Correcting history: Rizal was not into cougars

This week in 1845 on July 17, Susanna (Suzanne) Jacoby was born in Asselborn, Clervaux, in the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg. For many years, students of the Rizal subject learned that one of Jose Rizal’s girlfriends was a Belgian named Suzanne Jacoby. Most standard biographies of our national hero teach us that Rizal stayed at a boarding house when he was in Belgium. Rizal most likely arrived in Brussels on or before January 30, 1890 and officially registered in the municipal registry of Brussels on March 28, 1890 at 38 Rue Philippe de Champagne. The address 38 Rue Philippe de Champagne was a boarding house run by two sisters in their forties: Susanna (also known as Suzanne) and Catherine Jacoby. And while most writers have identified them as Belgian, they were actually Luxembourgish. Many history books give Suzanne Jacoby as Jose Rizal’s girlfriend while he stayed in Brussels.

For a long time, many historians have gotten the name of Rizal’s Belgian love interest wrong. In earlier biographies, she was identified as Suzanne Jacoby and later historians would simply repeat this mistake. Unknown to earlier historians, there was another woman who lived with the Jacoby sisters. Her name was Suzanne Thill, and she was the niece of Suzanne and Catherine. Because Rizal’s letters and diaries sometimes contained codes and just the initials or first names of people, many initially assumed the Suzanne in Rizal’s writings was the aunt. But anyone who has studied Rizal knows that our national hero was more into younger women. Among the nine identified love interests of Rizal, the oldest was Seiko Usui, known to many as O-sei-san, who was just 21 years old when she met Rizal. When Rizal was in Brussels, he was just 29 but Suzanne Jacoby was already 45! While it would not have been impossible for him to fall for an older woman, his past girlfriends (and future ones) were all young. So, it would have made more sense for Rizal to have been attracted to the younger rather than older Suzanne, and letters from a le petite Suzanne (small Suzanne) also corroborate that it was the niece Rizal was romantically involved with, not the aunt. So yes, this proves Rizal was not into cougars, after all.

So who was Suzanne Thill? She was born in the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, the daughter of Peter Thill and Klara Jacoby, a sister of the older Suzanne. Suzanne and Rizal flirted with each other and she was most likely more in love with Rizal than he was with her. The short romance ended in 1891 when Rizal moved to Ghent. After the death of Catherine in 1912, young Suzanne moved to another location in Brussels with her other aunt, the older Suzanne, who died less than a month later. Between 1913 to 1916, she met Victor Wolff, a stockbroker who was also from Luxembourg. They moved to Vorst, still in Brussels, in 1916 and after years of living together, she finally married Victor on December 22, 1920. They both died in Vorst, Brussels, Belgium, Suzanne on August 17, 1951 and Victor on April 8, 1952. It took her a while to get over Rizal and that is why she married 30 years after Rizal left her forever.

Quite a few generations of Filipinos memorized Suzanne Jacoby’s name as the Belgian girlfriend of Rizal. Only recently were historians able to correct this. Which goes to prove that even after many years some historical truths can and should be reassessed and revisited.