diepraam.nl

History and today's spreading of the Diepraam name

The Diepraam name was first seen in medieval Germany, when two knightly brothers, Gerhard and Hermann ingen Dippramme, pledged their allegiance to the Duke of Gelre. Their estate is still to be found in Kamp-Lintfort, on the outskirts of today's industrial Ruhr area, onto this day known as Haus Dieprahm.

Going back a long way

For centuries, this Western German noble family - in Germany, knights are ranked slightly below barons - controlled the Rhine forelands between Xanten and Rheinberg, until one of their principal members had to flee to the Netherlands in the time of counter-reform.

While the German branch faded away, with one of the last remaining daughters marrying into the Goering family, the new Dutch Diepraem offshoot flourished in the region around Rotterdam. Although they had lost their nobility in equalitarian Holland, they held important local government positions in the villages of the Alblasserwaard, east of Rotterdam, while until four generations ago one of the few Diepraams who stayed in Rotterdam owned an impressive amount of real estate in the harbour city's Delfshaven quarter.

Worldwide presence

By then, other offshoots had become equally successful. In the 19th century two brothers and their nephews and niece decided to emigrate to South Africa, while another branched off to Frisia.

Members of the three remaining Diepraam branches still populate the world today. Parts of the South African offshoot - which is in fact the principal line going back to Hendrick Diepraam, the man who fled from Germany - now live in Texas and New Zealand, while most of the Diepraams still residing in the Netherlands have stayed or moved back to the populous Randstad region in the west of the country.

So if you run into two Diepraams anywhere across the world, they are bound to be relatives...

(md)