Op maandag 23 mei 2016 20:59:35 UTC+2 schreef ziggy beseler via: > Hello list - I'm a new member - researching the family van Becelaere, > Beselaere and various spellings of those (NOT Besler which is Swiss) - my > family originated from Ypres, Flanders in the 1500s and before, back to the > 1st Crusade, 1095. My particular branch of this family fled to Hamburg > about, I'm guessing,1572 - sometime in the late 1500s anyhow. The family > were clothiers and belonged to the cloth guild in Ypres/Ieper. Anyone with > any info, I would be thrilled to hear from you! > > Lora in finally warm Wisconsin No direct answer but I can confirm that Beselare is a Belgian village nowadays part of the municipal of Zonnebeke, a couple of miles east of the town of Ieper. See: https://www.google.nl/maps/place/Beselare,+8980+Zonnebeke,+Belgi%C3%AB/@50.8478927,2.8845993,11z/data=!4m5!3m4!1s0x47c33329755b813b:0x595ac85f57b897c0!8m2!3d50.84788!4d3.024675 https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beselare https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zonnebeke https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ieper The remark that the family was present in the first crusade should be taken with caution. One could assume that they then were part of the nobility. No such family is known or recorded in The Flemish Nobility before 1300 by Dr. Hist. E. Warlop (1976). Therefore it is doubtfull if the origin of the family Van Becelaere/Beselaere, urban clothiers, can be traced back into the 13th century. Hans Vogels