Wednesday, March 31, 2010

Other Marin Duval's in France

Mareen Duvall the Emigrant was not the only Marin Duval in France in the 1600's.  In attempting to find more about the ancestry of the Emigrant I found first, and to me most interesting, a Marin Duval who was buried 10 Jan 1649 in Alencon, Normandy.  Interestingly, Alencon was one of the first cities in France to adopt Calvanism (Huguenots were essentially Calvanists).  It became a hotbed of the Reformation.  Many Protestants fled Alencon for England, the Netherlands, or the Channel Islands.  http://www.ville-alencon.fr/alencon.asp?idpage=10659 .  Could the Marin Duval who died in Alencon in 1649 be the father of Mareenn Duval the Emigrant, or in some way be related to him?

There was another Marin Duval in the 1600's in the Normandy region.  A Marin Duval married a Noelle Laisne 27 Nov 1632 in La Coulonche, Department of Ome, in Basse - Normande (Lower Normandy).  They had 3 children:  Marie, Martine and Francoise, all born within a few years of Marin and Noelle's marriage. 

In Mareen Duvall of  Middle Plantation, p. 21, Harry Wright Newman writes about a Marin Duval "who on December 2, 1651, took an oath before the Norman Parliament at Rouen as Special Civil Lieutenant for Andleys.*"  Notably, Rouen is the historic capital city of Normandy.  Newman questions whether this may have been Mareen Duval the Emigrant, noting that the Emigrant, at the time of his death had legal books in his library, and that a civil lieutenant would have had some understanding of the law. 

Laval, where it is believed Mareen Duval the Emigrant had probably lived, is in the Department of Mayenne, Pays-de-la-Loire (Loire Valley), which is bordered by Normandy.  We may never know who the ancestors of Mareen Duvall the Emigrant were, but it should be noteworthy that at least 3 Marin Duval's were in Normandy at the time Mareen Duval the Emigrant probably lived in the region.

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