Neeltgen van Cortlandt

NEELTJE STEVENS VAN CORTLANDT, notwithstanding her illness in 1652 which prompted her to make her will, lived to a ripe old age, remaining unmarried. She lived at Wijk-bij-Duurstede with her sister Mayken in the Peperstraat, in a house which must have come into her possession from her grandfather, for in 1580 Cornelis Janssen, in all probability Cornelis Janssen Cortlant, is mentioned as the owner of an adjoining property in the Peperstraat, in deeds registered in that year (Schepen Register folio 86 vo., 184 vo.). On May 3, 1690, Neeltje Stevens van Cortlant made her will before Notary Public Johan van Sandick at Wijk-bij-Duurstede (Inv. 1733). She was then sick in body but in full possession of mind and memory. She requested a church funeral and it was her wish that her body be carried to the grave by decent young men each clothed in a long mourning cloak. She left a legacy of 200 guilders to Abraham Bastiaens van den Ende, "for special reasons of her own," this sum however to be divided between his sisters and brothers in case Abraham should have died without leaving any children. Upon payment of this legacy the residue was to revert in equal parts to her sole heirs, Fytgen van Cortlant and Steven van Cortlant, children of her brother Adrian van Cortlant. As her executors she appointed Johan de Wael, first burgomaster of Wijk-bij-Duurstede, and Dr. Med. Peter Benier, a schepen of that city. She signed with a mark.

On March 26, 1698, she made before the same notary a codicil (Inv. 1738) changing the legacy and now provided for the sum of 100 guilders to be paid each to Abram Bastiaens van den Enden and his two brothers Steven Bastiaens van den Ende and Adolph van den Ende, and to the poor of the city 50 caroli guilders to be put at interest. . . .