Grave with the Hands
{{Short description|Burial monument in Roermond, Netherlands}}
{{Infobox monument
| name = Grave with the Little Hands
| native_name = Graf met de handjes
| native_name_lang = nl
| image = Graf met de handjes, Roermond 02.jpg
| caption = The monument in 2016
| location = Begraafplaats Nabij Kapel in 't Zand, Roermond, Netherlands
| mapframe =
| map_name =
| map_text =
| map_width =
| map_relief =
| coordinates = {{Wikidatacoord|Q17596974|region:NL-LI_type:landmark|display=inline,title}}
| designer =
| type = Funerary monument
| material = Limestone,{{cite web |last1=Mathijs |first1=Armand |title=Graf met de Handjes -Grave with tiny hands |url=https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/graf-met-de-handjes-grave-tiny-hands-armand-mathijs |access-date=5 March 2024 |quote=So yes, I'm proud that I did the restoration of this iconic grave. The headstone of the grave of the colonel and the hands that connects the two stones were carved in a similar limestone last year.}} sandstone, hardstone
| length =
| width =
| height =
| weight =
| visitors_num =
| visitors_year =
| begin =
| complete = {{circa|{{start date|1888}}}}{{cite web |title=Restauratie 'graf met de handjes' |url=https://www.oudekerkhofroermond.nl/25-jaar-stichting-oude-kerkhof/ |website=oudekerkhofroermond.nl |publisher=Stichting Oude Kerkhof |access-date=5 March 2024 |lang=nl |trans-title=Restoration of the 'grave with the hands' |quote=Het befaamde ‘graf met de handjes’ dateert waarschijnlijk uit 1888.}}
| dedicated =
| open =
| dismantled =
| dedicated_to = {{plainlist|
- Josephina van Aefferden
- Jacobus van Gorkum
}}
}}
The Grave with the Hands ({{langx|nl|Graf met de handjes|lit=Grave with the little hands}}) is a 19th-century funerary monument in the Dutch city of Roermond. It comprises two almost identical tombstones on either side of a wall separating the Catholic part from the Protestant part of Begraafplaats Nabij de Kapel in 't Zand (Cemetery Near the Chapel in the Sand), each with a carved arm and hand that clasps the other across the wall. The monument marks the graves of Josephina van Aefferden, a Catholic, and Jacobus van Gorkum, a Protestant, who were married in life, but had to be buried in separate sections of the cemetery. It was listed as a rijksmonument (state monument) in 2002.
Background
The cemetery {{ill|Begraafplaats Nabij de Kapel in 't Zand|nl}}, colloquially known as "Oude Kerkhof" (the "Old Cemetery"), originally served as a Jewish burial ground. By 1785, in reaction to Emperor Joseph II's order that forbade burials within churches and city walls within the Holy Roman Empire, it was expanded to accommodate Christian residents of Roermond. Architect Pierre Cuypers undertook a redesign of the cemetery in 1858, walling off separate sections for Catholic and Protestant burials, and reserving a {{ill|place for his own family|nl|Grafmonument van de familie Cuypers
File:Portret van Jacobus Warnerus Constantinus van Gorkum (1809-1880).jpg
Jacobus Warnerus Constantinus van Gorkum (1809–1880), originally from Amsterdam, was a son of cartographer and engineering officer {{ill|Jan Egbert van Gorkum|nl}}.{{cite web |title=Indexen : DTB Dopen |trans-title=Index: DTB Baptisms |url=https://archief.amsterdam/indexen/deeds/8588d1cf-34d5-42df-9a49-1ae9d0aef1dd |website=Amsterdam City Archives |access-date=8 March 2024 |language=nl |date=1 October 1809}} He became a cavalry colonel in the Dutch army, and militia commissioner of Limburg.{{cite news |last1=Tückmantel |first1=Ulli |title=Totensonntag: Die Liebe eines Ehepaares: Was aber Gott verbunden hat. . . |trans-title=The Love of a Married Couple: What God Has Joined Together . . . |url=https://www.wz.de/politik/die-liebe-eines-ehepaares-was-aber-gott-verbunden-hat--_aid-27667113 |access-date=11 March 2024 |work=Westdeutsche Zeitung |date=18 November 2016 |language=de}} The 1839 Treaty of London divided the province of Limburg in two, with the eastern part going to the Netherlands and the western part to Belgium, and van Gorkum was one of the military men from Holland who settled in the Dutch part of Limburg.{{cite web |last1=Jacobs |first1=Frank |title=1839, the Year Limburg Split in Two |url=https://bigthink.com/strange-maps/90-the-limburg-split-of-1839/ |website=Big Think |access-date=5 April 2024 |date=23 July 2010}}
On 3 November 1842, van Gorkum married Josephina Carolina Petronella Hubertina van Aefferden (1820–1888), a noblewoman from Roermond and a member of the {{ill|Van Aefferden|nl}} family of Dutch-Belgian nobility. She was the ninth of ten children.{{cite book |title=Nederland's adelsboek |date=1912 |publisher='s-Gravenhage, W. P. Van Stockum en zoon |pages=18–19 |url=https://archive.org/details/nederlandsadelsb28unse_7/page/n69/mode/2up |language=nl}} Two of Josephina's brothers, Albert Pierre Joseph (1808–1892) and Felix Hendrik Johannes Hubertus (1811–1842), had previously raised a battalion of soldiers at their own expense with the aim of fighting on the Belgian side against the Dutch during the Belgian secession.{{cite web |last1=Verzijl |first1=J. |title=[Aefferden, Albert Pierre Joseph burggraaf van], Nieuw Nederlandsch biografisch woordenboek. Deel 9, P.J. Blok, P.C. Molhuysen |url=https://www.dbnl.org/tekst/molh003nieu09_01/molh003nieu09_01_0018.php |website=Digital Library for Dutch Literature |access-date=25 March 2024 |language=nl}}
The marriage was controversial for many reasons: van Gorkum was Protestant and van Aefferden was Catholic;{{cite news |last1=Jaromezuk |first1=Andres |title=The Mystery Behind Holland's 'Grave with the Hands': A Beautiful Story of Eternal Love |url=https://ewtn.co.uk/chpop-the-mystery-behind-hollands-grave-with-the-hands-a-beautiful-story-of-eternal-love/ |access-date=8 March 2024 |publisher=EWTN |date=11 February 2023}} their families had fought on opposite sides of the recent war; he was 11 years older than she was; and he was a commoner while she was of noble birth. To avoid provocation, their marriage was conducted in the German town of Pont, near Geldern, just across the border from Venlo.{{cite web |last1=Vaessen |first1=John |title=Het 'graf met de handjes' |url=https://www.archiefroermond.nl/nl/roermonds-verleden/verhalen/verhalen-rond-het-oude-kerkhof/het-graf-met-de-handjes |trans-title=The 'grave with the hands' |lang=nl |website=archiefroermond.nl |publisher=Gemeentearchief Roermond |access-date=6 March 2024}} The couple raised their five children in Catholicism.
File:Overlijdensadvertentie-Josephine-van-Aefferden-echte-van-wijlen-JWC-van-Gorkum (cropped).png
After his death, on 28 August 1880, van Gorkum was buried in the Protestant section of the cemetery. His widow desired to be buried next to him, instead of in the family mausoleum, but as a Catholic, she could not be buried in unconsecrated ground. After she died on 29 November 1888, their children implemented her last wishes: a double grave, with markers on either side of the wall, connected by two arms reaching across the wall and holding hands. They were likely made in 1888, the year of her death, possibly by the Roermond firm {{ill|Atelier Cuypers-Stoltzenberg|nl}}. The motto {{lang|la|Vivit post funera virtus}} (Latin, {{translation|i=yes|Virtue outlives death}}), originally from the van Gorkum family coat of arms, was chiseled on both monuments.
Description
The neo-Gothic{{cite web |title=Rijksmonumentenregister:Tegenover Weg langs het Kerkhof 1, 6045 AN te Roermond |trans-title=National Monument Register: Opposite Weg langs het Kerkhof 1, 6045 AN in Roermond |url=https://monumentenregister.cultureelerfgoed.nl/monumenten/520489 |website=cultureelerfgoed.nl |publisher=Rijksdienst voor het Cultureel Erfgoed |lang=nl |access-date=5 March 2024}} grave markers, placed on a limestone base, consist of sandstone columns with a gable-shaped top that are higher than the wall separating them. At the top of each of the grave markers is a cross. On his side is the coat of arms of the van Gorkum family and on her side her arms of alliance. There is a wrought-iron fence around the base of each.
The two hands, a man's hand from his monument, clasping a woman's hand from hers, symbolize the connection between the spouses across the boundaries of religion, family alliances and even death.
The grave was listed as Rijksmonument number 520489 on May 27, 2002.
Gallery
{{gallery
| align = center
| mode = nolines
| whitebg = no
| File:Graf met de handjes, Roermond 01.jpg
| Van Gorkum
| File:Weg langs het kerkhof tegenover 1, Roermond.jpg
| Van Aefferden
| File:GrafMetDeHandjesIn2021 Ausschnitt2.jpg
| Clasped hands
}}
In popular culture
The story of Josephina van Gorkum was dramatized in 2016 in Les Culottées, a French webcomic by Pénélope Bagieu that depicts short biographies of unusual or inspiring women.{{cite news |last1=Bodoc |first1=Clemence |title=Josephina van Gorkum, têtue jusque dans l'Au-Delà — Les Culottées, par Pénélope Bagieu |trans-title=Josephina van Gorkum, Stubborn Unto the Afterlife — Les Culottées, by Pénélope Bagieu |url=https://www.madmoizelle.com/les-culottees-josephina-van-gorkum-penelope-bagieu-499855 |access-date=12 March 2024 |work={{ill|Madmoizelle|fr}} |date=8 February 2016 |language=fr-FR}} Les Culottées was published in two printed volumes, and then translated into English and released in a single volume in 2017.{{cite news |title=Josephina Van Gorkum broke the rules by marrying a Protestant. Here's how she ensured eternity with him. |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/gender-identity/josephina-van-gorkum-broke-the-rules-by-marrying-a-protestant-heres-how-she-ensured-eternity-with-him/ |access-date=12 March 2024 |newspaper=The Washington Post |date=13 January 2018}} In 2020, it was adapted into an animated series that aired on France Télévisions.{{cite news |last1=Zafimehy |first1=Marie |title='Culottées' : 3 raisons de regarder cette série féministe |url=https://www.rtl.fr/culture/medias-people/culottees-3-raisons-de-regarder-la-serie-feministe-tiree-de-la-bd-de-penelope-bagieu-7800231716 |access-date=12 March 2024 |publisher=RTL |date=15 March 2020 |language=fr-FR}}{{cite web |title=Culottées - Josephina van Gorkum, amoureuse têtue, à la tv |url=https://www.linternaute.com/television/serie-culottees-p4844107/josephina-van-gorkum-amoureuse-tetue-e4879356/ |website=L'Internaute |access-date=12 March 2024 |language=fr}} The animated series also was translated into Portuguese and broadcast on RTP2.{{cite web |title=SÉRIE: Destemidas EP26 - Josephina Van Gorkum |url=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWBNRHtY_XM |via=YouTube |publisher=Saber Mais |access-date=12 March 2024 |language=pt |date=7 July 2020}}
References
{{Reflist}}
External links
{{Commonscat|Graf met de handjes}}
{{Rijksmonument|520489}}
Category:Buildings and structures in Roermond
Category:Burial monuments and structures
Category:Burials in Limburg (Netherlands)
Category:Monuments and memorials completed in the 19th century