Using AI to make photos of villages look like old sketches

When doing genealogy, I occasionally use ChatGPT to create images to beautify my family tree. This blog post is about how ChatGPT can convert modern images into drawings that show what it used to be like.

Strijen

In the first example, I used a photograph I had taken of the old Saint Lambertus church in Strijen. The building to the left was build in the 20th century, so it had to be removed.

Thus, I asked Chat GPT: 

"Can you transform the photo into a drawing with pastel colours? Can you remove all the poles, lampposts, and posts? Also remove the leaning building on the left. Can you focus on the church complex of buildings, and blur the background? Thanks!"

In this case I manually fixed the dark little door in the middle, because ChatGPT had messed it up.

 

My photograph of the church in Strijen

 

The church of Strijen with AI

Barendrecht

In the second example, I used an old photograph of the village of Barendrecht. The lamppost was way too modern, and had to be removed.

Thus, I asked Chat GPT:

"Hi, can you turn this photograph into a nice drawing? Can you remove the lamppost? Give it a bit of pastel colour? Thank you."

In this case I did a follow up with

"Can you remove the boy in the middle of the picture?"

Using AI to improve old images of villages

The term “AI” is buzzing around everywhere these days. It can do so much, but it often seems incredibly complicated. Luckily, you can also use AI for relatively simple tasks.

An old book series by Lieve van Ollefen (1749-1816), titled “De Nederlandsche stad- en dorpbeschrijver” (The Dutch Village and City Describer), contains drawings of Dutch villages from the 1790s. Some images from this book can be found online, but they are often of bad quality, often very dark, with little contrast, or of low resolution.

Therefore, I had Ollefen's drawing of the village of Strijen polished by ChatGPT. The original oval, black-and-white image of Strijen had a resolution of 1326 x 1022 pixels and a dpi of 96. The prompt I used was:

“Can you improve upon this image, make it better, more contrast and give it some color? Remove the circle and make it rectangular. Remove the heraldic shield at the bottom. Thanks.”

Original image of Strijen	ChatGPT's image of Strijen

I am very pleased with the result. The only comment I have on the result is that ChatGPT did not extend the dike behind the fence on the right. 

Alas, the result isn't always this good. I tried to improve Ollefen's image of a nearby village, Numansdorp (Buitensluis), with Gemini's Nano Banana. Alas, the resolution of the original image was quite low, and Gemini changed the water behind the houses into land, while creating water in front of the image, where the text used to be.
I also tried to improve Ollefen's image of the village of Ammerstol with a lot of trees in it. Using ChatGPT, I included the question “Can you make the church in the background to the right stand-out a bit more?” The result was a church with a longer nave and a much higher and more pointed tower. It was no longer the church of Ammerstol.

If you have an original picture with sufficient resolution, and ask the right questions, AI can improve your old images of villages.

Sources: ChatGPT.com, Gemini.Google.com/app, nl.Wikipedia.org.

It's my 12th Blogiversary!

On  17 January 2013   I published my 1st post for this blog,  so  today is my  12th   blogiversary !

My genealogy research file contains ancestors from January 2003 onwards. Those are ancestors of my father's mother, so I must have started my research even earlier. My paternal ancestors, the Bos family in Cillaarshoek were the ancestors I started with.
My ancestors with the most children are Otto van Driel (1756-1832) and my male-line ancestor Cornelis Bos (1813-1888): both had 17 children with 2 wives. In the 17th century Arij Peijnsz. Hogerwaert and his wife Trijntje Willems had 16 children together.
The couple Gerrit Korver and Neeltje Bloet (±1640-1727) were married for over 66 years. When my ancestor Jan Pieterse Vasen died on 11-8-1702 in Ottoland, Holland, he was "around 100 years old and had been blind for 3 or 4 years".

My favourite blog posts of my own ancestors are:

1. Arie de Sterke (1796-1892) fought in Russia and at Waterloo
2. Thomas Brullee's Whaling Expeditions of 1687 and 1712
3. Bos is a common name in The Netherlands

Tips & Tricks

These are some tips and tricks for researching ancestors.

• Genealogy in The Netherlands
• Dutch Sources for Genealogy
• The Netherlands Links at Cindi's List
• Dutch Naming Traditions by Yvette
• How to Find Your Dutch Ancestor’s Occupation by Yvette
• Genealogy in Europe
• Passenger lists of the Holland-America Line
• Extracts of emigration cards of Dutch people in Australia 1946-1991
  
• Checklist for starting Research in the Country of Origin by Yvette
• Find East European Ancestors Online by Geoff
• Gjenvick-Gjønvik Archives feature immigration records and maritime history
• Scottish BMD Exchange for researching Scottish ancestry
  
• Search for Napoleon's Soldiers
  
• Illustrations for Genealogy
• Add an image to your blog post
• The location of Blogger's Photo Albums
  
• Sources for images to illustrate your family tree by Yvette
• Improve your research
• Check for improbable dates
• Was your ancestor married more than once?
• Don't be afraid to question 3rd-party publications
  
• Tips for finding Brick-Wall Ancestors
• Additional Tips
• DNA and Inheritance explained by Marc 
• Find relevant genealogy results in Google by using key search commands by Marian 
• Mind the Chronology of a Population Register
• Searching for soldiers fighting for the Dutch Republic 1595-1795
  
• Marriage Impediments for Catholics
• Latin Abbreviations when doing Genealogy

How the DIV tag can disrupt blog formatting

When a new, programmed blog post was automatically posted to my blog, once in a while it happened to mess up the layout of the blog. Strangely, the Archive and Label sections to the right of the blog post, then appeared at the bottom of the blogs.

Recently, I had a newly released blog post that didn't mess up the layout at first, but when I pressed the "Read more »" link, the Archive and Label sections moved to the bottom. Thus, I knew the problem was after the jump-break tag. That section contained a HTML list. Immediately before the list I noticed a

tag. The matching end tag with the slash, however, didn't appear until the very end of the blog post. When I removed both this opening divider tag and its end tag, the Archive and Label sections of the blog page returned to their normal position at the right.

The <div> tag in HTML is a fundamental and versatile element used for grouping and structuring content on a web page. It stands for “division” or “divider”. It is by default a block element, meaning that it takes all available width, and comes with line breaks before and after.
This is the HTML layout:

<div>
<!-- contained content goes here -->
</div>

My impression is that Blogger inserts <div> tags too casually in blog posts.

Further reading: w3schools.com, GeeksForGeeks.org, Elementor.com/blog, Shiksha.com/online-courses.

Searching for soldiers fighting for the Dutch Republic 1595-1795

An index to the "Staat van Oorlog" (States of War) has recently been added to the website of the Brabants Historisch Informatie Centrum (BHIC). It’s a Who-Was-Who in the Dutch army of the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands. The index can help genealogists who are looking for information about military ancestors, because the States of War zooms in to the level of the individual companies. This resource can thus greatly simplify your search for military ancestors in The Netherlands.

Marriage registrations of soldiers, may mention the name of the captain under whom the soldier in question served, but it is often quite a search to find out to which regiment that captain and his company belonged. With the data from the "Staat van Oorlog" that search becomes a lot easier.

Because the manpower potential of the small Republic's territory was so limited, the States-General had to look beyond Dutch borders for a large part of their recruits. Fortunately, in those days foreign authorities did often not object to recruitment efforts within their territories. The Republic therefore was able to obtain large numbers of recruits from Scotland, England, the Holy Roman Empire, France, and later also the Protestant Swiss Cantons.

soldier

The entire content of the "Staat van Oorlog" material was copied - as much as possible - and incorporated into the database. It contains around 400,000 registrations over the period 1595-1795, but the data for the first 50 years is incomplete.

Each entry contains a meticulous and detailed summary of the ranks of the Dutch State Army down to the level of individual companies: who was in charge, how many men did he have under him, and what were the costs? In addition, the average summary-list contains additional data, such as salaries for officers, commissioners who arranged the signing-on, guardsmen, ammunition masters, public prosecutors, teachers, preachers and gunners. A further distinction is also made between cavalry and foot soldiers. Included are military personnel stationed in multiple areas of The Netherlands, for example in Utrecht, Ommerschans, or Delfzijl.
Because these summaries were created annually, and always according to the same fixed schedule, this source is also ideally suited to follow the careers of officers in the State Army.

Link to the Database of soldiers fighting for the Dutch Republic:

https://www.bhic.nl/onderzoeken/staten-van-oorlog

This is an example with Scottish soldiers:

Sources: Uitleg over zoeken naar Staatse militairen, Hulp bij zoeken naar Staatse militairen, Informatie over staatse militairen online toegankelijk gemaakt, Dutch States Army.

Smart Genealogy Do-Over

In recent years there’s been “Genealogy Do-Over” hype^*. However, I don’t like to do things anew, especially not when it’s “just” a hobby that we’re talking about. I’m not stating that I never review older research, on the contrary, I do some “Do-Over” once in a while, but only when there’s an inducement to do so.
With currently some 5588 possible ancestors, I just can't review all of them. Thus, I try to do some “Smart Do-Over” only when I have a reason to do so.

When a new source has become digitally available for an area where some of my ancestors are living, I go through that source, and add new insights into my ancestors’ data. When I revisit an ancestor in this way, I could find a reason for additional research - a “Do-Over”.

For example, the genealogy software^** I use, has an option to add sources, which I use. When I notice that the current source is not a primary source, I may try to find the primary source, when it’s digitally available.
When thus adding information, I may notice some inconsistency, or wonder why none of the sons has the same name as the father's father, I can do some addition research to improve (or disprove) my data.

My genealogy software also has some functionality to check for improbable dates, like a woman giving birth at an unlikely old age, or a child that's older than its parent. Finds like that can also trigger some “Do-Over” research.

That's enough “Do-Over” for me!

^* Websites like "Genealogy Do-Over - The 12 steps" by Thomas MacEntee (who started the ‘hype’ with a book), a "Genealogy Do-Over Index" by Kathleen, "The Genealogy Do-Over - Are you ready to hit the restart button?" by Carol Kostakos Petranek, and "The Magic of a Genealogy Do-Over" by Paul Hoesl.
^** I use Dutch-language genealogy software program Aldfaer.

How to find the RSS feed URL for a blog (when it has one)

An RSS feed is a tool for helping people access content from your site. An RSS feed can list the articles on a website. You can read an RSS feed in an RSS Feed Reader. You can also use the feed to automatically tweet new blog posts to Twitter (X) by feeding the url to social media management tools like HootSuite, dlvr.it or SocialPilot.co.

If you go to the URL for a website's RSS feed, you'll see the text of the .xml file, which social media management tools use to pull access your content. However, different websites use different locations and names for their RSS feed. This blog post will describe the RSS feed locations of some common blogging websites.

Blogger

On a Blogger website, like this one, take the URL of the site, and add “feeds/posts/default” at the end of that URL. For my blog you can find the URL with

https://genealogiebos.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default

Additionly, Blogger has an additional feed for comments on posts: https://genealogiebos.blogspot.com/feeds/comments/default

SquareSpace

The RSS URL for any SquareSpace page is
the URL including its page slug, followed by “?format=rss”.
Depending on whether the built-in domain is used or a custom domain, it will look like one of these:

https://www.yourdomain.com/pageslug?format=rss
https://sitename.squarespace.com/pageslug?format=rss

Note: The RSS feeds of Squarepage page pull the 20 most recent blog posts.

WordPress

Many websites are build with WordPress - even if they have a “normal” URL. To find a WordPress RSS Feed, add “/feed” to the end of the URL, for example

https://www.amyjohnsoncrow.com/feed

If an error message appears, the site has no feed, otherwise the RSS Feed will appear.

Medium

If a site is hosted on Medium, add “/feed/” before the publication's name.
So medium.com/example-site becomes

medium.com/feed/example-site

Tumblr

If a site is hosted on Tumblr, add “/rss” to the end of the URL. Like this:

https://example.tumblr.com/rss>

Further reading: How to find the RSS feed URL for almost any site by Zapier, How to Find an RSS Feed’s URL by RSS.com, Using RSS feeds with SquareSpace.

Tip: The location of Blogger's Photo Albums has changed

Album Archive was a web gallery to view and manage photo and video content from a number of Google products, and also Blogger's photos, but it's no longer available.
Photos and videos that were visible in Album Archive, but that are still available in existing products like Google Photos, or Blogger, can be found within those products.
You can access and manage your blog's images from inside your Blogger account in the Media Manager.

This is the link to the new Blogger Photo Albums location:

https://www.blogger.com/mediamanager/albums

How I search for ancestors in a structured way

Genealogy is the study and tracing of lines of descent. Ancestry refers to a person's ethnic origin or descent, someone’s "roots" or heritage. A lineage is a line of descent. The persons comprising a line of descent are the ancestors.

By now, I’ve been searching for my ancestors for over 20 years. In the early years, I had to visit different archives at different locations to research my predecessors. Since then, loads of genealogical sources have been copied or transcribed, and made available over the Internet.

When adding or editing ancestors, I use an optional, internal field * to note special features of a person like “short marriage”, “longevity”, an index number in a publication about the family, or an alternative surname when the person was known by more than one surname. In recent years, I’ve developed an additional use for this optional, internal field, or “label”.

Genealogists use the term “Brick Wall” to describe a point in their research where they are unable to move forward with something — a kind of dead end. They break through a “Brick Wall” when they make a new discovery that helps them move past this dead end.

When I get stuck with an ancestor, the so-called “Brick Wall”, I mark that ancestor’s “label” with the word  “BRICK-WALL”.  When - in the future - new sources should become available for the area where that ancestor is living, I could take a new look at that ancestor. Basically, the  “BRICK-WALL”  label means that I’m currently stuck.

Another improvement in the way I research ancestors, also involves the  “label”.  When I’ve found both parents of some person, I decide which one of the parents I will research first, and then I label the other parent as  “TO-DO”.  I do this with every new couple of parents I find, until I hit - and mark - a  “BRICK-WALL”.  Then I can start researching one of the people marked earlier as “TO-DO”. This way, I can also focus on people in a specific area with a specific set of sources, until I’ve finished researching all persons in that area, marked with “TO-DO”.

My genealogy software does have a feature to generate “all ancestors without ancestors”,  but that’s a long list of names with birth years. The main list, including ancestors without surnames, too, currently comprises of 2158 persons. When I generate a list of ancestors without ancestors, but with a surname, then I get a list of 740 people. Using the software, I can try to work on an ancestor with recent birth years, but usually there’s a reason why a fairly recent ancestor is at the top of a branch, like missing sources, or the person was a foundling. With my “TO-DO” system I can easily find ancestors to work on.

* In the Dutch genealogy software program “Aldfaer”, I use an optional, internal field named “Code” for this purpose.

For an explanation of common genealogy terms see: MyHeritage.com.

It's my 10-Year blogiversary !

On 17 January 2013, I published my 1st post for this blog, so today is my  10th  blogiversary !

In those years the months with the most posts (5) were January and August 2018 and October 2019. But it’s not about quantity but quality, and that's for you to determine. The most popular blog posts in 2022 were those explaining where and how to find genealogy information, so I've added a list of blog posts with genealogy tips below.

The downside of 10 years of blogging is that it has become harder to find new topics to blog about. I skipped the month of December to be able to plan some blog posts in the first months of 2023. I may skip more holiday months in the future, because blogging should remain a hobby, and not an obligation.

The most common surnames among my known ancestors are Van Driel, Oerlemans, Spruijt, Brand and Bos. On this blog the most common surnames in my posts are Bos and De Jong, which are the surnames of my parents.
My ancestors with the most children are Cornelis Bos (1813-1888) and Otto van Driel (1756-1832); both had 17 children with 2 wives. In the 17th century Arij Peijnsz. Hogerwaert and his wife Trijntje Willems had 16 children together.
Ancestors Gerrit Korver and Neeltjen Bloet (±1640-1727) were married for over 66 years. When my ancestor Jan Pieterse Vasen died on 11-8-1702 in Ottoland, Holland, he was "around 100 years old and had been blind for 3 or 4 years".

To celebrate this 10-year milestone, I've updated - in addition to the statistics above - my list featuring interesting genealogy posts from this and other blogs.

Tips & Tricks

• Check for improbable dates
• Was your ancestor married more than once?
• Dutch Genealogy Research Tips
• The Netherlands Links at Cindi's List
• Dutch Naming Traditions by @DutchGen
• Researching Unusual Last Names for Genealogy by David
• How to Find Your Dutch Ancestor’s Occupation by @DutchGen
• Find European Ancestors on the Internet
• Checklist for starting Research in the Country of Origin by @DutchGen
• Passenger lists of the Holland-America Line
• Ships Passenger Lists to New York 1624-64 by Lorene
• Castle Garden Immigration Before Ellis Island by FamilySearch
• Search for Napoleon's Soldiers
• Searching the Soundtoll Registers for shipmasters sailing the Baltic Sea
• Mind the Chronology of a Population Register by @DutchGen
• Find relevant genealogy results in Google by using key search commands by @MarianBWood
• Ancestors With Unusual Names - Weird, Cool, or Historical? by Mercedes
• Tips for finding Brick-Wall Ancestors by Family Tree Magazine
• Sources for images to illustrate your Dutch family tree by @DutchGen
• Add an image to your blog post
• DNA and Inheritance explained by Marc
• Marriage Impediments for Catholics 
• Latin Abbreviations when doing Genealogy
• Extracts of emigration cards of Dutch people in Australia 1946-1991

‘Black Sheep’ Sources

• Historical U.S. Prison Records Online
• Prisons, Prisoners & Outlaws at Cindi's List
• Criminal Ancestor Records at Family History Daily
• Prisoners in Brabant
• Prison Record Index for Zeeland
• Dutch Prison Record Examples by @DutchGen
• Inhabitants of the Dutch colonies of the Society of Benevolence
  
• Black Sheep Ancestors Sources (USA & Canada)
• Insane Asylums Search (USA)
  
• Scottish Asylum Archives and more on Scottish ‘Lunatics’

Extracts of emigration cards of Dutch people in Australia 1946-1991

Though the Dutch were the first Europeans to visit Australia and New Zealand, initially colonisation did not take place. It was only after World War II that a sharp increase in Dutch emigration to Australia occurred. Poor economic prospects for many Dutchmen, and houses destroyed in the 1953 flood were powerful incentives to emigrate.
With Australia experiencing a shortage of agricultural and metal industry workers it, and to a lesser extent New Zealand, they seemed an attractive possibility, with the Dutch government actively promoting emigration.

You can search in the extracts of the emigration cards here:

https://www.nationaalarchief.nl/onderzoeken/index/nt00335

You can search with the whole surname - or a partial surname to get more results.

There's also a Commonwealth Government Agencies database (ca. 1850 - ca. 1975):

https://recordsearch.naa.gov.au/SearchNRetrieve/Interface/SearchScreens/BasicSearch.aspx

This database includes a large number of individuals from the Netherlands and Belgium.

Search for Napoleon's Soldiers

In the period 1802-1815 the (in)famous Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte was at war with the other European powers. The recruitment of men required for his huge army - volunteers and conscripts - was enormous, likely the largest in France - except for the First World War.

Initially, a series of military victories allowed the French Empire to exercise unprecedented control over most of Europe. During the disastrous invasion of Russia in 1812, however, Napoleon's army suffered enormous losses, after which it never recovered its tactical superiority.

Unlike most armed forces at the time, Napoleon's army operated on a strictly meritocratic basis; while most contingents were commanded by French generals - except for the Polish and Austrian corps, most soldiers could climb the ranks regardless of class, wealth, or national origin.

Over 1 million soldiers have now been indexed from their military roll register records, while indexing of the remainder is ongoing. Each record contains the family name, first name, date and place of birth, parents' names, enrollment and discharge dates, and campaign records for every soldier. A link to the high-resolution scanned image hosted by France's Ministère des Armées is added, too. Most records are for French soldiers, but there are also men from other European countries like Belgium, Germany, The Netherlands, Italy, and Poland.

One of those many soldiers in Napoleon's “Grande Armée” was my ancestor Arie de Sterke (1796-1892).

You can search here at GeneaNet.org :

https://en.geneanet.org/fonds/search-event/76/napoleon-s-soldiers

Note: When searching, keep in mind that a French version of the given name may have been written down, for example "Jacques" i.s.o. Jacob(us).

Further reading: Wikipedia.org

Passenger lists of the Holland-America Line have been digitised

The Holland-America Line (HAL) was founded in Rotterdam, The Netherlands. In the period 1873-1989, it operated as a Dutch passenger line, cargo line, and cruise line, operating primarily between the Netherlands and North America. The suffix indicated the ship’s primary function - “dam” for passenger service, “dijk” for cargo. The Holland America Line - with its yellow and white funnels ringed with green stripes - has transported more than 850,000 emigrants to the New World.

The first great wave of immigration ended with the advent of World War I, during which HAL would lose 6 ships and 13 employees. At the start of the Second World War, HAL had 25 ships; 9 remained at war's end. After the war, the shipping line was instrumental in transporting a massive wave of immigrants from the Netherlands to Canada and elsewhere.

All passenger lists of the Holland-America Line covering the period 1900-1969 have now been digitised. You can easily search for family members who travelled, or emigrated, with the Holland-America Line.
The information was made available due to a joint project of the CBG (Dutch Center for Family History) and the Rotterdam City Archives that lasted three years, and is now completed thanks to the help of many volunteers.

You can search here:
    https://stadsarchief.rotterdam.nl/zoek-en-ontdek/passagierslijsten/zoeken-op-passagiers/

An example

For more information on the Holland-America Line and its former fleet, see:
     https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holland_America_Line
     https://maritime-executive.com/article/holland-america-line-history-distinction-innovation-and-growth

9-Year Blogiversary - Interesting Blog Posts

On 17 January 2013   I published my 1st post for this blog,  so  today is my  9th  blogiversary !

In those years January and August 2018 and October 2019 were the months with the most posts (5). Of course it’s not about quantity but quality. I've tried to achieve quality by writing about topics that arouse my interest. The stories on this blog are usually not about my own ancestors, but about deceased people who catch my attention. 

To celebrate this 9-year milestone, here's my list featuring interesting genealogy posts from this, and other blogs.

Tips & Tricks

• Dutch Genealogy Research Tips
• The Netherlands Links at Cindi's List
• Finding European Ancestors on the Internet
• Compare to the neighbors by Yvette
• How to Find Your Dutch Ancestor’s Occupation by Yvette
• Investigate gaps between children by Yvette
• Sources for images to illustrate your Dutch family tree by Yvette
• Add an image to your blog post
• Check for improbable dates
• Was your ancestor married more than once?
• DNA and Inheritance explained by Marc
• Find relevant genealogy results in Google by using key search commands by Marian
• Tips for finding Brick-Wall Ancestors
• Mind the Chronology of a Population Register
• Checklist for starting Research in the Country of Origin
• Latin Abbreviations when doing Genealogy

Black Sheep

• Historical U.S. Prison Records Online
• Prisons, Prisoners & Outlaws at Cindi's List
• Criminal Ancestor Records at Family History Daily
• Dutch Prison Records
• Criminal Records discover black sheep ancestors by TheGenealogist
  
• Black Sheep Ancestors Sources (USA & Canada)
• How to Find Black Sheep Family in Old Newspapers by Gena
• John Dove (†1878), Jacob Shelton's murderer by Amanda
• John Carter (†1893) was hanged for murdering his 3rd wife Rhoda Titcombe by Angela
• Tonnis Willinck was shot near Winterwijk around 1593 by Yvette
• In 1668 Antoine Gaboury was found guilty of attempted rape by Yvonne
• Gerhard Linneman - erotic asphyxiation with a belt gone wrong?
• Allen Bowlin - 5x bigamy by Gwen
  
• Kundertje Dijksman (1866-1917): teenage pregnancy & divorce in Delft, Holland
• Philip Wyatt (†1892) and his 3 Elizabeths by Susan
• Madness: 
• Scottish Asylum Archives and more on Scottish ‘Lunatics’
• Edmund Frowein (1813-90) was locked up
• Joannes Abeel, "an alleged lunatic" in 18th-century Albany
• Martha Williams Saul was patient in a lunatic asylum by Nancy 
• Insane baseball pitcher Albert Charles Hungler (1860-93) by Diane
• Elisabeth Maria Comans was locked up in 1785 in Dordrecht

Marriage Impediments

A couple that wants to marry should make known their intention of contraction marriage several weeks before the date set for their marriage. That way time is left for objections to be made - if there are reasons why the marriage cannot take place.
This article is about under what circumstances a marriage is forbidden by the Catholic Church; some reasons are in themselves sufficient to invalidate it altogether, others do not absolutely prevent the possibility of marriage, but render it undesirable and harmful.

Nullifying impediments of marriage are: 

• Lack of proper age;
• Certain physical defects, like impotency;
• The bond of a previous marriage; exceptions are the dissolution of a non-consummated marriage by Papal dispensation, or dissolution of marriage of two persons not baptized at the time the marriage occurred;
• Holy Orders;
• Solemn vows;
• Abduction;  if a man compels a woman to marry him, threatening to kill her in case of refusal, or to do her some very serious injury, their marriage is not valid; her consent is extorted by force, and is not given voluntarily;
• Crime, like causing the death of a partner by mutual cooperation, either physical or moral;
• Blood relationship to all in the direct line, and to the third degree in the collateral line;
• Affinity or relationship through marriage to all in the direct line, and to the second degree in the collateral line;
• Mistaken identity, when there is a mistake as to one of the contracting parties;
• Spiritual relationship, which exists between a baptized person, and the one who baptized him, or stood for him in Baptism;
• Legal adoption; wherever it is an impediment under the civil law. 

Latin Abbreviations when doing Genealogy

 A list of Latin Abbriviations, used in church documents:

aas.	anno aetatis suae	died in the year of his/her age
A.D.	Anno Domini	in the Year of our Lord
acc.	acatholicus	non-Catholic
aet.	at aetatis suae	at the age of
cop.	copula	bond
d.b.n., de bo non	de bonis non administratis	of goods unadministered
d.p.	designatus patrinis	designated sponsors
dsp.	decessit sine prole	died without issue (children)
dspl.	decessit sine prole legitima	died without legitimate issue (children)
dspm.	decessit sine prole mascula	died without male issue (sons)
dspml.	decessit sine prole mascula legitima	died without legitimate male issue (sons)
dspms.	decessit sine prole mascula superstite	died without surviving male issue (living sons)
dsps.	decessit sine prole superstite	died without surviving issue (living children)
dspv.	decessit sine prole virilli	died without male issue (sons)
dvm.	decessit vita matris	died in the lifetime of the mother
dvp.	decessit vita patris	died in the lifetime of the father
et al.	et alii	others
fla	filia	daughter
fls	filius	son
inst.	instant	in the present or current month
j.s.	matrimon juncti, juncti sunt	joined in marriage (married)
msp.	mortuus sine prole	died without offspring (children)
ob. caelebs	obdormio caelebs	died single or as a bachelor
osp.	obiit sine prole	died without issue
spl.	sine prole legitima	without legitimate issue
spm.	sine prole mascula	without sons
sps.	sine prole superstite	without surviving issue
solv.	solvit	has paid
ult.	ultimo, ultimo mense	in the previous month
vf.	via fratris	in the lifetime of his brother
vmp	via patris	in the lifetime of his father
vulgo	vulgo vocatus	generally called
V.D.M.	Verbi Divini Minister	minister of the divine word, preacher

Sources: FamilySearch.org/wiki, NazatenDeVries.nl, GenealogyBank.com .

My 7th blogiversary !

On 17 January 2013 I published my 1st post for this blog, so today is my 7th blogiversary !

In those years January and August 2018 were the months with the most posts (5), followed by July and October 2018, November 2017 and January 2014 (4). The 6th year, 2018, was the year with the most blog posts: 39. In 2019 I wrote ...

The most common surnames among my known ancestors are Van Driel, Oerlemans, Spruijt, Brand and Bos. On this blog the most common surnames in my posts are Bos and De Jong, the surnames of my parents.
My favourite posts of my own ancestors are:

1. Arie de Sterke (1796-1892) fought in Russia & at Waterloo
2. Thomas Brullee's Whaling Expeditions of 1687 and 1712
3. Bos is a common name in The Netherlands

My ancestors with the most children are Cornelis Bos (1813-1888) and Otto van Driel (1756-1832): both had 17 children with 2 wives. In the 17th century Arij Peijnsz. Hogerwaert and his wife Trijntje Willems had 16 children together. 
The couple Gerrit Korver and Neeltjen Bloet (±1640-1727) were married for over 66 years. When my ancestor Jan Pieterse Vasen died on 11-8-1702 in Ottoland, Holland, he was "around 100 years old and had been blind for 3 or 4 years".

To celebrate this 7-year milestone I've compiled a list of genealogy tips & tricks articles. 

Tips & Tricks

• Dutch Genealogy Research Tips
• Links to Dutch Sources on FamilySearch by E. Hennekam
• Dutch Naming Traditions by Y. Hoitink
• How to Find Your Dutch Ancestor’s Occupation by Y. Hoitink
• The Netherlands Links at Cindi's List
• Add an image to your blog post
• Sources for images to illustrate your Dutch family tree by Y. Hoitink
• Find European Ancestors on the Internet by K. Schrober
• Checklist for starting Research in the Country of Origin by Y. Hoitink
• Check for improbable dates
• Check the women's ages
• Mind the Chronology of a Population Register by Y. Hoitink
• Was your ancestor married more than once?
• When a website uses small characters
• Find relevant genealogy results by using Google & Yahoo Search Commands
• Blogging Tips for Newbies and Veterans by J. Goins
• Tips for finding Brick-Wall Ancestors by Family Tree Magazine
• DNA and Inheritance explained by M. McDermott