This page was first created on 26 December1999

This authorised monograph was originally compiled by Prof. Edgard De Bruyne and published in the "Tablettes des Flandres", editor Ch. van Reyninghe de Voxvrie, Tome 2, 1949, pp.9-62.

The described family history is illustrated with many historical facts. This gives a much better insight in the effect of, e.g. the religious troubles on the economic live. It also helps understanding the difficulties experienced by people in times of constant war and social unrest. While following the de Bruynes in Ieper (Ypres), Steenwerk and Nieuwkerke, the author follows the evolution and history of the cloth and linen industry in the Diocese of Ypres. It is quite straightforward that this particular cloth producer family line closely follows the ups en downs of the economic prosperity of the region, since they played a prominent role in the region for more than five centuries.

Prof. De Bruyne succeeded in collecting and structuring these data in about three years. This is quite an achievement, taking into account that no real reference point was available. He also had to research the archives of a region that severely suffered from the destructive First World War: Ieper (Ypres), Steenwerk, Nieuwkerke, Belle (Bailleul in N.France). He could consult the Fonds Merghelynck though, a massive collection of original files structured by he famous Ypres archivist. This collection contains plenty of data on the Ypres branch of the family. The State Archives in Brugge (Bruges) provided for the additional information on the Nieuwkerke branch.

Data were structured using the genealogy software Roots3. This enables us to link all the data from Prof. De Bruyne's publication into almost one single family line. The family line presented here is based on the original text of Prof. De Bruyne, although a few "artificial" links to side-branches needed to be made. This also does not imply that the original data provided in the 1949 publication are 100% reality proof. One may indeed reasonably assume that Prof. Edgard De Bruyne consciously or unconsciously transformed hypotheses in real relations. In a few cases, it was easy to detect conflicting data in the original text. These were solved by choosing for the most probable alternative. In some other cases however this was not possible since data were too much confusing, e.g. due to the co-existence of people with the same first names and family name.

One can only conclude that the data and relations presented here have to be read with extreme caution. Before integrating (some of) these data into a genealogy file, independent and objective reconfirmation is needed.