This research was originated from a document that is in the possession of our family.
From the dates provided in that document, it can be ascertained that the document was produced
in around 1947, with handwritten additions up until approximately 1950.
To me it is not entirely clear who began the original version, but there are two candidates.
Firstly Femmigje Lagaaij–van der Woude who is said to have done the investigation in the
years before the Second World war. Another candidate, according to a letter and oral information,
is Jacobus Arsène Cornelis Lagaaij (1913-1990), married to Geessien Nijssien Davids.
He supposedly commissioned a research in around 1940.
Several members of the family that I have approached during the course of this research,
also have this document in their possession already.
This version is a supplement to a version, which I produced in 1983.
For this edition, the use of the Internet was very useful, especially through the on-line data of the
Zeeuws Archief
and also personcards and -lists through the Dutch Central Office for Genealogy.
There are clear indications that (at least part of) the Lagaaij family had Huguenot relatives.
This is not only known from ‘stories-in-the-family’, but also from the time when the family supposedly
came from Belgium (and possibly before that from France) to the Netherlands. Besides this, there is
a collection of baptism registrations from the Eglise Wallone (the Walloon church) in the archives of Leiden.Some contexts and characteristics of the Huguenots
In the 16th century a Reformed Protestant group arose following the teachings of Calvin in France.
The partisans of these ecclesiastical teaching got the name Huguenots.
It is not known where this naming originated. The speculation exists that this denomination is a
degeneration of Eidgenossen (‘eiguenots ' in French).
Although pure theological ideas form the base of this movement, a political movement developed in
around 1560 under the Huguenots. Amongst them, all sorts of people are found, even noblemen.
On the night of August 23 or 24, 1572 the so-called Bartholomeus-night or Parisian Blood Wedding
took place in Paris. With the approval of the queen mother Catharina de Medicis, the catholic party
caused a carnage amongst the Huguenots, who were in Paris at that time, to celebrate the marriage
of one of their leaders, Hendrik van Navarra (who later became king Hendrik IV), to Magaretha
(the sister of king Hendrik II).
On April 13, 1598, this Hendrik IV, whom had become king and converted to catholic in the meanwhile,
promulgated the Edict of Nantes. This Edict promised the Huguenots religious freedom and gave them
a number of ‘cautionary towns’.
In freedom, the Huguenots were then able to develop themselves. They were allowed to build churches;
only they were not allowed to call them ‘churches’. Instead, they were called ‘temples’.
In addition, they were permitted positions in the administration and in the army.
Above all, they obtained the authority to form armies and keep garrisons.
During this period of freedom, the number of supporters of the movement grew to approximately 10 percent
of the total population. Also, because teaching was considered to be particular important, many prominent
people and scientists came from their midst.
However, their freedom was of a short duration. Only twenty years later, upon the arrival of
Lodewijk XIII and Richelieu, the repression of this newly acquired freedom started. Richelieu brought
an end to the political dominant position of the Huguenots. In 1628 he succeeded in taking away the
last of their ‘cautionary towns’ (La Rochelle). This Huguenot bastion fell after a long siege in
which many victims fell. The battles that followed were won by the royal troops in a shattering way,
thus ending the political - and military power of the Huguenots.
A period of relative rest then followed, until the catholic king Lodewijk XIV, after the death of
Mazarin in 1661, personally took the government into his own hands. A period consisting of hard
measures against the Huguenots followed. Initially Lodewijk had no real religious interest.
But when, in 1661, he gained executive power, he apparently wanted to make history by being the king
that made France into a catholic country. Bit by bit measures were introduced that increasingly
influenced the edict of Nantes further.
Eventually, on October 18, 1685, the edict of Nantes was revoked. As a consequence, the position of
Huguenots became impossible and their churches were destroyed. Those that held public positions were
evicted from their office, artisans were repulsed from the guilds, Protestant schools were transferred
to the Catholics or raised to the ground. Heavy taxes were retroactively imposed, which one could only
prevent by renouncing the Reformed believe in writing and converting back to the catholic church.
Many were brought down a peg or two, but those whom did not convert themselves had more far-reaching terror to endure. In order to convince them to convert, cavaliers and soldiers were sent out into the country on a so-called ‘mission with the booth’ (mission bottée). Upon royal order, dragoons were billeted on obstinate Huguenots, for their so-called protection against catholic aggressors. However: nothing was received for nothing. Those that enjoyed this ‘protection’ were obliged to provide for the billeted soldiers and moreover, provide them with compensation for each day. The more capital or goods that were present, the more soldiers that were billeted, so that in a short time the victim’s fortune disappeared like snow before the sun. When someone was eventually no longer able to meet his obligations, the hosts’ furniture would then be sold to satisfy the claim.
Those that did not return to the catholic belief, were as a result, eventually obliged to leave their
homes and take refuge in a foreign country. This exodus had already started approximately 20 year before
the revocation of the edict of Nantes. Especially countries such as Switzerland, England, the Netherlands,
Germany (Brandenburg) and the Cape-of-Good-Hope became their destination. Due to their generally being
highly trained and developed, they contributed to those countries, in both a cultural and economic respect.
In around 1550, Walloon ecclesiastical municipalities arose in the Southern Netherlands, which also met
in synod (= church assembly)around 1560. They initially merged themselves with the ‘Nederduitse’
municipalities in 1571. In 1577 they, after having become separately organized, met in Dordrecht in synod.
Especially after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, in 1685, the Walloon (French-speaking person) municipalities developed strongly by a pouring in of escaped Huguenots or ‘refugiés’, as they were also called.
Origion of the word Huguenot
source:
http://www.huguenot.netnation.com/general/huguenot.htm
The exact origin of the word Huguenot is unknown, but many consider it to be a combination of Flemish and German. Protestants who met to study the Bible in secret were called Huis Genooten, meaning "house fellows." They were also referred to as Eid Genossen, or "oath fellows" meaning persons bound by an oath. Two possible but different derivations incorporating this concept can be found in the Encyclopedia Britannica:
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Generally, the application of data that was used in the original documents that served as a starting point to this research, appears to have been a bit careless to me. Not a single source is provided and the question remains of where the first data came from. Particularly, the fact that no parent names of the first four family members are mentioned. (in this research, the father of the children, Maihljaerts, was inferred from the inscription next to the coat of arms (click on the picture for a larger image); as to whether the others are children or not, I have been unable to establish (yet)), and it seems strange that they are considered to be brothers and sisters. It is possible that these four children were admitted to an orphanage and for that reason have been considered to be one family, but there is no proof of this. The coat of arms resided in the church of St. Maartensdijk until approximately 1798. During
the French predominance this coat of arms was lost. The coat of arms is presented in the Catalogue
of the Zelandia Illustrate II cat. no. 2066. (1880) and in a book by
Rethaan Macarré, Coat of arms and
weapons on tombs, monuments and gravestones in the churches of the province Zeeland. The text is (old Dutch): ALTERÆ SPESVITE |
Data that can still be retrieved has been checked against the birth -, marriage- and death registers, as well as those of baptism books and marriage registers. They frequently show that the original data is inaccurate or at least very incomplete. Sometimes whole families were mixed up or parts were exchanged with other families. As far as is now known, the data is as best as is possible, in conformity with the data from these sources.
Also the more recent data contains quite a lot of incorrect data. I cannot suppress the feeling that the first research was fairly careless and since the ‘rumour-in-the-family’ seems to indicate that (at least a part of) the research was done by a genealogist whom was not part of the family, there is a fair chance that a number of ‘easy’' assumptions were made and, after all ‘time is money’.
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The coat of arms that the family used is presented here (Click on the picture for a larger image). It was displayed in the church of St. Maartensdijk until the end of the 18th century. The coat of arms is described in heraldry as in gold three (2 and 1) birds of synopel (green), with a red beak and with red paws. Crest: a synopel (green) bird, with a red beak and with red paws (placed on the wreath).
Based upon this data, the image was painted by Leo Ooijkaas from Haaksbergen in 2002.
With respect to the coat of arms there are still some questions. In the famous reference work on coats of arms ("Armorial General, contenant la description des armoiries des familles nobles et patriciennes de l'Europe, precede d'un dictionnaire des termes du blason" [Johannes Baptista Rietstap, 1861]) Lagaaij, Lagaay, La Gay are not mentioned.
The monumental work contains the coats of arms of 50,000 families from all over Europe.
Two additions were published in 1884 and 1887.
The coat of arms
is included in this book, but under a different name: Lagasse.
Rietstap mentions as the origin of the
Lagasse
family: France / Belgium. When checked using Google, it shows that people wiht the name Lagasse still are living 'everywhere'.
Still the coat of arms is being used for a along time also by the family members of the Lagaaij-family.
In April 2012, at an auction at Christie's (Catalogue:
1,
2)
a seal stamp was offered with the three birds. The stamp itself was part of a larger lot from the collection of Michel Neugarten.
Jeroen de Kuyper, auctioneer of the Zeeland Auction House,
collects these. The total lot has been auctioned for £ 3250, but was offered after the auction on the Internet in pieces.
Jeroen purchased it then.
The seal stamp (
1,
2,
3,
4)
with three birdies has been made by silversmith Jacobus Clement in Middelburg in 1772.
Jacobus Clement used as his sign a master clip. The style is, given the way the decorations are displayed around the helmet, Louis XVI style.. |
The family distribution area was originally Brugge, Zeeuws-Vlaanderen, Tholen and Zuid-Beveland. They appear to have been reasonably well to do middle class people. In the second half of the 18th century, the family moved to Vlissingen, so that by the end of the 18th century most of the family members lived there.
The four remaining branches descended from the family Lagaaij-Hoogvliet are: Pieter Lagaaij, Willem Lagaaij, Abraham Albertus Lagaaij and Louis Chistiaan Lagaaij.
The branch of Pieter Lagaaij (in 1808 - 1883), married to Anna Maria Verhoeff, characterizes itself by family members that were frequently seafaring or worked in the Navy. The distribution area mainly Noord- and Zuid-Holland, and England where as far as I know now, all male offspring of this branch live.
The branch of Willem Lagaaij (approx. in 1822 - 1899), married to Isabelle Harinck, is a small branch where the emphasis also seems to lie with the sea and related professions. This branch lived mainly in Vlissingen and The Hague and has emigrated from there to (mainly?) South Africa.
The branch of Abraham Albertus Lagaaij (in 1814 - 1862), married to Caroline Therese van Goethem, lived in Vlissingen for a period, but spread strongly thereafter since approx. 1900. We mainly find highly trained persons and soldiers here. After three generations only one branch remains (in Holland?) which are the family of Charles Albertus Lagaaij and Carla Alexandrina Wienecke.
The branch of Louis Christiaan Lagaaij (in 1816 - 1883), married to Cornelia van der Does, is a branch that remained in Vlissingen longer, but thereafter also scattered throughout the Netherlands. Representatives of this branch were frequently shopkeepers and contractors. The tobacco industry was also strongly represented in this branch consisting of manufacturers, wholesalers and tradesmen. With the closure of the tobacco shop in Vlissingen in 1980, this came to an end.
Dutch memorandum of family names 1947
Number of members of the Lagaaij/y family at the census of 1947 according to the Dutch memorandum of family names:
| Groningen | 4 | Den Haag | 12 |
| Friesland | 0 | Rotterdam | 21 |
| Drenthe | 0 | Zuid-Holland | 6 |
| Overijssel | 0 |
Zuid-Holland totaal |
39 |
| Gelderland | 8 | Zeeland | 13 |
| Utrecht | 3 | Noord-Brabant | 2 |
| Amsterdam | 5 | Limburg | 0 |
| Noord-Holland | 4 | ||
|
Noord-Holland totaal
|
9 |
Totaal |
78 |
Through access to the internet site of the
Meertens
Institute, information has been obtained that relates to the explanation (etymological) and occurrence of the name Lagaaij. Initially, the story in the family was that the name should be inferred from the coat of arms, but more correctly the opposite is true in that the coat of arms originates from the name. Also, in consultation with the Meertens institute it, appears that it is more logical that a name was in use prior to a (matching) coat of arms being made. When a coat of arms was chosen, an image connected to the sound of the name was generally chosen. In a case such as that one refers to it as a ‘speaking coats of arms’. These coats of arms were designed on the basis of what the last stage of a name sounds like, that is to say that the name was matched with words from the dictionary. Therefore it is logical that in the Lagaaij coat of arms, a bird, the jaybird (‘gaai’ in Dutch) was used. But that does not then say anything related to the true origin of the name.
Source: W. Beele, ‘The familiy name Laga(e)’, in: Naamkunde 8
(1976), p 126-127.
In this short rendition it is my intention to provide a plausible explanation of the family name that is spread in especially central West-Vlaanderen.
By all accounts the name is an alternative of family names of Lagaey, Lagay, Lagaye and Lagey which also sporadically appear in West-Vlaanderen; compare this to a.o. Dequaey/Dequa(e), kaai/ka, schapraai/schapra, vlaai/vla from which it appears that the aai/a - exchange is very well possible.
Moreover Laga(e) and presumable alternatives in turn can possibly be connected with family names like Lega, Legai, Legay and Legaye which have all been recorded from the telephone guide of Brussels. The ‘le/la’ - exchange in family names is indeed very ordinary as seen from Lechat/Lachat , Leconte/Laconte, Lefere/Lafere, Legrand/Lagrand, Lemaire/Lamaire, Lepage/Lapage, Lepere/Lapere, Leroy/Laroy etc..
The French article appears in the first element of the family name Laga(e), whereas the second would be a normal reduction of the old-French adjective gai, gay ‘qui est d'humeur riante; vif et petulant’ (he that is of joyful temper; cheerful and exuberant). That adjective was also known in the medieval Dutch period as ‘cheerful, living; moreover merry’ and became noted by De Bo as ‘energetic; handsome’. Finally, it is also suspected to hide in some Mid- West Flemish surnames: werinus gaye a. 1281 and jannet le gaye a. 1305. both at Ieper; fierin gaye a. 1396 at Woesten; gillis the gaye a. 1398 at Pittem.
With a little bit of luck some genealogist could perhaps eventually find the ‘final’ connection to the family names through these old certificates.
Ieper, W. Beele
Before being fixed in their final form, when setting-up the civil records in the first half of the 19th century, family names were still liable to change. Recording of names took place frequently by interview: a clerk or ecclesiastical servant noted a name in a certificate or book as he understood that name. That is, as he would understand a name in his own framework of reference. Many people that appeared before them in person had not mastered the ability to write, so they were also unable to help them record correctly. One can imagine that especially names that came from afar, yielded problems in pronunciation and being written down. Foreign names were mostly translated into a Dutch form. That could be done relatively simply and transparently (Wetselaar < Wezlaar, Caljouw < Cailloux, Brus < Bruce), by translation (Zuurdeeg < Sauerteig, Cannegieter <Kannegiesser) or according to a popular etymological procedure in which names were linked by association to recognisable (Dutch) words (Piekhaar < Picard, Schattelijn < Chatillon, De Nijs < Denis, Traanboer < Traunbauer, Stokje < Stöcky). Sometime a foreign name was completely inimitably adapted: the foreignar was unintelligible and/or the clerk completely lost it in the translation, as with Roetcisoender from Rutischhausen.
“Popular etymology is an unfortunate name for a language phenomenon that had nothing to do with etymology, but everything to do with language psychology. A misunderstood or obscure word became associated with a well-known word as it was reinterpreted. The school example is the (Dutch) hangmat < French hamac < Spanish hamaca” [Frans Debrabandere, ‘Popular etymology in names’, in: Nederlands van Nu 48 (2000), nr 4, p 60-62].
From a practical point of view, no distinction has been
made between names including ij and y in the Dutch Family Names Database. For example, the names of De Bruijn and De Bruyn are represented in one section. In a linguistic sense this is not unjust: the y in De Bruyn is certainly not an i-grec, but an ij without the dots, is in fact is the same character as the ij with dots. In most Dutch names with a y, it is in fact an ij without dots, which is a relic in the Dutch alphabet that has taken the form of the Greek y, but can be made equal to the ij without any problem. In modern spelling, both in combination with another vowel, can be replaced by a single i: De Bruijn > De Bruin.
In fact the typical Dutch character consists of two characters. It originates from ii = a ‘long’ i, which later on was replaced by ij as clarification and even later was pronounced as a diphthong ij (ei). From the 16th until the 18th century, when writing was by no means normalised yet, the ij was often written without the dots. The same character was used as a variant of the i (yemant, cleyn). In handwriting therefore, the difference between i, ij with and without the dots, was lost. The confusion grew even more because in the alphabet the ij, which strictly spoken needed to come between i and j, got the place before z, while in other languages the y (i-grec) was placed there. This Greek y (upsilon) is in fact another character that the Dutch language has ‘imported’ from foreign words.