Mihalcea Colocviu V Genealogie Iasi 2007 En [310850]

ION ADRIAN MIHALCEA

THE SAINT GEORGES OF BOTOSANI – A [anonimizat], [anonimizat], [anonimizat], but, mostly, melting themselves ethnically and assimilating the language of the adopting family.

Very few of these families have transmitted the memory of their origin within their name and/or through documents until today or almost nowadays.

Such a family is the Saint Georges of Botosani with remarkable representatives in the history of the town (see „Dictionarul Botosenenilor”/The Dictionary of the Botosani inhabitants/, by I. Bajenaru, [anonimizat], 1994). They settled here for more than 300 [anonimizat] (Didia) Saint Georges (1888 – 1979), musician and composer.

There are only a [anonimizat], [anonimizat] (cousins of second degree), after about 1000 years, [anonimizat].

My grandmother’s father, [anonimizat], the architect Alexandru Saint Georges (1854 – 1904), had a [anonimizat], but who died without any children. The son founded and managed a [anonimizat]. It is he who was so much involved in heraldry that performed researches on the origin of our family.

Alexandru Saint Georges’s second marriage with Maria Stroici (daughter of Manolache Stroici) [anonimizat], Great Chancellor (Prime Minister of Moldavia) during more rulers of the 16th and 17th centuries and an important learned man of the times. [anonimizat].

Our first ancestors who transmitted their name until nowadays came from Germany and settled in Hungary and Austria at the beginning of the second millennium. They got involved in the history of Transylvania /Ardeal/. Towards the end of the 17[anonimizat] 18th century a branch of the family moved eastward and settled down in Moldavia.

[anonimizat], the evolution of the Saint Georges family until today.

I The German origin of the Saint Georges family

The pages 483 – 484 of “[anonimizat] V-FS” (inserted below in the text), [anonimizat], III, S.248 – 266, under letter “G” that “Die Grafen von St. Georgen und Pösing, oder Bösing , Comites de St. Georgio et Bazin” are of noble origin and inheritors of the counts of Altenburg and Homburg. In 1028 or 1030 Chunradus (Conrad) [anonimizat]. [anonimizat], settled down in Hungary and set up the family of the Counts of St. Georgen and Pösing, whose kin were described in detail by Wissgril.

Thus, it can be said that they did not only administrate important estates in lease in Hungary but they also had their own lands in the Lowlands of Austria. And that they were considered as of king decent. The family flourished by the first half of the 16th century and disappeared in 1543 when count Cristoff II died without any descendants from his marriage with Elisabeth, countess of Salm and Neuburg upon Inn.

Nota bene: They have not passed of existence in all because they continue to live in Transylvania /Ardeal/ and then, in Moldavia, and in Romania until today.

Pages 483 – 484 of “Rietstap Armoir General”:

Owing to the Romanian specialist in heraldry Jean Manescu’s good will we have further information related to the German-Austrian-Hungarian branch in the period of the 14th century and 16th century in what concerns the heraldry of the family and their evolution in time. The coats-of-arms, drawn by himself (see the drawings below) are mentioned in:

– The Panoply of the Herald Gelre (the 14th century) in Brussels (fig.1);

– The Book of the St. Cristopher upon Arlberg Brotherhood (the 14th – 15th centuries) (fig. 2);

– The Archive of Buda-Pesta: A Rectification from Frederic III (as king of Hungary) made up in Wien on the 19th of June 1459 for George, Ioan /John/ and Sigismund, counts of Sanct-Georgen and Bazin, and adding the crown of Frederic III (which was borne by Louis /Ludovic/ the Great of Hungary) to the coat-of-arms (fig. 3);

– In another diploma written also by Frederic III, this time as a Roman Emperor, for the counties Ioan (John) and Sigismund of Sanct-Georgen (fig. 4).

Nota bene: we are certain that they were the two voivodes of Transylvania /Ardeal/ who ruled in the period 1465 – 1467.

Jean Manescu makes precise that the origin of the above referred is German, as they assumed the names of the domains of Szent-Gyorgy (Sanct Georges) and Bazin (Pösing), both in the county of Presburg (Bratislava), had estates in the counties of Bratislava, Oldenburg, Raab, Neograd, Nitra, Satmar, Cenad, as well as in Moravia, Lowlands of Austria (see Wissgril, too), Stiria, Carintia etc. And going further on in time, the family was descending (at the level of the 12th – 13th century) from the count Thomas (1208), who received lands from the king Emeric (in 1196 and in 1204) and the king Andrew II (1208) – the domain under discussion is just this domain of Bazin (Pösing), while in 1209 he becomes count of Nitra.

Count Thomas has two sons, Sebus and Alexandru. Sebus (1239) being that whose genealogy/line comes from Abraham (1253), followed by Abraham the Red (1308), continues with John /Ioan/, then, Sigismund and Petru in the 15th – 16th centuries, rulers of Transylvania /Ardeal/, and while in the area of origin, Austria – Hungary, the line ends once with the count Cristof II.

Jean Manescu’s bibliography:

II The Saint Georges Family in Ardeal

Out of the list of voivodes of Ardeal /Transylvania/ it results that between 1465 – 1467, kings are Ioan and Sigismund of Szentgyorgy (of Sancto Giorgio) and of Bozin, together with Elderbach of Monyorokerek. Petru of Szentgyorgy and Bozin rules between 1499 – 1510. In orther words, they are those mentioned below in the legal decision of the Metropolitan Gedeon of Suceava.

We also notice the existence of a Latin transcription of their name beside the Magyar transcription, respectively Sancto Giorgio/Szentgyorgy, fact that indicates clearly the consciousness of another ascending line beside the Hungarian one, probably, the initial German ascending line.

List of voivodes of Transylvania /Ardeal/:

III The Saint Georges Family in Moldavia

In the document published in “Miron Costin” A.I. no I.doc.no. 5, present and quoated in “Condica de documenturile veci a familiei Sendgeorge – 1866” /Register of legacy documents of the family Sendgeorge – 1866/ it comes the following:

In 1723, Gedeon, Archibishop and Metropolitan of Suceava, judges a cause between “the nun Alexandra the bailiff-wife, widow of the bailiff Varlan” and “her father of a son-in-law, the provost marshal Iftimi (of) Senjorji, and his son, Ion /John/, the bailiff-wife’s son-in-law”, which continued an older patrimony trial on the dowry received by Ion John/ Senjorj from his wife’s family (among others, it is mentioned the Ioneseni domain, an estate which the Saint Georges family had in propriety until the 19th century via my great-grandfather). Later on the dowry is contested by the family of this remote foremother of ours, the daughter-in-law of the provost marshal Iftimie (of) Senjorji.

When stating the reasons of this contest they said that Iftimie’s declarations regarding his noble descending from the “kin of the Transylvania /Ardeal/ Emperor, graph Ion /John/ of Senjorji” and that they are “honest Romanian believers” (meaning orthodox Christians) were false.

In front of the Metropolitan, the provost marshal presented written records regarding the royal extraction of his family. The Metropolitan admitted the proofs as authentic and delivered a verdict in favour of the provost marshal and his son. More than that, as a sign of acknowledgement, he gave him a symbolic present, a silver icon of our family’s patron saint, St. George. In return, “the graph Ifimie gives the Metropolitan a precious stone cross which belonged to his uncle, the king (voivode) Petre (of) Senjorji”.

The provost marshal also explains how he arrived in Moldavia: he, a little child, came with his father in Wallahia /Tara Munteneasca/ because of some revolts in Transylvania /Ardeal/ and, then, after a while, they settled down in the upper part of Moldavia. His son, Ion /John/, married with the daughter of the bailiff-wife Varlan.

The document published in “Miron Costin” A.I. no I.doc.no. 5:

The German compilation (1866) of the Romanian document::

We add, just for your information, that at Ionaseni, county Botosani, on the estate we already spoke about, there were ( it is a note on the interior cover of the Register of legacy documents of the family Sendgeorge – 1866) and, maybe, still they are, surviving the communist wrath, two tombstones: one of the treasurer Gavrilas and the other one of a exciseman Nicita, dated from the 16th century. Probably, they were the forefathers of the bailiff-wife or the bailiff himself.

The Moldovian branch continued as it is written in Fondul Saint-Georges, pachet XIV/1 /Fund of the Saint-Georges, pack XIV/1/ preserved at the State Archives of Bucharest, as it follows:

Ion Senjorji’s son was called Constantin Sanjorzu, he was a commander and married with Eftimia, a great-niece of king Stefan Tomsa;

Constantin’s son was called Tudor Senjorzu (1848), he was an attendant to the ruling prince;

Tudor’s son was called Gheorghe Senjorzu (1877), he was an agha(functie nobiliara) and married with Maria Gherghel;

Gheorghe’s son was called (1854 – 1904), he was an engineer, architect, composer and singer and he is my great-grandfather.

*****

What is interesting to notice after all it was brought into your sight is the fact that a very old and important European family, about which many things are known until its extinction in their western native space, has continued to exist preserving the name borne by one of its members from the Transylvania /Ardeal/ branch who migrated in the neighboring country, Moldavia. He was making Romanian, although we believe that the process had begun at least in the 16th century, in Ardeal/Transylvania/, when it was possible that the father of the provost marshal Iftimie (note it is a Romanian name), who was the first comer in the space of Wallachia, would have known the Romanian language, too, and, we dare say, they would have absorbed certain Transylvanians of Roman origin and language into their family.

We also believe that it is possible that in Hungary, the family still exist, because, at the end of the last century, a man called Albert von Szent Gyorgy was awarded the Nobel prize for biology (genetics).

We also believe that it is possible as cousins of ours, whose descendant starts at a ltime previous to Cunradus (10 century) could sill live nowadays, and we are thinking of a high rank officer in the OTAN whose name is von Altenburg, as we know precisely that the German origin family continued to exist after Cunradus, because, between 1335 and 1341, the 19th Great Master of the Teutonic Order was called Dietrich von Altenburg (1341).

And how many others can be?

So it is, we all are closed in on by a great and, unfortunately, very few known family history that always ignored the frontiers.