Attingahem Bridge

Brooklyn. Named after the charming village of Breukelen in the Netherlands. Its original Frisian name was Attingahem. With only a twist of history, the borough of Brooklyn would have been named Attingahem today, and the Brooklyn Bridge therefore the Attingahem Bridge. The streets of Brooklyn, the set of movies like The Warriors (’79), The French Connection (’71), Once Upon a Time in America (’84) and, of course, Saturday Night Fever (’77). But many more.

The name Breukelen, or Breuckelen, was brought to the New World in the first half of the seventeenth century, when Nieuw Amsterdam ‘New Amsterdam’ was founded and now known to the whole world as New York City. Many other place names remind of the Dutch immigrants back then, like Flushing (town of Vlissingen), Harlem (town of Haarlem), Staten Island (Staten Eylant), Broadway (Brede Weg), Bowery (bouwerie, meaning farmstead; property of the Frisian statesman Peter Stuyvesant), boss (baas), the small porch called stoop (stoep), cookies (koekjes), and so forth. And, we must not forget, the name Yankee itself. Named after the zillion Dutch guys called Jan and Kees living in Nieuw Amsterdam. Even the name dollar originates from the Dutch currency name daalder. Then again, daalder originates from the coin struck around the year 1500 in the Joachimsthal ‘Joachim Valley’ in Bohemia, abbreviated to thaler.

If interested in more Dutch and Frisian influence on American history, read our post History is written by the victors – a history of credits.

Pagus Niftarlake

The village of Breukelen in the Netherlands today is a quiet and fly village of nearly 11,000 inhabitants, located on the western bank of the river Stichtse Vecht in the center of the country. Mostly wealthy inhabitants, and the opposite of its progeny Bed-Stuy in New York City. A small village but one with a rich history. Not only because the Dutch-American actor Rutger Hauer was born here. No, there is much more to its history.

Bedford Stuyvesant – Bed-Stuy, or Bedford Stuyvesant, is one of the oldest neighborhoods of Brooklyn. Pieter Stuyvesant was the former governor of New Amsterdam in the seventeenth century. Pieter Stuyvesant originates from the south of province Friesland. He also has been indicted by the ITCF among other for being one of the bigger slave owners in the New World. Read our Press Release: Consensus Frisia Tribunal.

Already in Roman times, river Stichtse Vecht was an important route between the river Rhine and lake Almere, now IJsselmeer ‘lake IJssel’. It’s even the most probable location of the so-called Drususkanalen ‘Drusus’ canals’. These were a series of canals Roman army commander Drusus had dug between 12 and 9 BC, to make passage possible from the fortress of Vechten to lake IJsselmeer. By the Early Middle Ages, Frisians had taken control over the river Stichtse Vecht and the wider area. It was an area called pagus ‘shire’ Niftarlake, also written as Nifterlake or Nifterlaca. Niftar meant ‘along’ and lake/laca meant ‘stream’. The first documented reference of pagus Niftarlake is in the year 723, and the last entry in history is in 953. From then on, the shire is called by its Latin name luxta Vechtam ‘along the (Stichtse) Vecht’. The component luxta is the same as niftar.

Pagus Niftarlake encompassed the area between the settlement of Amuthon, the current village of Muiden, in the north of the shire, and the settlement of Feht or Fethna in the south, the current town of Vechten. At the settlement of Amuthon, the river Stichtse Vecht flowed into lake Almere. At the settlement Feht, a name that originates from the Roman fortress Fectio, the river Rhine split into the rivers Stichtse Vecht and (Old) Rhine. Three smaller streams named Aa, Angstel, and Het Gein also belonged to pagus Niftarlake.

At the settlement of Amuthon in the tenth century, ships had to pay a teloneum ‘toll’ by order of the Frankish king. This toll was collected by the Frisian nobleman count Waldger and his son, count Radbod, afterward. Count Radbod is not to be confused with the heathen king Radbod, also known by his pet name the Enemy of God. King Radbod was overking of the western part of Frisia, and lived at the end of the seventh and beginning of the eighth centuries. So, a few centuries before count Radbod walked on planet earth. Nor should count Radbod be mixed up with Saint Radbod, who was bishop of Utrecht at the end of the ninth century.

Count Radbod probably died without offspring. After Waldger and Radbod, Hatto was count of pagus Niftarlake. Counts Waldger, Radbod, and Hatto probably were not merely count of pagus Niftarlake, but also of pagus Teisterbant and of pagus Lek-and-IJssel as well. In the year 953, count Hatto somehow forfeits his rights, and Holy Roman Emperor Otto donates pagus Niftarlake to the bishopric of Utrecht.The toll at Amuthon, or control over pagus Niftarlake for that matter, was very lucrative for a long time. It was the ancient gateway of the trade between the great trading hub Dorestat and the wider North Sea, including southern Scandinavia.

Read our post Porcupines bore U.S. bucks to know more about the magnitude of the early-medieval maritime trade of the Frisians, and eventually how free trade and economic liberalism was kind of a Frisian invention, inherited by the Dutch and brought to Manhattan in the seventeenth century.

So, pagus Niftarlake is of origin Frisian and was ruled by Frisian noblemen like Wrrsing (see further below) in the Early Middle Ages. When in the year 719 king Radbod dies of an illness, the Franks seized the opportunity, and took possession of this part of Frisia as well. However, interestingly, pagus Niftarlake keeps being administered by Frisian noble families, although from then on under Frankish control. Only in the already mentioned year of 953, the Frisian ruling class is finally sidelined by the bishop of Utrecht.

Boss Wrssing aka Atte

An important Frisian big man who lived in the river Stichtse Vecht region before it became part of the Frankish empire in the beginning of the eighth century, was the Frisian nobleman Wrssing or, easier, Wursing, meaning ‘son of Wurso’. His wife was named Adalgard, and his two sons were named Thiadgrim and Nothgrim. This besides nine daughters whose names we do not know. Six of these nine daughters died young. Wrrsing lived around 700, and was a contemporary and acquaintance of king Redbad. At some point Wrrsing, when he was not married long yet, came into conflict with king Radbod and had to flee with his wife. Both sought protection at the Frankish court. During this period, Wrrsing was converted to Christianity, and most of his children were born (and died). It was only after the death of king Radbod in 719 that Wrrsing dare to return to ‘his’ pagus Niftarlake of which the Franks had taken possession in the meantime.

Read also our post king Redbad’s last act to learn more about the complicated interaction between Radbod (also Redbad) and Wrrsing.

Weisenheimer Wrrsing was also the grandfather of Saint Ludger. Ludger’s father was Wrrsing’s son named Thiadgrim. Ludger’s mother was named Liafburg. She was the daughter of a certain Nothrad and Adelburg. Saint Ludger was born at the settlement of Suecsnon, current Oud-Zuilen, more upstream the river Stichtse Vecht. Therefore, also in the pagus Niftarlake. Saint Ludger was not the first within the family to become an influential cleric. Wrrsing’s brother Hildigrim made it to bishop of Helmstadt in Germany, and to bishop of Châlons in France. Nut for nuttin’ but, the area of the river Stichtse Vecht was an important center of influential families within Frisia, already in the seventh century.

And now why Wrrsing is relevant for this post. The ninth-century Vita sancti Liudgerii tells that Wrrsing’s nickname was Ado or Atte. Indeed, he gave the settlement its name: Attingahem, which translates as ‘Atte’s home’.

Friezenbuurt – Today, near where the settlement of Suecsnon (i.e. Oud-Zuilen) was located, exists today the Friezenbuurt, ‘Frisians borough’. However, the area only developed after the Great War, when the Frisian company Twijnstra set up a plant there, and built housing for their employers also from province Friesland. An initiative with historical memory. Or, was it just by chance?

A stream dug in the bog

In the year 722, a few years after most of Frisia was incorporated into the Frankish kingdom, it was the Anglo-Saxon monk Wynfrith, later known as Saint Boniface, who used the settlement of Attingahem as his base to convert the then still heathen Frisians. He probably founded the parish church dedicated to Saint Peter. In the year 1705, the location of this church was probably pinned down after several sarcophagi of tuff were excavated. The type of sarcophagi, i.e. without a base, suggests it are early Carolingian coffins. Thus the beginning of the ninth century.

Attingahem changed its name into Breukelen somewhere around 1050, with a range of a century earlier or later. So, bit unclear when, but it did for sure. The settlement of Broclede surfaces in the year 1139. Broc or broek means ‘wetland or bog’. Circumneutral bog, to be precise. Lede means ‘(dug) stream’. So, Breukelen means ‘dug-stream-in-circumneutral-bog’. The Brooklynites will be more than thrilled with this sexy and edgy translation. Smokin’.

We do not know why Attingahem changed into Breukelen, but many other place names of Frisian origin disappeared as well in the region of the river Stichtse Vecht and wider area. This might have had to do with the de-Frisianization process of western Frisia that had started in the ninth century already. Western Frisia was the territory what is now the combined provinces Noord Holland, Zuid Holland, Zeeland and part of province Utrecht. The influence of the bishopric of Utrecht expanded and it got control over pagus Niftarlake in the tenth century. As said, it was in the year 953 that Holy Roman Emperor Otto took away the pagus from count Hatto. But the de-Frisianization also had to do with the large-scale, commercial peat reclamation in the High Middle Ages. The so-called Great Reclamation. The fundamental reshaping of the peat landscape as result, led to a total shift of identity.

Read our post The United Frisian Emirates and Black Peat to get a basic idea of this brown-gold revolution.

John Travolta in (click link for music) Saturday Night Fever, Brooklyn, just after having finished two slices of Lenny’s Pizza

Well, imagine the catchy names: the Attingahem Dodgers, the Attingahem Cyclons, Attingahem College, the Attingahem Nets, the movie Attingahem Rules, Attingahem Nine-Nine, and Attingahem Bridge. And, of course, we should not forget that the movie Saturday Night Fever would then be shot in the streets of Attingahem. instead of Brooklyn.

So, the name Brooklyn is, in fact, fugazy. Fuggedabautit!

Suggested music

Bee Gees, Stayin’ Alive (1977)