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Biography
Children: Cornelis (1600), Adriaen (1600), Pieter (1605)
We know nothing from direct records about Cornelis, but several things about him can be gleaned from records incidentally.
In the 1646 membership list of the Aartswoud Reformed Church, there is a Cornelis Cornelisz and Cornelis Reijersz (died 1652). Either one could be our Cornelis if he was still alive at this time.
I have found a few places in West-Friesland that Cornelis van der Sluys could have come from. He would have received his surname either from working on a sluice or by living in a place called Sluis. There were many such places across the area. The less likely ones are small communities just outside Barsingerhorn and close to Wervershoof called Sluis.
There were also many places ending in –sluis in the Aardswoud area. The 1704 Aartswoud Reformed Church membership lists has Arien, Jacob, Pieter and Jannetje Cornelis Sluis living by the Sluis on the Dike. This would have been their father's and grandfather's property. Therefore they would have received the last name Sluis because they lived by the sluice on the dike in Aartswoud. They would most likely have been the family to care for it too. Ariaen is also listed as living in Aartswoud aan de Zeedijk op de Geestmerambacht Sluijzen (on the sea dike on the sluices in the Geestmerambacht, an area in between various towns that was once the sea coast; today is a tourist resort) in 1721.
Since we know Cornelis would have lived by the Sluis on the Zeedijk, we can also guess that he was the person in charge of taking care of the various Sluizen (sluices, or locks) in the Aartswoud area. In 1537 a Molenakte (windmill act) was passed that allowed for windmills to be set up to drain the sea out of the area land. If I understand it correctly, the Geestmerambacht is the name of the system. A long drainage canal called de Langereis was dug around 1575 to the outside of a very long dike called de Omringdijk which winds its way past several towns from the Atlantic ocean to the IJsselmeer (formerly de Zuider Zee, which until then actually came all the way to these now inland towns). By 1575 there were ten windmills along the Zeedijk (Omringdijk) between Aartswoud and Medemblik. A map made that year shows 3 windmills and a sluice in Aartswoud. Aartswoud being a northern point of the system, there were 2 locks for lifting and lowering the water built here. Since the 4 Sluijs brothers and sister were the only people living by the Sluis in 1704 and 1710, it's obvious they were the caretakers of it. It stands to reason that they inherited it from their forefathers. Once the water was drained, one would think the locks would have been moved or abandoned. But because one never knew when the sea might break through the dikes again, the locks were left up for a very long time. They were replaced in 1895 with a pumping station that was only torn down in 1970. A monument now marks the place where the locks once stood.
It’s obvious that the names Aeriaen and Cornelis were very popular in that area. There were plenty of men named Aeriaen, Cornelis, Jan, Jacob and Pieter in the Barsingerhorn, Winkel, Abbekerk, Nieuwe Niedorp and Oude Niedorp records, but none that matched our family’s names exactly. There was one birth record in nearby Winkel of Ariaan Jans baptizing Cornelis on September 30 1645, but then there’s the problem of no Jan among Cornelis’ 5 sons.
Another place at least one Sluijs family came from is ter Sluis, a village next to (and considered a part of) Venhuizen. Of the 22 Reformed church members listed as living in ter Sluis in 1660, several have similar names to our family. And it's also obvious that many of these people took on the last name of Sluis or van der Sluis. Jan Cornelissen van der Sluijs died in Venhuizen in 1669, showing that already then “van der Sluijs” and “van ter Sluijs” were interchangeable. While Ter Sluis seems to hold a lot of promise for being where our family is from, there is one place that seems to hold a lot more promise.
There was also a Griet Floris van der Sluys who married Pieter Jansz in Venhuizen in 1661 (there were other children of Floris living in ter Sluis at this time), and an Anna Claes van der Sluijs who married Cornelis Florisz in 1665. And there was a Jan Kornelisz Sluis & Trijntje Meinders who were members of the Venhuizen church in 1707. They all would have taken their last name from the town Ter Sluis, not necessarily from working on a lock.
There were also about 50 vital records of Alkmaar where people have the last name van der Sluijs. Cornelis Claesz van der Sluijs and his brother Dirck had children there in the 1680's; so did Cornelis Jacobsz van der Sluijs in the 1680's and Jacob Cornelisz van der Sluijs in the 1690's (both in Graft). The earliest mention here is Cornelis Claesz who lived op 't Sluijs whose wife died in 1574. And Dirck Sluijss' daughter died in Alkmaar on Oct 8 1604. While there are some similarities of names, this would have been an unrelated or distantly related family that took on the last name of Sluijs because of the locks in Alkmaar.
Other Sluijs' in the 1600's in West-Friesland include the following: Hilbrant van der Sluijs married in Enkhuizen & Midwoud in 1671; Jan Jelisz Sluijs, Claas Reijndertsz Sluijs, and Trijntje, Kornelisje and Cornelis Klaas Sluijs had children in Medemblik in the 1670's - 1690's; Jan Cornelisz Sluys married in 1624, Germet Cornelisz van der Sluijs married in 1644 & 1646, and Meindert Cornelisz Sluijs married in 1682 in Hoorn. These would likely have been related to the Alkmaar or Ter Sluis Sluijs', or they may have been unrelated families. There were also a Jacob Claasz Sluijs, Klaas Aartsz (Arisz) Sluijs and Jacob Arisz Sluijs in Spanbroek in the 1650's to 1680's. They could have been related to any Sluijs family, including ours.
Sources
- 1666 Aartswoud Reformed Church membership list: 1702-01_1 DTB Aartswoud 1. Gereformeerde trouw- en lidmaatinschrijvingen, 1646-1816. as found at [1]
- Last name Sluijs in West-Friesland to 1690 as found at [2]
- Alkmaar Sluijs records as found at [3]
- Windmill & sluice information as found at [4]
