|he earliest record of the WIJNALDA name in the Netherlands is found in 1691: Dokkum, Friesland Province, Netherlands was the birthplace of Ijde PIETERS (Wijnalda). Ijde was the first son of Pieter HARMENS. Pieter's father was a Prussian (German) immigrant to Friesland in the middle 17th Century. Wijnalda (in the Fries language) means "of Wijnald" or "from Wijnald." Wijn tranlates to "wine" Other possible Fries or Dutch names in our ancestry could be: DeWijnald, VanWijnald, VanDerWijnald, Wijnaldma, Wijnalds, Wijnaldse, and Wijnaldsma.|
|Wijtse PIETERS was the third son of Pieter HARMENS. Witse Pieters was born in 1715 in WIJNALDUM, Friesland, Netherlands.
|Age Pieters WIJNALDA , was the second son of Pieter HARMENS. Age was given a waupun or crest by King George II for service to crown. Whether this was for bravery in battle (note the armored helmet) or for works deemed advantageous to the kingdom (tribute money or supplies, safe passage, introductions, etc) is unknown.
o understand how a Dutchman (Frisan) would be knighted by an English king (actually Prussian), it is necessary to understand a little about the politics of the European world in the mid 18th century. The importance of ingratiating and rewarding the local populace can be understood from the following examples.
Additionally, the Province of Friesland was a distant part (relative to the times) of the Netherlands, far in the north. Friesland had closer ties to Scandinavia, the German (Prussian) states, and Russia. Much of the province's land had been claimed from the sea, through the use of elevated mounds and the ingenious system of dikes. The Fries people were fiercely independent, and spoke a completely different language (Frijsk) from the Dutch spoken to the in the southern provinces, including those of Holland (North and South),and even to the east in the Groningen Province. Frijske (or Fries) is more closely related to English than to Dutch!
|reviously in England, the hamlet of Wynald (~1500) was established southwest of the city of Coventry in Warwickshire (Warwick County). This hamlet is mentioned in the maps of "The Road From Southam to Derby" in 1750 (from the surveys of John Ogilby in 1625, the cartography of Emanuel Bowen in 1640, and the published atlas of John Owen in 1750). Starting about 1500, the name WYNN (eg, the infamous privateer Emanuel Wynn) was established in England and Wales. WYNALD is a variation of "auld wyn," an Old English phrase meaning "old wine." Considering the wars at sea between the Dutch and the English, it is very possible an English sailor named WYN or WYNN fathered children in Friesland.|
|"the story:" PROLOGUE - Notes|
|PLEASE NOTE! The colored portions of the story are enhanced based on oral history recited in the 1950's by Gramma Hoeksema (Trijnte Rients Wijnalda nee Bergsma), as told by her fatherr-in-law, Douwe Ijnses Wijnalda.|
|Note!: many of the names, places, and objects mentioned on these pages are (or will be) LINKED to pictures and documents. Simply click on the word, and you will be taken to the appropriate picture or document. You also can (or will be able to) click on the crests to see a LARGER picture and description or explanation.|
he Frieslander Story presently starts in Finland in the mid-13th Century. A Fenn named Matt was born (ca 1260) near Varsinais, on the east coast of the Baltic Sea in the Suomi Province of what was then Sweden (to become Finland in later years). The Fenns were a tribe of nomad farmers who established themselves in this widerness area after the Ice Age, along with the Lapps (herdsmen) and the Rus (hunters). Because of the overlapping of these three groups in the area, Varsinais became a trading center among different cultures. Additionally, the seafaring Vikings (from Sweden, Iceland, and Greenland) conquered and claimed Suomi as a province, but did not closely govern the land. The naval expertise of the Norsemen was assimilated by the Fenns, and this afforded them the ability to range overseas in search of trade (on the North Sea of the Atlantic Ocean, on the rivers and seas into middle Europe and Asia).
|Matt fathered a child with a Dutch woman in the port of Hoorn, in the province of Noord Holland in the Netherlands. Matt HORN was born about 1290 in the Netherlands, and as he grew older, he probably became a seaman trader, because he relocated back to his father's homeland in Varsinais, Suomi.|
|the song is
by John Lennon
|Mattis HORN, "little son" of Matt HORN, was born about 1320 in Varsinais Suomi..|
|Olaf Mattisson HORN, "son of" Mattis HORN, was born in 1350 in Amine Halikko, Turku Pori, Vasinais Suomi. He died in 1438 in Uusimaa, Vasinais Suomi.|
|Josse OLOFSON, "son of" Olaf Mattisson HORN and Katrina, was born in 1387 in Amine, Rallikks, Vasinais Suomi.|
|Eric JONSSON, "son of" Josse OLOFSON, was born about 1440 in Skitinback, Pojo, Uusimaa, Vasinais Suomi.|
|Bertil Ericsson GIOS, "son of" Eric JONSSON, was born about 1480 in Skitinback, Pojo, Uusimaa, Vasinais Suomi.|
|Per Bertilsson GIOS, "son of" Bertil Ericsson GIOS, was born about 1510 in Skitinback, Pojo, Uusimaa, Vasinais Suomi.|
he Netherlands had adopted the FIRST constitutional and republican government with The Dutch Declaration of Independence in 1581. Monarchs were permitted to rule, but only with the endorsement of the people. The idea of "Absolute Power" was totally rejected by the citizens of the Netherlands. The rulers were "stadtholders" or Governor Generals.
|"... for they (the Freislanders) said they should prefer death with liberty, to being slaves; and would never quit the battle while alive."
"...and it was seldom they (the Fries) would surrender, but fought until they were slain, saying they preferred death and liberty to being under the subjection of any lord whatever."
TALES FROM FROISSART: The Wars in Friesland; Book IV; Chapter 79, pages 615-617 (ca1370 AD)