I learned by James Elton Bell, Knight Ordinis Balliolensis, that a Scottish University is undertaking some historical research concerning the Flemish people in Scotland history. Thinking the researchers may benefit from my more than 30 years long research on the subject, I contacted in March 2014, Professor Roger Mason, and his colleagues, at the St. Andrews Institute of Scottish Historical Research.

Please find hereunder an excerpt of some information the project leaders put on Internet:

“… Some estimates suggest that up to a third of the current Scottish population may have had Flemish ancestors. While this is almost certainly an exaggeration, many Flemish émigrés did settle in Scotland over a 600-year period between the 11th and 17th centuries. Many shed their continental sounding names to take on the name Fleming or its variants. Others took on different names that give little clue as to their country or region of origin. As the Flemish left Flanders over a relatively long period, they were absorbed into Scottish society gradually.

So, while the Flemish may well be one of Scotland’s largest immigrant groups the question of why they came, their significance in Scottish history, and their broader impact on the economy, society and culture of their adopted homeland has never been examined in detail.

The overall aim of the Project is to provide an accessible overview of the impact of the Flemish people on Scotland and the historical interactions between Scotland and Flanders (the Low Countries or modem-day Belgium).

Combining genealogical and historical research, the project will reassess the settlement of Flemings in Scotland - their distribution and local impact - as well as reviewing the role of the Flemish in the broad sweep of Scottish history.

The Project has been made possible by a generous grant from the P F Charitable Trust and the support of Alex and Susan Fleming and is conducted through the St. Andrews Institute of Scottish Historical Research. For further details, please contact Professor Roger Mason…”.

“… If any of our readers have knowledge of particular areas in Scotland where there is historical evidence of a Flemish presence and would be prepared to assist us in the development of case studies, please let us know...”.

Scotland and the Flemish People.

Project Personnel. St. Andrews staff members as of March 2014:

• Dr Roger Mason. Dr Michael Brown. Dr Katie Stevenson. Dr Alex Woolf.

Research Student:

• Amy Eberlin

A key element of the project is family history and genealogical research. This project is done by Mr John Irvine and Mr Alex Fleming.

Links as of 2014:

Professor Roger Mason. St. Andrews Institute of Scottish Historical Research.

University of St. Andrews. St. Katherine’s Lodge, The Scores, St. Andrews Fife. United Kingdom. KY16 9AL. ishrmail@st-andrews.ac.uk

The Scottish University project is in line with my main theory developed in this Essay, wanting the Flemish being key elements in the Scottish History (being they the Balliols, the Bruces, the Comyns but also the Bels, the Belle and their countless phonetic variants). However, I sincerely doubt that the project members will share my views on our Dynastic involvement in the highly explosive and controversial matter of Rennes-le-Château and other events that happened in the south of France. Parallel History is, on purpose, not taught in universities.

This “…Flemish being key elements in the Scottish History...” was the main reason behind my solid determination to write this Essay. I definitively wanted a monumental historical error to be “repaired”. But was it, after all, an error or was it a deliberate lie and manipulation, for whatever reasons, perpetrated by the French Historian Mr Vosgier.  As I wrote in this Essay:

“… They all got the information from wrong assertions made by the 18th century French writer Mr Vosgier. Assertions that were subsequently and blindly taken over by other French writers such as Mr Blanchard and Mr René de Belleval (1866)... “.

These three writers were considered as "the" references for the Balliol History and their never questioned assertions landed straight into the leading world Encyclopaedias.

Only the historian Mr Francis Bailey had the correct view on what happened in those remote times. However, by the time his work was published (Ed. Spottiswoode. London 1881), all leading world encyclopaedic works had already published Mr Vosgier´s and consorts’ assertions. Consequently, no one “serious” historian would ever have taken the risk to contradict these so solid “established facts” !

Unfortunately, Mr Bailey’s study came far too late! The irreparable was done! From then on, only freelance, independent, or simply interested researchers, passionate and motivated, would ever dare to take by storm such a solid grounded historical establishment Ivory tower!

Will Professor Mr Roger Mason’s team brand new project finally establish the truth? I hope that some parts of my Essay may be of some interest to the St. Andrews Institute of Scottish Historical Research. That it might bring its contribution, how small it may be, to a better comprehension of the so animated and interesting Scottish History.

From left to right, the author, Fra. Robert Adelsohn Bels (Baron de l’Ormier).

Fra. Jürgen Bels (Baron of Oosthove) and Prof. Dr Roger Mason, head of the

St. Andrews Institute of Scottish Historical Research. (Scotland). On 12th August 2014.

In the University’s “Scotland and the Flemish People” Newsletter Nr 2, dated May 2013, there is a list of Flemish people who came to Scotland around 1601:

• Bart, Bishop, Byschop, Clasen, Cowart, De Corte, Den Turk, De Pyel, Henman, Le Rouge, Roche, Sturman, Van der Broeck, Van Houte, Vermont. Source: David Dobson. Huguenot and Scots Links (1575-1775) Baltimore, 2005.

The following list of names are identified in Beryl Platts, Scottish Hazard: The Flemish Nobility and their Impact on Scotland, London.

• Abernethy, Anstruther, Baird, Balliol (+ Bell, Beal, le Bel, Bailey, Bels, Belles, Bellis etc. from Bell Roots by Jim Elton and France Bell), Boswell, Brodie, Bruce, Cameron, Campbell, Comyn, Crawfurd, Douglas, Erskine, Fleming (and variants), Hamilton, Innes, Leith, Leslie, Lindsay, Lochore, Montgomerie, Murray, Oliphant, Seton, Stewart, Stirling.

The St. Andrews Institute of Scottish Historical research noted:

“…Some estimates suggest that up to a third of the current Scottish population may have had Flemish ancestors. While this is almost certainly an exaggeration, many Flemish emigrants did settle in Scotland over a 600-year period between the 11th and the 17th century. Many shed their continental sounding names to take on the name Fleming or his variants. Others took on different names that give little clue as to their country or region of origins. As a Flemish left Flanders over relatively long time they were absorbed into Scottish society gradually.

So, while the Flemish may well be one of Scotland's largest immigrant groups the question of why they came, their significance in Scottish history, and their broader impact on the economy, society and culture of the adopted homeland has never been examined in detail.

The overall aim of the Project is to provide an accessible overview of the impact of the Flemish people in Scotland and the historical interactions between Scotland and Flanders, (the Low Countries or modern-day Belgium…

The project has been made possible by a generous grant from the P F Charitable Trust and the support of Alex and Susan Fleming and is conducted through the St Andrews Institute of Scottish Historical Research.”

"Scotland and the Flemish People" is the title of the book on the subject, that Roger Mason and Alex Fleming published in February 2019. It was exactly five years since I had deposited my study at the University of St Andrews, in the hands of Prof. Dr. Roger Mason.

My book will undoubtedly have inspired him and his team on the "Scotland and the Flemish People" project. The revelation of some of the theories developed in my book will certainly have saved them many years of tedious research.

Unfortunately, as is often the case, my work is not mentioned in the index to their book, nor in the selective bibliography. The only mention made, of other authors who might have influenced the work, is so vague as to make it expedient to the reason they were not mentioned in the references. In the acknowledgements, at the beginning of the book, the authors Mr Alexander Fleming and Roger Mason resume:

“… Many others with expertise ranging from medieval and early modern Scottisch history through to familily and local history have contributed to the book...”.

On the centuries of Flemish influences in Scotland, and on the tormented history of the Balliols, and other important Flemish families, I detailed in my work, there is in their publication, only these two mentions:

“… David II’s. reign had a troubled beginning as Edward Balliol pressed his claim to the throne on the grounds that he was the son of John Balliol, the Scottish king deposed in 1296. Edward Balliol had himself crowned at Scone in September 1332 and had the support of the English King Edward III…”. Page 156.

“…However, when Edwards appointee, John Balliol, began resisting to English King's demands, it led in 1296 to the invasion of Scotland and the sack of Berwick-upon-Tweed…”. Page 31.

In short: to get as complete a picture as possible of Scotland's historical past, historians will find that "Scotland and the Flemish People" has huge historical gaps, which can only be filled by studying my book: "Essay on the Bels-Belle-Balliol Dynasty".

When updating this Essay in 2024, I decided to inserted part of a text that appeared in “The Setons of Scotland” under the title “The rise of the Flemish families in Scotland”.

BALLIOL:

“… A number of 11th and 12th-century charters survived, signed by members of the Bailleul family, which give conclusive proof that their home at the relevant dates was Bailleul near Hazebrouck in the present-day’ Nord department of France, but then, of course, in Flanders.

It appears certain that Guy de Bailleul was present at the Battle of Hastings. The date when the English Balliols first acquired lands in Scotland is obscure. But that they had an interest in the Christian advancement of Scotland is shown by the gift Bernard de Balliol made to the abbey of Kelso in the year 1153, of fishery rights in the river Tweed at Wudehorn.

Although they chose wives from leading Flemish families, their changes of heraldic symbols (often acquired through such marriages) tend to suggest that the Balliols themselves were not of the Charlemagnic nobility - an important factor when judging the lack of support John Balliol received from fellow Flemings when he was trying to acquire for himself and his heirs the crown of Scotland…”.   Source: Annette Hardie - Stoffelen

The author has, indeed, an accurate view of the origins of the Balliols of Scotland, and I congratulate him on having had the courage to “go upstream” from preconceived ideas. However, in all humility, I would like, without going into detail at this stage of my development, to point out two probable inaccuracies.

1. The ancestry of the Balliols as well as those of the Bels and Belle different patronymic variants, goes back well beyond Charlemagne. They didn't wait for him to reach their state of nobility or of elite families attached to administrations and courts. We deal here with families who already held important positions in Roman times, and who, following the fall of their empire, were taken over by the new masters of the West, the Merovingians. Charlemagne, on the other hand, did not appear until centuries later!

2. The lack of support for certain Flemish families in Scotland and northern England has nothing to do with the story of Charlemagne's nobility. The lack of support in Scotland for these families of Flemish origin has other reasons. They can be found in the ancient history of these peoples. The indigenous peoples of Flanders were Menapiens, Morins, Eburons and Nerviens. There were already enough sources of problems, among them, that were "happily" exported beyond the Channel, when the opportunity arose. The other contributors to the equations were people from beyond the Rhine, in Gallo-Roman times. They were fleeing the steamroller of barbarian invasions from Eastern Europe and settled in Belgium. I doubt that they were welcomed.

We need to get used to this kind of amalgam, as we'll be encountering it regularly throughout this Essay.