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| VAN TINE, Fontyne, Funtine, Fontain, Vantine Carol Van Tine Yocum This is an excerpt from a history of the family that I started many years ago. The rest is sadly out of date. What has this to do with the Vantine (Van Tine, Van Tyne, etc) family, you are certainly asking. The legal language of New Amsterdam was Dutch, but most people were illiterate in any language. Henry Fiske says in his Dutch and Quaker Colonies that there were at least 26 languages being spoken in a town with only about four thousand inhabitants. I have never found proof that Charles Fonteyn could read or write either French or Dutch, the one signature existing being his mark "X" only. Throughout these records, wild variations in spelling the name Fonteyn are evident. As Rosalie Fellows Bailey remarks in "Dutch Naming Systems": "In the seventeenth century, it was the custom of Dutch magistrates and scribes to translate foreign names into what they believed to be equivalent Dutch names and so enter them on the court records or other series of records kept in that language.... If the foreign name was difficult to translate, the seventeenth century Dutch magistrate or scribe usually entered a phonetic approximation. Such might take the form of a Dutch name similar in sound to the foreign name, but often quite different in meaning; or the foreign name might merely be spelled phonetically by translating the sound of the name in letters as the Dutch pronounced their letters." Through my years of research on this family, I have discovered that the change from Fonteyn to Vantine follows many different paths. In the following chart, there are a few listed: Fontaine, Fonteyn, Vontine, Vantine, Ffontaine, Vonteyn, Vantyne, Fantine, Fontime, Van Tine, Fountin, Van Tyne, Fontijn, Phantine, Tine, Fanton, Tyne. To further complicate matters, the name is frequently misspelled as Valentine, Van Dyne, Van Line, Dantine, and Van Jines. It can be confused with the "real" Dutch names of Van Tyn and Van Tien, of which I tell more later. Given names suffered similar mistreatment as evidenced by the name Jacques Fonteyn. In the late 1780's a perplexed tax enumerator in Adams County, Pennsylvania, scratched his head and gave it his best effort and listed Zwacks Vantine as a taxable male head of household. Rosalie Fellows Bailey also came to the same conclusion, "The Van Tyne or Vantine family of central New Jersey has a misleadingly Dutch connotation since the family is of French origin." As late as 1814, I have clear evidence that the family continued to use both variations of the name. The documents that I have which were signed by Cornelius Vantine to receive his War of 1812 land grant are clearly signed Cornelius Fantine in two separate places (I believe this to be John Vantine's, my third great grandfather's, brother--but no proof). The early tax and church records of Dutchess County use many variations of Fonteyn/Vantine. The only clear exception is William Vantine who always seems to be Vantine. Since his father William Fonteyn, who married Kniertje Wiltsie 29 Nov 1741, died shortly after William (son) was born, I feel certain that this steadfast spelling can be attributed to his mother's second husband, Koenradt Applie, a literate Swiss-German. A CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF THE LIFE OF CHARLES FONTEYN --1647 Married [in Honnechy?] France, at St. Catherine's. The cure has lost the records, but an attorney gives an attestation of the marriage. --17 May 1658 Listed as "Charles Fonteyn, a frenchman and wife" sailing on the Gilded Beaver from Amsterdam to New Amsterdam. --26 Oct 1659 Magdaleen baptised in the RDC of New Amsterdam, parents were Carel Fonteyn and Catharyn Bale, wit: Mr. Jacob Huygens, Magdaleen Douteljet. 974.7 B4ne 1968, p. 54. --16 Feb 1660/1 One of 14 Frenchmen who petition for permission to settle on Long Island in Boswyck (Bushwick). Ms Records of Bushwick. --14 Mar 1 [rest missing in source]129 Note: 3. Immigration, 17 May 1658, Nieuw Amsterdam, Nieuw Nederlandt "a french man and wife" to New Amsterdam aboard the Gilded Beaver The Beaver is the ship my ancestor Carel Fonteyn arrived in - The fastest crossing from N.A. to the Republic was made by the "Vergulde Beaver" in 1658. "The good Lord (è..) after a prosperous voyage allowed her after 34 days to arrive at Texel" (Correspondence of Jeremias van Rensselaer 1651-1674 p 133-4) 129 | ||||||
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| Last Modified 9 Dec 2005 | Created 9 Dec 2005 by Reunion for Macintosh |