Closest family and ancestry of the Eidsvoll Men

Norsk Slektshistorisk Forening's (The Norwegian Genealogical Society's) contribution to the celebration of the bicentenary of the Norwegian Constitution was launched at the National Archives in Oslo on Saturday 26 April 2014. The book is called "Eidsvollsmennene - Hvem var de?" ("The Eidsvoll Men - Who were they?"), and covers the closest family and ancestry of the 112 men who were elected to the Constituent Assembly at Eidsvoll and passed the Constitution of Norway in May 1814.

To be more exact, in the book you will find genealogical details on the Eidsvoll Men's spouses, children, siblings as well as their ancestry back to their great-grandparents, in addition to a short biography, their portrait (if found) and their seal. It has not been possible to find all the details on all the Eidsvoll Men, but for most of them. The book gives the current research status. Hopefully it will some time in the future be possible to find more information, and hopefully the book can be a useful starting point for future articles and research about various aspects of the Eidsvoll Men. Among the contributors to the genealogy are well-established historians and/or genealogists like Lars Løberg, Knut Bryn, Hans Cappelen, Elin Galtung Lihaug and Torkel Fagerli, to mention a few. The head editor is Anders Bjønnes, while the other members of the editorial commitee are Håvard Blom and Svein Becken. The same men were also main responsible for the book Segltegninger fra hyllingene i Norge 1591 og 1610 ("Drawings of Norwegian Seals from 1591 and 1610") which was published in 2010. Yours sincerely has contributed to the chapter about Arnoldus von Westen Sylow Koren (1764-1854) of Bergen, later Ullensvang.

In additon to the genealogy the reader can find a short introduction to the events in 1814 written by the historian Håkon Andreas Evju, an article about the use of seals in Norway (by Anders Bjønnes), another article about what the seals on the original Constitution of 17 May 1814 can show us (by Hans Cappelen) and a description of each seal (by Anders Bjønnes and Hans Cappelen together). The book is richly illustrated and also has a personal name and place name index. The book is meant to reach out to a wider audience of people interested in the genealogy of the Eidsvoll Men and the history of 1814. The book, which has 269 pages (including the list of illustrations and the presentations of the contributors to the book) in addition to the index (pages 276 to 320), would be too expensive to produce if also the notes (the research material) should be included. The research material will be made available through the Norwegian Genealogical Society.

The book (ISBN 978-82-998428-2-2) costs NOK 495,- + P & P and can be ordered from the Norwegian Genealogical Society by e-mail (kontor [at] genealogi.no) and soon also directly from the website (the online shop is just around the corner).

See also more information about the book (in Norwegian) here.