A Brief History of the Balteas Family from Stavropigi of
Exo Mani and Messinia, to Varousi in Lakonia

By Aris Poulimenakos, genealogist, and Nikos Balteas

Foreward by Donald George McPhail, Editor of Mani: Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow

Translation and notes by Mary Papoutsy

The original article appeared in Greek in the May-June issue
(Volume 10) of the magazine Mani: Yesterday, Today, Tomorrow. 
Posted to HCS with permission of the editor.

Continued from Page Three


The First Balteas Generation

The people of the first generation of the [Balteas Family] Genealogical Chart10 we find on the sale documents of 1807, 1809, and on the manuscript of 15 June 1850 (see Fig. 1, Fig. 2, and Fig. 4)11 which we have already discussed. They are as follows:

"balteas" an estimator mentioned in a sale document of 1807

"georgakis baltakis," who wrote the sale document of 1809

G. palteas (3rd)

dimitrios balteas (4th) signer of the document of 1850

Georgios balteas (5th)

One might say that Dimitrios and a Georgios of Fig. 4 are the 3rd generation of the Balteas Genealogical Chart. But this Dimitrios was born in 1851, and Georgios in 1844. Therefore the persons who have been discussed above and who are the signatories [of those documents] must be their grandfathers.

This Dimitrios is indeed the same as a Batlis whom we discussed earlier, the Balteas with a father named Pavlos from a still earlier generation. We speculate about the genealogical connection with the following generation, the second, after similarly enlightening documents were found. Nevertheless, it is very likely that their connection with the second generation is exactly as it appears in our Balteas Genealogical Chart, especially because of their identically-named grandsons Dimitrios and Georgios (3rd generation).12

All of these people of the first and second generations were probably educated, an inference easily drawn from the documents above. They drew up notarial papers, signed manuscripts, and were [ecclesiastical] readers13. In other words, all the men of the family probably had an intellectual superiority, a rare thing for that era. This inference, of course, requires further investigation, even though the current descendants of the family are not lacking in intellectual capacity.

And finally, we must note the following: in this first generation there are two men with the same baptismal [given] name, that is, there are two "Georges." And they cannot be brothers. Consequently, the beginning of the surname with the progenitor of the entire family, namely, the man who first assumed the surname Baltakis, is far removed from this "first" generation that we found.14

10Click here to see the version developed by the translator using common genealogical software in the U.S. While the original chart of the article resembles a hand-drawn pedigree chart, space and language constraints here favor another version common in genealogical reports in the U.S.

11HCS editors have utilized a labeling and numbering system for the figures that is different from the one originally employed by the Greek authors, one more consistent with publishing guidelines here in the U.S.

12Greek custom dictates that the first-born male be named after his paternal grandfather, thus establishing a set pattern of naming. See our forthcoming article titled, "Greek Patterns of Naming," which will be posted to the genealogical section of HCS.

13Readers" as the authors refer to them are ecclesiastical readers of Biblical passages read aloud during Eastern Orthodox Christian Divine Liturgies.

14They could be first cousins, both named after an hypothetical paternal grandfather with the given name George.