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Tanneken van der Leyen (Verleyen), an Anabaptist martyr, was executed at Antwerp, Belgium, on 5 October 1555, by being bound into a sack and drowned in the Scheldt River. The accounts on this martyr in the Offer des Heeren and the following martyr books including van Braght's Martyrs' Mirror are very concise, mentioning only that Tanneken was a "jonge dochter," i.e., an unmarried woman, of Ghent, and that she died steadfast; the exact date of the execution is not given. Génard published a few facts: while still living at Ghent Tanneken had joined the Mennonites, but when she was arrested there she recanted. Upon her release she moved to Antwerp and joined the Mennonite congregation there. After her second arrest she was repeatedly tried, first on 27 January 1555. Thus she must have been in prison a relatively long time. She left some property, which was confiscated. Génard also states that before she was executed she had to take off her outer clothing and put on a pair of linen pants. Tanneken is named in the hymn "Aenhoort Godt, hemelsche Vader," No. 16 of the Lietboecxken. (She is erroneously called Janneken van der Leyen in Mennonitisches Lexikon II, 648.)

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Dit Boec wort genoemt: Het Offer des Herren, om het inhout van sommighe opgheofferde kinderen Godts . . . N.p., 1562, 1567, 1570, 1578, 1580, Amsterdam, 1590, n.p., 1591, Amsterdam, 1595, Harlingen, 1599: 564, No. 5.

Génard, Petrus. Antwerpsch archievenblad: v. VIII, 426-28, 430, 468; v. XIV, 20 f., No. 226.

Wolkan, Rudolf. Die Lieder der Wiedertäufer. Berlin, 1903. Reprinted Nieuwkoop : B. De Graaf, 1965 : 63, 72.

Author(s) Nanne van der Zijpp
Date Published 1959

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MLA style

Zijpp, Nanne van der. "Tanneken van der Leyen (d. 1555)." Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online. 1959. Web. 16 Mar 2014.

APA style

Zijpp, Nanne van der. (1959). Tanneken van der Leyen (d. 1555). Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online. Retrieved 16 March 2014, from

Adapted by permission of Herald Press, Harrisonburg, Virginia, and Waterloo, Ontario, from Mennonite Encyclopedia, Vol. 4, p. 683. All rights reserved. For information on ordering the encyclopedia visit the Herald Press website.
