Welcome to BelbinMania
BelbinMania is a family history and genealogy website aimed at family historians researching their BELBIN ancestors and the many variant names, especially that of BELBEN, which until the early 18th century was interchangeable, rather than the separate name it has become.
The site contains two distinct elements. There are a selection of pages containing extensive record extracts of UK births, marriages and deaths; ideas on the origin of the BELBIN name; articles and gossip about anyone or anywhere past or present carrying the name and an interactive photo gallery of assorted BELBIN images from across the decades. New articles will be added to these static pages as time permits.
In addition, there is a BelbinMania Family Trees database which will include several UK BELBIN family trees with copies of associated photographs and documents linked to individuals in those trees. These family trees will gradually be updated over the coming months with some from Australia and North America.
BelbinMania is not a commercial site. It is an ongoing personal project of mine and as such, development is regrettably slow. The old site at belbin.net became dormant owing to an unhelpful ISP but I have now rediscovered my mo-jo and am starting again at a new ISP with the new domain belbinmania.com initially using old page material just to get things going. My intention is for all published information and data to be relied upon as being accurate but inevitably errors will unfortunately creep in, so please feel free to get in touch if you spot anything which looks wrong or out of place.
I have more data offline than is currently online. My interest in the name is such that I am happy to discuss and share research where I can about any BELBIN family, whether it is from the UK or overseas. My accumulated research, which lies partially sorted in my office at home in England, may contain information you are looking for. You, on the other hand may have information, documents, old photographs, etc. that I would be very keen to see and perhaps be able to publish here.
If you do wish to make any contribution such as providing some ideas as to the origin of the name, passing on some BELBIN family gossip or photographs, repeating family lore or submitting details of your BELBIN connections, then please get in touch with me, TERRY BELBIN, as I will be pleased to hear from you if you can help improve and expand on knowledge of our interesting BELBIN family history.
Let’s see if we can help each other. I hope you will enjoy the site.
TERRY BELBIN
Essex, England.
Belbin One-Name Study
For my sins, I also registered the BELBIN surname as one of some 7,600 study surnames with The Guild of One-Name Studies, a London based charitable organisation dedicated to promoting the public understanding of one-name studies and the preservation and accessibility of the resultant information.
The BELBIN One-Name Study is registered under membership No. 2417 and is a project researching facts about the surname and all the people who have held it, as opposed to a particular pedigree or ancestry and I am collecting data from anyone and anywhere in order to be able to publish this information for the benefit of not only people who are currently interested in the name, but also with the aim of trying to preserve it for future generations.
It has turned out to be a huge undertaking despite the BELBIN surname being a rare one. Anyone who wishes to assist by contributing information about the Belbins please do contact me via this site or via the Guild website. The variants of the name listed are all currently of interest. Other variants could include BULBIN, VELVIN and VELVEN, but so far it has not been possible to prove that this is the case.
Some variants of the BELBIN name
| BALBAN |
| BALBYN |
| BAILLEBYN |
| BALIBYNNE |
| BAYLBYN |
| BELB |
| BELBBEN |
| BELBEIN |
| BELBEN |
| BELBIN |
| BELBINE |
| BELBMAN |
| BELBON |
| BELBONE |
| BELBYN |
| BELEWINE |
| BELGIN |
| BELLBEN |
| BELLBEIN |
| BELLBIN |
| BELLBYN |
| BELLMAN |
| BELVIN |
| BELVYN |
| BILBON |
| BILBORNE |
The BelbinManiac
Family history was always a subconscious interest of mine but didn’t really take off until 1988 when I joined a London law firm situated a few minutes walk from the main record repositories (the then Public Record Office in Portugal Street and Chancery Lane, St. Catherines House for Births, Marriages and Deaths and the Probate Registry at Somerset House). It was a golden opportunity to explore these records and the more I found out, the more I wanted to find.
I was interested in home computers as early as 1984 and with the arrival of the internet in the 1990s I soon realised that a website was the new way to reach out to fellow BELBIN researchers. I created BelbinMania in September 1998 and although sometimes very much neglected, the site has been on the web ever since. What I failed to anticipate was the sheer number of people who would contact me and with family and work commitments taking so much of my time I gradually spent less and less time with the Belbins resulting in too many contacts remaining unanswered, for which I sincerely apologise. Thankfully, I am no longer working long hours in London and can at last spend much more time on this project, prioritising the rebuilding of BelbinMania.
For the record, I descend from one of the BELBIN families of Dorset. The furthest back I have been able to trace my line is to my 4 x Great Grandfather, Robert BELBIN who was born in Dewlish in 1729 and I am quietly confident that I will eventually be able to trace the family back to Sturminster Newton, a mere 13 miles down the road from Dewlish, and possibly thereafter link into family trees connecting to Newfoundland, Canada which has always been my aim. My family tree is UK Tree 1 in the Family Trees Database.
Robert BELBIN of Sturminster Newton signed this Indenture in 1703. Could he be my 5 x Great Grandfather?
What will you discover about the Belbins?
Despite its rarity, the BELBIN name sometimes seems to be everywhere you look. In England and Wales, between 1837 and 2025, only about 1700 people were actually born with either the surname BELBIN or BELBEN, yet over the years I have discovered many stories about those who once carried our name to prominence and those who still do. Some of these stories seem quite unusual to me, but perhaps it’s because the name is so rare that they stand out. Anyway, in order to make this website as interesting as possible to everyone I aim to include as many of these stories as I can in the Bits & Pieces page and to expand the more interesting articles on the Feature Pages. Inevitably, other parts of the site will be aimed at BelbinManiacs like me such as all the birth, marriage and death records on the Records Pages and, of course, the Family Trees Database section. You should hopefully therefore discover at least one thing that interests you….with a bit of luck. Happy surfing and please do CONTACT ME if you want to talk about BELBIN family history.
Extracts of the following records can currently be found on BelbinMania
- UK Births 1837 to 1901
- UK Marriages 1837 to 1903
- UK Deaths 1837 to 1942
- NSW Births 1788 to 1905
- NSW Marriages 1788 to 1945
- NSW Deaths 1788 to 1945
It is planned to add additional records such as UK Parish Records and UK Probates in due course as well as assorted PDF documents for download.
BELBIN family trees currently available on BelbinMania
UK Family Trees – there are several separate UK trees and they are the research priority at present
Non-UK Family Trees – these will be added when formatting is completed
To view the family trees you will need access to the separate BelbinMania Family Trees database where you will need to register for a User Account
A page of miscellaneous BELBIN stories which might interest you
James BELBIN was a pirate executed in 1725. The Court reporter was Daniel Defoe
Capt. William BLIGH, as in Mutiny on the Bounty. was known to another James BELBIN
BELBIN is the name of a village in Iran, a town in Egypt and a cave system in Spain
Heather BELBIN and Tanith BELBIN were both world famous ice skating champions
and much more …
Albums of photographs of anyone and anything BELBIN
Includes Terry BELBIN’S family photos and documents
Includes photos from connected families
Can include your BELBIN family photographs as well
Articles about prominent BELBINS, past and present
The BELBINS hamlet in Hampshire
The BELBINS of Sturminster Newton, Dorset
The Queen of Romania’s Tutor
There is much more in preparation!
What do we know about the origin of the BELBIN surname?
There are many speculative ideas
Could be as old as the 13th Century
Might even be 4000 years old
Possibly of German origin, or French, Russian, Persian, Slavic, Spanish or even old English. Who really knows?
Other Belbin Websites
The internet is full of BELBIN websites these days. Below are links to some sites which relate to BELBIN genealogy and to others belonging to family members which may be of interest. If you find other interesting BELBIN websites please do send details.
THE BELBINS & MATTHEWS This comprehensive site should be the first port of call for the descendants of William BELLMAN (BELBIN) who was born c.1750 in Newfoundland as it contains detailed information of 2471 individuals. The site was created by the late Brenda BELBIN who gave me administrator rights before she passed and my plan is to ensure her work is not lost to the ether by ultimately incorporating her work into BelbinMania.
BELBIN WORLD Terry BELBIN'S Facebook Group
BELBIN'S BUS SERVICES Tasmanian Tours
THE LESLIE GAMELIN FAMILY HOME PAGE Belbins of Shaftesbury, Dorset
BELBIN'S GROCERY The Little Urban Market in the Heart of Old St. John's, Newfoundland
REBECCA DOWDELL AND WILLIAM BELBIN Australian Family of James Belbin The Emancipist
DR. MEREDITH BELBIN The founder of the World famous BELBIN Team Role Company
LAURENCE BELBIN Dorset based painter of light and atmosphere
JAKOB BELBIN Eastbourne based fine artist and illustrator
BELBIN GENEALOGY WikiTree
TASMANIAN BELBINS Another tree of the family of James Belbin The Emancipist
ROBERT BELBIN Dorset based Photographer and Web Developer (part time co-editor of BelbinMania)
Some brief acknowledgements
Finally, before you go on to explore BelbinMania there are some people who should be recognised for their generous and helpful contributions with which they unwittingly persuaded me to create the original site way back in 1998. So, my special BelbinManiac awards are for PAT BAINES who did most of the legwork for the RECORDS pages, REG WRIGHT who provided chapters from his book THE YOUNGS OF ROKEBY, which will form the basis of a group of Feature pages, ANGELA BELBIN-WOOD who investigated the life and times of the Tutor to the children of QUEEN MARIE OF ROMANIA, HOWARD BELBEN who donated his research on the BELBINS OF STURMINSTER NEWTON and most importantly, ED BELBIN, who provided the name of the site when he declared quite openly that he suffered from BelbinMania! The internet is still suffering after 27 years and counting!
And lastly, my brother, ROBERT BELBIN at Dorset Photographic who undertook the initial reconstruction of the website giving me the renewed impetus to continue with the project.
Terry Belbin, June 2025.
