History of the Nibbelink Family Crest

Since the 18^th century the Nibbelink family branch, descending from 17^th century ancestors from the Dutch town of Zutphen in the province of Gelderland, has an officially recognized family crest, designed and heraldically deposited and registered by Dirk Willem Nibbelink around 1800.

Dirk Willem (1757-1835) was a notary in Hendrik Ido Ambacht and also mayor of that village and another township Meerdevoort. In Dutch books about heraldics, the following formal description is given: “The Crest is in silver, a tree trunk of natural colour with two branches with leaves and standing on a grass field. Above the tree a flying pigeon”. The tree stands for ‘unity’ and the pigeon represent ‘peace, reconciliation, simplicity, innocence and purity’.

The colors were probably:

Natural color

Metals or tinctures – silver or argent – plain white – silver or white

After 1835 – the year of the passing of Dirk Willem – his son Wouter Dirk (who also became a notary and mayor) had a his own design made with 3 crosses on the right side:

Since 1999, Geurt Nibbelink (1941) is the ‘Pater Familias‘ and sponsor of the world-wide development of the genealogical (Groot) Nibbelink family branch, starting from beginning 18^th century ancestors from the still existing farm house (Groot) Nibbelink in Dutch village of Varsseveld, also in the province of Gelderland . Due to a fatal fire of September 14, 1723 in Varsseveld, in which the whole village including the church and ist archives were destroyed, the documented genealogical (Groot) Nibbelink family branch therefore starts from around that year.

Since 1999, many Nibbelinks were contacted and consulted worldwide, including Dutch Micha and Juan Nibbelink. Micha and Juan, both with certified professional artistic backgrounds, were inspired by the old crest to give the family coat of arms a modern and, above all, still historically significant appearance.

Their efforts first resulted in this design:

In 2022, a new heraldic initiative was started. In close consultation with a Dutch heraldic specialist, the following design was made by them, in line with current heraldic conditionalities:

N.B.: To enable official Dutch heraldic registration of the newly designed crest, only one missing genealogical link has still to be established, i.e. between the Varsseveld and the Zutphen* branches and realistic hope exists that this will be found in due course.

*Dirk Willem Nibbelink (1757-1835) – the 1st client for a family coat of arms – was the son of Frederik Robert Evert Nibbelink (1726-1804). Frederik was born in Venlo. Frederik’s father was Dirk Nibbelink (1691-1744). Dirk was born in Zutphen. His father was Herman Nibbelink. As in those days most family names were descending from the names of farms (here Groot Nibbelink) – and the distance between Zutphen and Varsseveld is only 36 kilometers – it is highly reasonable to assume that there is a family relation between these two ‘Nibbelink’ branches.

Family flag

By designing a ‘Nibbelink’ flag, based on ‘our’ Coat of Arms, Micha and Juan Nibbelink have made another superb effort in projecting the Nibbelink family. Of course, the current respective heraldic ‘rules’ had to be respected, viz. “Coat of arms as flag: One of the more recent developments in the heraldic-flag field are family flags. They are often hung on family days at or near the home of the armourer(s). If there is a weapon, they should be based on it. However, it is not the intention that the entire coat of arms, including helmet and other showpieces, will be on such a flag. Only the contents of the shield are eligible. It must then be adjusted to the horizontal rectangular surface. The design below shows our Family Flag to be. Following the above guidlines, only the “Dove and the Tree” are on the flag, because they are the main symbols of our Coat of Arms.

The blue waves symbolize the river “IJsel” (a side arm of the river Rhine) which winds its way through the “Achterhoek”, the part of the province Gelderland where all the (Groot) Nibbelinks come from. The flag will have the following dimensions 1.00m*1.50m (H*W). In the very near future we will open the possibility to buy this flag. If you are interested please send an email to paul.nibbelink@gmail.com.

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In case, the reader of the above would have any additional related genealogical information, Geurt Nibbelink would be grateful to be informed by mail accordingly: geurt@nibbelink.com or geurt@paterfamilias-nibbelink.com.