Travel tales on 7 continents // DNA ancestors on a journey of a thousand years
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Tree of Conquerors
Knights, ladies, kings, commoners outlast a family journey of 1,000 years
At least three times during the past 4,500 years a man carrying my DNA strides the beaches of Brittany or Normandy with invasion on his mind – once as a Celt, once a Norman, once an American. Conquerors they are, though the epitaph of their lives is that they carry on, adapting, outlasting their times. Circumstances evolve from herders on horseback to knights who fight for kings and to feudal lords of England whose descendants slide from nobility to commoners, starting over at the dawn of the United States. The family continues life’s journey today, spiritual and grateful.
Vivere sat Vincere is the motto of the Molyneaux family knights since the reign of King Edward I, 1272-1307. Through centuries in England, as meanings and missions change, the life-focusing translation “Conquering is Living Enough” evolves into “Living is Conquering Enough” that guides an ancestor through a tragic kidnapping and a weary, wet landing in America.
Memorials, tombs, and effigies
Ancestor Sir William Molyneaux is buried at Canterbury Cathedral 1290. His effigy lies at St. Helen’s Church, Sefton, England. Sir William is carrying a shield with the carved Cross Moline, crest from the coat of arms for the Molyneaux family.
I have walked the ruins of Acre, Israel, with a learned Israeli guide. And here, in a church in England, I stand over the effigy of a man who fought at Acre in 1271 and 1272 as one of the knights supporting England’s King Edward I.
Photos by David G. Molyneaux
About David G. Molyneaux
For five decades, the world has welcomed me as a curious American traveler and a working journalist. I am grateful. I have visited, at last count, more than 100 countries and sailed on more than 150 vessels, mostly cruise ships and river boats but also international freighters, ferries, and rigged watercraft of various comforts and seaworthiness. I am a fortunate writer who began working for newspapers at age 19. My byline appeared for 55 years in The Plain Dealer of Cleveland, in recent years its website Cleveland.com, and internationally for its wire service connections. I am editor of MolyNews.com and a writer for TravelMavenBlog.com. A graduate of Mercersburg Academy and Miami University in economics, I am a member of the Cleveland Journalism Hall of Fame and vice president of the Society of American Travel Writers Foundation, which oversees the annual Lowell Thomas travel journalism competition.
My journey continues with my wife, writer Frances Golden. We live in Cleveland. From a lakeside porch near Huron, Ohio, we watch the sun rise and set, spring through fall, at the southern-most sands of Lake Erie.
Left, on a ferry to Martha’s Vineyard