Trying to understand Volker Reiche's (in)famous family tree

[Fethryfan]

I am fanatic by the Duck relatives, and i came across this one, by Volker Reiche

goofy313g.free.fr/calisota_online/trees/ducktrees/treereiche.jpg

I never understood it. I mean, is Quagmire McDuck supposed to be Scrooge's grandpa here?? The lines are too confusing. Does someone know how to read this tree?

By the way, i also know this dutch version of the tree, but i can't read the names. Is there a better version online?
goofy313g.free.fr/calisota_online/trees/ducktrees/treeschuijl.jpg

[RobbK1]

Nov 11, 2019 1:00:30 GMT Fethryfan said:

I am fanatic by the Duck relatives, and i came across this one, by Volker Reiche

goofy313g.free.fr/calisota_online/trees/ducktrees/treereiche.jpg

I never understood it. I mean, is Quagmire McDuck supposed to be Scrooge's grandpa here?? The lines are too confusing. Does someone know how to read this tree?

By the way, i also know this dutch version of the tree, but i can't read the names. Is there a better version online?
goofy313g.free.fr/calisota_online/trees/ducktrees/treeschuijl.jpg

I'm not with my Dutch books now, so I can't look to find that tree.  We discussed it on McDrake.nl (The Dutch language Disney Comics Forum), but we show Volker's German printing.  Unfortunately, when I increase the size of the image of that page, the letters blur even more.  I know I have the Dutch comic book with that tree, but I wouldn't have the time to look through all the 1990s books to find it, even if I were right with them. 

Maybe Scroogearello, or one of our other Dutch members remembers in which book it appeared.  I remembered it being a very sketchy tree, with no fan-generated family members, and I think no entries from Barks' and Rosa's trees - only characters who appeared in the printed comics.

[Scroogerello]

Here's a better quality picture of the Dutch version by Ed Van Schuijlenburg. It was printed on the back of a special issue for Donald's 50th birthday in 1984, which also marked the first publication of Marco Rota's "From Egg to Duck" biography. Schuijlenburg's art is great as always, but the portraits look a little "meh" compared to his usual art style (compare them to the Donald who is next to the tree, for example.) I think the lack of detail on the portraits might be because he first drew the tree, and then drew the portraits in the empty squares on the tree (i.e. on e very, very tiny format).
But don't ask me what all the complicated branches are supposed to mean here! They make absolutely no sense to me either..  I think it's probably intentionally vague.

[Fethryfan]

Nov 11, 2019 12:10:59 GMT Scroogerello said:

Here's a better quality picture of the Dutch version by Ed Van Schuijlenburg. It was printed on the back of a special issue for Donald's 50th birthday in 1984, which also marked the first publication of Marco Rota's "From Egg to Duck" biography. Schuijlenburg's art is great as always, but the portraits look a little "meh" compared to his usual art style (compare them to the Donald who is next to the tree, for example.) I think the lack of detail on the portraits might be because he first drew the tree, and then drew the portraits in the empty squares on the tree (i.e. on e very, very tiny format).
But don't ask me what all the complicated branches are supposed to mean here! They make absolutely no sense to me either..  I think it's probably intentionally vague.

You are a life savior, Scroogerello! Thanks!

I noticed Pokerface McDuck's name here is "Jeremias Borstel"...i always thought that was Quagmire's dutch name, but it seems i was wrong. Here Quagmire is called "Donshart Duck"


But thank you again. I am only having a hard time trying to read Wee-Angus' name

[Scrooge MacDuck]

If Donshart is Quagmire, then it would appear that both he and Pokerface are accounted for as great-uncles of Scrooge.

[Fethryfan]

Nov 11, 2019 13:16:04 GMT Scrooge MacDuck said:

If Donshart is Quagmire, then it would appear that both he and Pokerface are accounted for as great-uncles of Scrooge.

I noticed uncle Panhandle's name here is Knoest Duck. Isn't that the dutch name of Dingus?

[Scroogerello]

Indeed, "Jeremias Borstel" is the Dutch name of Quagmire McDuck, and "Knoest (Mc)Duck" is Dingus McDuck's. I think that whoever translated Rosa's tree into Dutch used Van Schuijlenburg's tree to come up with some of the names, even though they technically weren't supposed to be the same character in these two instances. Especially in Panhandle/Dingus' case it's very obvious why they were given the same name--their portraits on the two trees are very similar.
Generally, when it comes to very obscure characters like this, translated names are rarely consistent.

[LP]

I don't understand the arrows at all. What's the difference between an arrow and a connecting line? I guess the arrows are supposed to indicate that characters are distantly related, over multiple generations, maybe? But why do they appear in both directions? There's no clear consistency.

I think the worst offender is the arrows around Jake McDuck. There's an arrow below him pointing to Panhandle. Okay, so I assume Panhandle is Jake's father. But there's also an arrow from Panhandle to Gumboot. So, are Jake and Gumboot siblings? No, because there's a third arrow pointing from Gumboot to Jake! What?! If they want to say that Panhandle is Gumboot's father, and Gumboot is Jake's father, that's fine. My problem is that if this is what they tried to say, then that arrow from Jake to Panhandle makes no sense.

I just don't understand this at all. I think this tree is a failure in graphic design.

[Thomas]

Nov 11, 2019 12:45:01 GMT Fethryfan said:

I noticed Pokerface McDuck's name here is "Jeremias Borstel"...I always thought that was Quagmire's Dutch name, but it seems I was wrong.

Nov 11, 2019 18:07:21 GMT Scroogerello said:

Indeed, "Jeremias Borstel" is the Dutch name of Quagmire McDuck. [...] I think that whoever translated Rosa's tree into Dutch used Van Schuijlenburg's tree to come up with some of the names, even though they technically weren't supposed to be the same character in these two instances.

This, more or less. Jeremias Borstel is Pokerface McDuck from this story by Jack Bradbury. Quagmire McDuck is named Jeremias Borstel-Backenbaerth in the Dutch version of Rosa's Duck Family Tree.