As a new subscriber to this list, I am interested in learning more about a
family named Duevel from the Osnabr�ck area. The little I know comes from
an acquaintance who reports the family seat was Stockum, from near
Osnabr�ck. I am told the family belonged to the low nobility. They
apparently start with a Friedrich Diabolus, born about 1200 (the latinized
form of the German word "Teufel" and the low German form "D�vel", both
meaning "devil"). I am told that Friedrich�s grandson was the first to be
called by his German name "D�vel".
By the 1500's the name D�vel/D�wel/D�fel shows up about 75 kilometers east
in a village called Hille (near Minden) and also southeast in Brakel and
Erkeln. I am wondering if these Osnabr�ck Duevel's spawned these other
family lines.
Can anyone offer insights into this family or sources of study?
Gary,
I'm quite into 'Stockum' as a part of my ancestral family were
the Freiherren von Geismar who were owners or liegelords of
Gut Stockum. I hope we are speaking of the same place in
Achelriede and Bissendorf outside of Osnabrück.
I do not have my sources here in Florida but I must say that I
can't recall any source going back to 1200 naming names
etc for the place. I mean it was really only a large farm or
farm estate. My folks were the low nobility and I do have
additional information at home on the property and the
various lines who lived there. The estate always had other
farmers work the grounds (Heuerleute) and there may have
been a Düvel among them but typically such people do not
have any lineage going back beyond a generation or two.
It was quite common to Latinize names in the middle ages by
the Church who wrote the records just as many old German
names were Frenchified during the Napoleonic era. The
Geismars were then called 'de Geismar'. Rump was also
Rumpius and so forth. Many common given names were
always written in Latin but used in daily life their more
common German equivilants. Same with surnames.
In any case, anything going back to 1200 needs to be viewed
with a large amount of scepticism when one tries to establish
linkages to that time. The records really do not provide proof
of genetic connections.
Fred
PS If you can remember to write again next month, I can go
into this with some more certainty as to Gut Stockum.