NUMAGA

Association for the historical study of Nijmegen and its vicinity

What is Numaga?

Numaga is the association for the historical study of Nijmegen and its surrounding area. It was founded in 1954 by a rather mixed group of historians and historical amateurs under the stimulating guidance of Professor L.J. Rogier. Numaga - Nijmegen's name in the time of the Franks when Charlemagne built his palace here - encourages the study of the history of Nijmegen and its vicinity. The association aims at preserving the cultural heritage and its specific character of the Nijmegen area and it promotes and circulates knowledge thereof.
On the first of January 2005 Numaga had 1117 members. If you wish to join click here.

Wat does Numaga do?

Numaga organises all sorts of activities aimed at a miscellaneous group of people.

• Each year it publishes the Jaarboek, the annual collection of scientific articles about Nijmegen's history.
• Five times a year it publishes the Nijmeegs Katern in which local history is treated somewhat more lightly and which serves at the same time as an announcement bulletin.
• Numaga also organises some five or six meetings a year where papers are read about various topics from Nijmegen's history.
• Apart from this it organises regular excursions in the town and there is one annual excursion of two or three days abroad or in the Netherlands to a place of historic interest.
• Every five years Numaga awards a prize to a person, a group of persons or an institution that has exceptionally contributed to either the promotion of knowledge about Nijmegen's past or to the preservation of its cultural heritage.
• Finally, Numaga took the initiative for the production of a volume containing the complete history of Nijmegen, to appear in 2005. In 2002 it published, in a small edition, Een voorschot op de Nijmeegse stadsgeschiedenis (Towards a History of Nijmegen). Two of the articles appearing in this volume are to be found on the Numaga website: an article by Jan Kuys about a number of very turbulent weeks in Nijmegen's history entitled: 'De belegering van Nijmegen in het jaar 1473' (English version: The siege of Nijmegen in the year 1473), and an article by Maarten Hageman on the Nijmegen town council during the second half of the sixteenth century: 'Een elitair gezelschap te midden van roerige tijden'. (An elite company in turbulent times).

Knowing your way around the Numaga website

Since May 2000 Numaga has had and maintained a website containing information about the activities of the association. Here you can find, amongst other things, a table of contents of all the Yearbooks that have been published so far (1991-2002) and of the contents of the Nijmeegs Katern. In addition you can find here the contents of the 'yellow periodical' that Numaga published prior to the Yearbook, entitled: "Numaga, periodical devoted to present and past of Nijmegen and its surroundings", which ran from the start of the association in 1954 until 1990. Moreover, Numaga publishes on its website the Nijmegen chronicles that appear in the Yearbook. The entry to the Nijmegen chronicles on 1998, 1999, 2000 and 2001 you will find here. A small miscellany from the Nijmeegs Katern you can find here.

In addition to the above, the website offers information on exhibitions and recent publications concerning the Nijmegen area and its past. An overview of the exhibitions is to be found on the Museum page. Recent publications you can find under Signalementen (book reviews).

And furthermore, of course, we offer a page of Links, with interesting websites on Nijmegen and surroundings.

The Numaga logo

What is the origin of the Numaga logo (at the top of this page)? In the first Numaga publication it says about this:
"The oldest known seal of the city of Nijmegen dates back to the year 1265 and is attached to a charter that is deposited in the municipal museum. This charter deals with the transfer of property by the couple Remboldus Albertszoon and Helwig before judge Willem van Hirnen and aldermen. On the seal in white wax we see a part of a stronghold or castle that some identify as the imperial palace at the Valkhof, while others see it as the city of Nijmegen. Above the fragment of a city wall and flanked by two Roman towers we see, in front of a fortified gate, the bust of the emperor with his crown, sceptre and globe. The inscription at the edge reads: Sigillum Burgensium de Numegen (the seal of the Nijmegen citizens).
Numaga finds this seal a worthy and representative emblem for the Association and its periodical and for this reason it takes pride of place on the periodical's cover as a symbol of the Nijmegen community. The artwork is by Jan van Vught Tijssen Sr."
(NUMAGA, periodical devoted to past and present of Nijmegen and its surroundings, nr. 1/2, 1954.)

With this reading, the first Numaga publication contains a small historical blunder. For the inscription at the edge does not read: Sigillum burgensium de Numegen, but Sigillum burgeriensium de Numegen. It took several decades for a correction to be made. In 1980 Dr P. Leupen notices the mistake in a Numaga paper presentation. One year after that Jan Buylinckx (in Numaga 1981-3 XXVIII, p. 99) points out again that the inscription reads 'burgeriensium' and not 'burgensium'. In doing so he bases himself on an article by the retired keeper of the municipal archives Mr W. van de Poll in the Algemeen Nederlandsch Familieblad (Dutch Family Annual Periodical) (vol. III, The Hague 1886, p. 129-130), illustrated with a drawing of a print from 1271 in which the word 'BURGERIENSIUM' is clearly legible.

Another two years later the Numaga editorial board writes that "…as from today the emblem is presented in its historically correct version on the periodical, as letter heading and on envelopes" (Numaga 1983-1 XXX, p. 23), so, with the text 'burgeriensium'.
The drawing made by Jan van Vucht Tijssen in 1954 was adapted by Mr drs J.R.C. van Zijll de Jong, archaeologist.
(With thanks to Peter Houwen who went through back volumes of Numaga looking for information on the history of the logo).

(Translation: Gerard Willems).