A Tinn’s tale

amilies were settled and they had built their houses. It was around that time that an Earl and his wife, from another village, came to the land.

The few families who had some noble blood had another reason to live in an unclaimed land; maybe someday they could claim it themselves and become the lord of the land. But that was exactly what the Earl planned to do.

 

Earl Quinten Optima and his wife Miral were just married. They came from a nearby village where Quinten was the youngest son of the Earl. He loved Miral dearly and was glad they now could start a family, ánd a village.

Yes, Quinten had written to the King. In his letter he asked -with honour- for the Lordship of Tinn.
The answer was yes. Tinn became an earldom.

 

 

Dorus and Jantine Paral were not among the families from Locksley. They used to live in Applevalley nearby, but after an incident with the Church they fled. On their way to Tinn, they got married.

Jantine was actually often called ‘Tine’(which, in Dutch, has to be pronounced as ‘teeneh’) but because in English this name is a bit weird, I’ll stick to her full name, Jantine.

 

 

Anyway, Jantine got pregnant very soon and gave birth to a daughter: Robyn. The couple loved their daughter and eachother very much and soon Merle followed her sister.

But they couldn’t fly from the Church. Neither in Tinn Dorus was really friendly with the Church. He had critique on the way they were doing. They said and did things that weren’t in the Bible, Dorus said. He could be so angry about that. Jantine was of the same opinion, but sometimes she wished her husband wasn’t so obstinate. They just had their life steady, she didn’t want another fiasco like in Applevalley.

 

 

When Robyn and Merle were children, they got a little brother, Luc. Jantine worried about the Church and Dorus, her family and typical motherly concerns. Luckily, she had the little boy(who quickly became older) to keep her mind steady and also a happy event. Robyn became a teen!

 

 

Time went very very fast. Jantine found herself living in a nice village, with a loving husband, a teen daughter, another daughter who wasn’t a child anymore, nor a teenager- and a son who was now at the age of seven. She smiled at herself. Dorus and she had been figuring out who the girls could marry. They became older now and especially Robyn would be at an marriageable age soon.

 

 

When the farmers and the fishers came, the traders were pleased. The producers of their products were living nearby, which was very handy. At the market they sold fruits and fish to the neighbours. They took it with them on their journeys to other villages as well.

All what they - and the villagers too - needed, was people who did some handicraft. That was solved by a peasant’s family who had a bakery, merchants with a flower shop and also a family who sold clothes from another family’s hand.

 

Everyone was happy- at least so it seemed..