How to read this account
This is the history of one family line: the Saeijs of Sleidinge in Flanders, who moved in the eighteenth century to the villages of the Meetjesland, and in the nineteenth century across the border into Dutch Zeeland. It follows nine married couples, father to son, from a wedding at Sleidinge in November 1655 to a death at IJzendijke in June 2002. It ends with the names of the three living generations.
Throughout the account, the men of the direct line are marked in bold green with a ◆: click the name to see that person's page. Other people's names link to their pages in the ordinary colour. A date or a small number in square brackets such as [S12] opens the record image or the source itself.
The line at a glance
| Couple | Married | Where they lived | |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Livinus Saij and Maria Van Kerrebrouck | 1655 | Sleidinge |
| 2 | Joannes Saey and (1) Livina De Munck, (2) Jacoba Kerckaert | 1690; about 1705 | Sleidinge |
| 3 | Joannes Saey and Georgia Stofferis | 1734 | Sleidinge |
| 4 | Bernardus Saeij and Maria Anna van Hijfte | 1769 | Sleidinge, then Kaprijke |
| 5 | Judocus Bernardus Saeij and (1) Anna Marie Bolangiers, (2) Catherine de Keyzer | 1802; 1821 | Bassevelde |
| 6 | Bernardus Saey and Marie Therese Vervaet | 1842 | Bassevelde |
| 7 | Eduardus Saeij and Louisa Clementia Zwartelé | 1878 | IJzendijke and Oostburg, Zeeland |
| 8 | Pieter Johannes Saeij and Mathielde Sophia Lohman | 1914 | Waterlandkerkje and Oostburg |
| 9 | Achille Eduard Saeij and Irma Sophia de Paepe | 1946 | Oostburg, Schoondijke and IJzendijke |
How far back the line is proven
The earliest proven ancestor is Livinus Saij, born in 1627 or 1628 and buried at Sleidinge in January 1699. Every generation from him to Achille Eduard Saeij is joined to the next by a church or civil record naming the parents. Chapter 4 shows how that was established.
His parents are not proven. The most likely couple are Joannes Say and Maria Vereecken of Sleidinge, and the chapter "Before the line", which opens the history, sets out the evidence for them and against them. It is the one chapter that tells a probable story rather than a proven one.
Family trees published online carry the line two or three generations further back, to a Joannes Say and Livina Buyle of Destelbergen, east of Ghent, about 1570. That link is wrong. The register entries read for this account show that the Joannes who died at Sleidinge in 1719 was the son of Livinus Saij and Maria Van Kerrebrouck of Sleidinge, not of the Destelbergen family that the trees give him. Chapter 4 explains how the mistake arose, and chapter 5 describes the other Saey families of the region, with a drawn tree for each.
How the evidence is graded
Every fact in this account rests on a record, and every record has been graded:
- A: read from the original register page or scan. The original was examined for this account.
- B: taken from an index or transcription of the record, compiled by a careful volunteer or archive, where the original page has not been examined.
- C: worked out from other records, for example a birth year from an age at death.
- D: found only in family trees, with no record seen. Such facts are always marked as unconfirmed.
Sources are cited in square brackets, [S1], [S2] and so on. The list of sources at the end of the account gives the archive, the register and, for index entries, the record number.
The records
Until 1796 the only records of birth, marriage and death in Flanders are the Latin registers kept by the parish priests. Those of Sleidinge begin in 1608 for marriages and burials and in 1612 for baptisms. The originals are in the State Archives of Belgium and can be seen online in its AGATHA system. For the Sleidinge registers, J. Pauwels made indexes, published by the Meetjesland branch of Familiekunde Vlaanderen. They were used for this account alongside the originals.
From 1796, under French rule, civil registration took over. The registrar's acts are longer than the priest's entries. They give ages, trades and places of birth, and are signed by witnesses. For the Zeeland generations, the Dutch civil records are held by the Zeeuws Archief. The account also draws on staten van goed, the estate inventories drawn up when a parent died leaving children, which often name relatives and guardians.
The name
The surname appears as Say, Saij, Saey, Saeij, Saeys and Saÿs. Priests and clerks wrote what they heard. The Latin entries use Say, Saij and Saey; the Flemish civil acts mostly Saey; and the Dutch acts of the twentieth century often Saeij. There is no significance in the changes. In this account each person is given the spelling of their principal record, and the family is called the Saeijs. The same applies to the wives' names: Kerrebrouck is also written Kerbrock and Kerrebroeck, and Stofferis is written Stofferus, Stoffers and Stopherus.
Privacy
Only people who have died are described. Children of the last couple, who are living, are not listed. The epilogue gives the names of the living generations and nothing more, at the family's request.
Dates
Dates are given in the modern calendar. Dates in the French Republican calendar, used in civil acts from 1796 to 1805, have been converted, and the original form is given where it matters. A baptism date and a birth date are not the same: in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries children were usually baptised on the day of birth or within two or three days, and the account gives both where the record does.