trousers that have legs that are too short.
Zo vlug als water (as quick as water): very quick, very keen.
Kijken alsof men water ziet branden (to look as if there was water on fire): looking very surprised.
Het kind met het badwater weggooien (to throw out the baby along with the bathing water): taking such ill measures to solve a problem that you end up ruining everything, including that what you wanted to solve.
De boot missen (to miss the boat): being too late to participate in something lucrative or favorable.
Dat is geen man over boord (no-one fell overboard): that is no problem.
In troebel water is het goed vissen (murky waters make good fishing): one can benefit from the problems of others.
Recht door zee (straight through the sea): being honest (or as some non-Dutch experience this : being blunt).
Onder zeil gaan (going underneath the sail): going to bed/sleep.
Water naar de zee dragen (to carry water to the sea) : a pointless business, measures that do not solve a thing.
Als de koeien op het ijs dansen en het warm water regent (when the cows dance on the ice and it rains warm water) : never.
Er zal nog heel wat water door de Rijn stromen, eer dat gebeurt (a lot of water will flow through the Rhine before that happens): it will take a long time for that to happen.
Het water loopt over de dijk (the water flows over the dike) : to cry.
Spijkers op laag water zoeken (searching for nails at low tide): nitpicking.
De zon niet in het water kunnen zien schijnen (not being able to see the sun shine in the water) : to be jealous.
Want to know more about Dutch sayings an proverbs? Read this book:
Dictionary of 1000 Dutch Proverbs (Hippocrene Bilingual Proverbs)
