THE DUKES OF BRABANT--THE JOYEUSE ENTRÉE--END OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY
A few miles to the south-west of Alost, on the borders of East
Flanders, the River Dendre, on its way to join the Scheldt, forms
the boundary of Brabant. From Denderleeuw, the frontier station, to
Brussels is about fifteen miles by train, through a district which
gradually loses the bare flatness of the plains of Flanders, and
becomes wooded, undulating, and hilly as we approach the city.
And Brussels is quite different from the fallen towns of Flanders.
There are no mouldering ramparts here, and very few uneven causeways,
but broad boulevards, shaded by trees; handsome modern houses; wooden
pavements in some parts; a Bourse; arcades and bazaars; tempting shops,
their windows decked with Parisian art; theatres and music-halls;
glittering restaurants and expensive hotels. It is all modern,
spacious, full of movement. While Bruges and Ypres live chiefly in the
past, Brussels lives chiefly in the present and the future. But in the
middle of the city is the famous Grande Place; and the tall houses, so
gloriously picturesque with pointed gables and gilded cornices; and the
exquisite Hôtel de Ville with its curiously carved façade and steep
roof pierced by innumerable little windows, above which the graceful
spire, that 'miracle of needlework in stone,' has towered for 500
years. Here, as everywhere in the Netherlands, the traditions of the
past are imperishable; and we may look back and see how this bright,
gay, pleasant city--the 'petit Paris,' as its people love to call
it--rose and grew.
Old Brabant extended from beyond Tournai on the west to what is now the
Dutch frontier beyond Turnhout on the east, and from the neighbourhood
of Ghent nearly to Liége. Just north of the forest of Soignies a ridge
of undulating hills overlooked the little River Senne, which wound
along eastwards through sandbanks and brushwood. On an island in
this stream, according to tradition, a chapel was built by St. Gery,
Bishop of Cambrai; a watch-tower, afterwards named the Tower of St.
Nicholas, was erected on a hillock near the island; wooden houses, with
thatched roofs, began to appear on the banks and here and there
on the steep hillside up which pathways, afterwards to become streets,
clambered towards a promontory called the Coudenberg, or Cold Mountain;
a market was established; and the village became known as Bruxelles, or
(at least so it is said) 'the house in the swamp,' from _bruc_, swamp,
and _celle_, house.
[Illustration: BRUSSELS
PLACE de Brouckére.]
From a long time, in the early tales about Brabant, there are the
usual legends of warriors and saints; but when we reach the period
of authentic history there are four chief towns, Louvain, Brussels,
Antwerp, and Bois-le-Duc. Of these the most important was Louvain. In
1190 the Counts of Louvain became Dukes of Brabant. They built a castle
on the Coudenberg, and for the next 300 years the Court of Brabant was
celebrated for its power and splendour.
Lying in the midst of a fertile district, and on the trade-route
from Flanders to Germany, Brussels was a convenient stopping-place
for travellers. But in the Middle Ages, when Bruges, Ghent, Ypres,
and other places were so prosperous, the history of Brussels is less
eventful; and it was only when the famous Flemish cities were about to
fall that the town on the Senne became an important centre of industry.
Its population, too, increased rapidly, owing to the numbers of
workmen who came from Louvain in consequence of commercial troubles
there.
So trade flourished, and Brussels grew rich; but the continual wars
which desolated France, the chief market for the manufactures of the
Netherlands, did harm to the linen trade, which suffered also from
the keen competition of English merchants. The raw material came from
England, and by prohibiting the exportation of wool England was able
to well-nigh ruin this branch of the trade of Flanders and Brabant.
Fortunately, however, for Brussels, the introduction of new industries
at this critical time made the damage to the linen trade less fatal,
and with the growth of flax-weaving, the art of tapestry-making,
dye-works, and the production of valuable armour, the town more than
held its own.
Luxury and display followed, as usual, in the train of wealth, and
Brussels became a city of pleasure, of fêtes, and gorgeous festivals.
The Court of Brabant was one of the most luxurious and dissolute in
Europe. The Dukes set an example of extravagance which was followed by
the Barons who surrounded them, and also by the rich bourgeois. 'The
people alone,' we are told, 'that is to say, the men without leisure,
the artisans, remained apart from excesses.' There was luxury in dress,
in armour, in furniture. The rich went about clad in gold brocades
and other costly stuffs, attended by servants in fine liveries. Their
horses were richly caparisoned, and their wives and daughters spent
large sums on magnificent robes, and decked themselves with jewels, and
garlands from the rose-gardens for which Brussels was already famous.
Every occasion for a fête was eagerly welcomed. Not only was there the
yearly 'Ommegang,' that time-honoured procession through the streets of
triumphal cars, bands of music, and giants, which delighted the people
of Brabant and Flanders, but each separate guild and confraternity had
its own festival. In private life every event--a birth, a baptism, a
marriage, or a death--was an excuse for spending money on display.
To such an extent, indeed, was this carried, that rules were made
forbidding invitations being sent except to near relatives, to prevent
people going to fêtes without being asked, and at length even to put
some limit on the value of the presents which it was customary to give
to guests. The licentious and wasteful habits of the _jeunesse dorée_
became so notorious, that there was a lock-up at each of the city
gates for the benefit of young men who were living too fast. In such a
state of society the money-lender saw his chance; but a law was passed
making it illegal for anyone to sign a promissory note, or anticipate
his inheritance, before reaching the age of twenty-eight. Brussels was
full of taverns, and there were parts of the town where every house was
occupied by women of easy virtue. Fortunes were recklessly squandered,
and most of the nobles are said to have been insolvent, and to have
left heavy debts behind them.
Not a vestige remains of the wall which surrounded this mediæval
Brussels except the Porte de Hal, at the corner where the modern
Boulevard de Waterloo meets the Boulevard du Midi; and the Hôtel de
Ville and the guild-houses in the Grande Place have undergone many
changes since the fourteenth century. A great part of the Church of
Ste. Gudule, however--the choir and transept, part of the nave, and
the south aisle--was built in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries;
and during that period Notre Dame de la Chapelle and Notre Dame du
Sablon rose on the foundations of more ancient churches. The houses,
even of the rich, were still of wood, with sometimes a tower of
stone, built irregularly on the hillside which rose from the valley
of the Senne, each house standing by itself, with its thatched roof,
from which in winter the rain or melted snow poured (there were, of
course, no gutters then), and found its way down to the lower ground,
which was thus little better than a swamp, even long after Brussels
had become an important city. It was in the midst of this mixture of
discomfort and luxury, so characteristic of the Middle Ages, that the
people of Brussels, and of Brabant generally, passed their lives--gay,
joyous, dissolute, but always with an eye to the main chance, and
growing richer and richer. And in one thing Brabant differed greatly
from Flanders. While in Flanders the towns were generally at deadly
feud with each other--Bruges fighting with Ghent, and Ghent at enmity
with Ypres, with each town divided into hostile factions, such as the
Leliarts and Clauwerts, within its own walls, the people of Brabant
seem to have lived at peace with each other, and, as a rule, to have
made it their first business always to combine for the defence of their
common interests. And in the middle of the fourteenth century came a
time which called for mutual reliance.
The last Duke of Brabant in the male line of the House of Louvain
was Jean III. He died in 1355, leaving no heir male; and thus the
succession fell to his daughter Jeanne,[30] who had married Wencelas,
brother of Charles IV. of Luxembourg.
From time immemorial the rulers of Brabant, on succeeding to the
throne, had taken an oath to maintain the liberty of their subjects;
and many charters confirming ancient rights and privileges had been
drawn up for the towns and communes. Before recognising the Duchess
Jeanne and her husband, the towns of Brabant addressed to them a
series of demands, which they requested the new rulers to accept.
These took the form of a charter enumerating and confirming all the
points which constituted public liberty in Brabant; and this charter
received the name of the Joyeuse Entrée (or Blyde Incompste), because
it was hailed with such applause by the representatives of the people.
The inauguration of the Duchess Jeanne and Wencelas took place at
Louvain on January 3, 1356, when they swore to maintain all the
ancient privileges of the country. Thereafter the act of inauguration
of each ruler of Brabant was known as his Joyeuse Entrée, and each
Joyeuse Entrée was a development of acts declaring public rights
which had previously existed, just as Magna Charta was founded on the
older liberties of England. Each Duke had his Joyeuse Entrée, which
he accepted sometimes with as little goodwill as King John felt at
Runnymede. Thus, this famous constitution, the best known and the
most liberal of all the free charters in the Netherlands, was not a
parchment drawn up at one time, but a declaration of public rights
which gradually developed.[31]
'The inauguration of a Duke of Brabant was a splendid and imposing
ceremony. The Prince, who was lord of the noble Duchy, went to make
himself known to his subjects, and to confirm the relations which
secured both his and their happiness. He arrived, with his courtiers,
at the ancient capital of Brabant, Louvain. As he descended the
Brussels road he saw from afar the cradle of his ancestors, with its
steeples, towers, and majestic walls, in the rich valley of the Dyle.
Before entering, the heir of the old Counts of Louvain stopped for
a little at the gates of the city, in the Monastery of Terbanck,
where, in the midst of an immense crowd, the clergy, the officers of
the University, and the magistrates, came to greet him. The brilliant
assemblage then went into the chapel, where the Abbess of Terbanck, at
the altar, took the crucifix and gave it to the highest dignitary of
the Church who was present, and he, approaching the Duke, gave it him
to kiss. The Rector of the University made an oration in the name of
the University and the clergy. The Mayor placed in the Duke's hands the
red staff of justice, emblem of his office. The Burgomaster gave him
the keys of the city; and the Pensionary of Louvain welcomed him on
behalf of all the local magistrates. Then the procession, to the sound
of trumpets, went forth on horseback through the gates, the Duke and
his Councillors, the States of Brabant, and the magistrates of Louvain,
to the Church of St. Pierre, where they all dismounted and entered
the choir; and there, after prayers had been said, the Prince swore
to maintain the liberties and privileges of the Church in Brabant.
Thence they went to the market-place, which was between the church and
the Hôtel de Ville. The Duke took his stand on a platform with the
representatives of the people of Brabant, and the Chancellor announced
that he was about to swear his Joyeuse Entrée. The Act of Inauguration
was read, first in Flemish and then in French, and the Duke repeated
it word for word, and took an oath to the barons, nobles, towns,
and franchises of the Duchy, that he would be their good and loyal
seigneur, and that he would not treat them otherwise than justly, and
in accordance with all their rights. They clothed the Duke in a robe of
crimson trimmed with ermine, and put the ducal coronet of Brabant upon
his head. The States swore fidelity to him. The trumpets sounded. The
air was filled with acclamations; and the heralds' voices crying, "Long
live the Duke of Brabant!" told the Duchy that another ruler had taken
possession of his heritage in accordance with ancient custom.'[32]
The 'States' of Brabant grew out of the primitive method of government
by an assembly of the people in the market-place, where each vassal
voted in person. Later, chosen representatives alone voted; and at the
end of the fourteenth century the clergy began to attend as a separate
order in the assembly. The name of 'États' was not used in Brabant till
1421, when the nobles, clergy, and commons called themselves the States
of Brabant.[33] Side by side with the States grew up the Council of
Brabant, which was originally a consulting body, a judicial council to
assist the Duke in administering the law, but which gradually came to
concern itself with the management of local affairs, while the States
conducted the public business of the duchy.
Soon after the inauguration of Jeanne and Wencelas, the jealous and
ambitious Louis of Maele, Count of Flanders, who had married Jeanne's
sister Marguerite, made war upon Brabant, and the struggle continued
for years. Wencelas, whom Froissart describes as a wise and gallant
man, was at last quite worn out by the troubles which beset him. He
spent the winter and summer of 1382-1383 at Brussels with his wife, and
tried to forget his sorrows in hunting, and in a round of balls and
tournaments. But his health was ruined, and, having gone to breathe his
native air in Luxembourg, he died there on December 3, 1383.
The Duchess Jeanne, who survived her husband for thirteen years, years
of constant trouble, died on December 1, 1406, at the age of eighty,
after a reign of fifty years, and was buried in the old church of the
Carmelites at Brussels. On her death the duchy of Brabant passed, by a
family arrangement, to the House of Burgundy.[34]
Under the House of Burgundy, during the fifteenth century Brussels
became more than ever a city of pomp, gaiety, and pleasure. For nearly
half a century of this period the history of Brabant is full of the
names of Philip the Good and Charles the Bold. Philip lived generally
at Brussels, and this brought to the town so many Frenchmen that French
became the language of the Court and the fashionable tongue amongst
the noblesse. The old castle or palace of the Dukes of Brabant on
the Coudenberg was enlarged, and beautified by the addition of the
Great Hall, where the Knights of the Golden Fleece, whose Order Philip
founded, used to hold their Chapters, and which in later days was to
witness the imposing spectacle of the abdication of Charles V. The
boundaries of the park were extended, walls were built round it, and
it was stocked with game. Bishops and nobles built themselves great
mansions. The first stone of the magnificent Hôtel de Ville had been
carved at the beginning of the century, and in 1444 Charles the Bold,
then only ten years old, laid the foundations of the lofty spire, on
the summit of which ten years later was placed that gilded statue of
St. Michael which is there to this day. The Burgundian Library still
remains, with its wealth of illuminated manuscripts and rare books; and
the paintings of Roger van der Weyden and his cotemporaries show how
art flourished at Brussels in the fifteenth century.
Unlike Philip, Charles the Bold detested the people of Brussels. His
father, he said, had increased their riches and their pride beyond
measure. He attacked the States of Brabant, and threatened to pull
down the walls and gates of Brussels. And when, after sweeping like a
tempest over Europe, he died before the walls of Nancy in 1477,
and the male line of the House of Burgundy came to an end, it was seen
that the wide domain over which his family had reigned so proudly, and
which he left to his daughter Marie, was torn by internal dissensions,
and that the people of Brabant and Flanders were smarting under the
inroads which had been made upon their ancient privileges.
[Illustration: BRUSSELS
ENTRANCE to the old church of the Carmelites.]
The Duchess Marie succeeded to a splendid inheritance, but her position
was full of difficulty. Her treasury was empty. She had no army at
her command. Popular discontent was growing. Her father had made the
haughty burghers of Ghent bow before him, but as soon as he was dead
they rose again. Ghent, Bruges, Brussels, all Brabant, were seething
with disaffection. Payment of the taxes was refused and the officers
of the Government were ill-treated. And, moreover, Hannibal was at the
gates, in the person of Louis XI., who had rejoiced on hearing of the
fate of Charles the Bold. The inauguration of Marie took place at the
end of May, 1477, five months after her father's death; and her Joyeuse
Entrée not only renewed the public rights which Philip and Charles had
infringed, but placed fresh restrictions on the power of the future
rulers of Brabant.
The marriage of the young Duchess to some husband who could defend her
rights was seen to be the only means of preserving the peace of the
country. Her distrust of Louis XI. led her to refuse an alliance with a
French Prince. She chose the Archduke Maximilian of Austria, and thus
the fortunes of Brabant and Flanders were united with the fortunes of
the House of Hapsburg, and the opportunity of peacefully absorbing
Belgium was lost to France.
The marriage was celebrated in August, 1477. Five years later Marie
died, leaving a son--the boy, then four years of age, who was
afterwards known as Philip the Fair. He in turn married Joanna,
daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain; and the offspring of this
marriage was the Great Emperor Charles V., during whose reign the
capital of Brabant was more brilliant than ever.
No story is better known than the story of how in the evil days,
when Philip II. ruled the 'Spanish Netherlands' in the interests
of the Church, Bréderode and his friends, hearing of Berlaimont's
scornful words, assumed the name of 'Beggars,' by which their party
was afterwards known. But how typical it is! How full their doings
are of the gay spirit of Brabant! It is springtime, fresh and bright,
when the confederate nobles leave the mansion of Count Kuilemburg,[35]
a brilliant company of handsome, hot-blooded men of fashion and high
birth, bearded all, and dressed in the elaborate finery of that time,
and walk to the palace, where Margaret of Parma awaits them. They pass
along the roadway which crowns the ridge, overlooking the multitude
of pointed roofs below them to the left, with the spire of the Hôtel
de Ville rising from where an opening among the housetops marks the
situation of the Grande Place, where so many of them are afterwards
to lay down their lives. The majestic towers of Ste. Gudule stand
out above the houses which cluster round them on the plateau of St.
Michael. In front of them is the palace, and beyond it the green glades
and pleasure-grounds of the park. A crowd of people, who have climbed
up from the lower town by the long steep way known as La Chausée and
the Montagne de la Cour, greet them with cheers at the entrance of the
palace. The doors of that magnificent dwelling receive the glittering
band, who go with gay insouciance to their momentous interview, and
come out from it in the same spirit. They walk about the streets,
and pass Berlaimont, who is talking to Arenberg. 'Look at our fine
beggars!' says Berlaimont. 'How they ruffle it before us!' They sup
at Kuilemburg's. Bréderode repeats Berlaimont's jest against them.
They take it up. They toast 'The Beggars.' They dress themselves up as
beggars, with leathern wallets and wooden bowls. They laugh, and spill
their wine about, drain more bumpers to the Beggars' health, dance on
the tables, and shout 'Vivent les Gueux!'[36] Not even the grave face
of Orange, who comes in, can stop the revel. And next day they lay
aside their fine clothes, dress themselves, their families, and their
servants as beggars, shave off their beards, and go about with wallets
and bowls.
This was the spirit of the masquerade, of the carnival, the Kermesse;
and thirty years later, when for a whole generation the country had
suffered unexampled miseries, and most of the beggars of 1566 had
perished by a violent death, the arrival of the Archduke Ernest as
Governor of Brabant was made the occasion for a grotesque display--'a
stately procession of knights and burghers in historical and
mythological costumes, followed by ships, dromedaries, elephants,
whales, giants, dragons.' A strange people. The Dutch had fought with
all the courage of the Nervii, and gained their freedom. The Belgians,
descendants of the Nervii, had been slaughtered, defeated, tortured,
and made slaves, had seen their country laid waste, and their cherished
liberties taken from them wholesale; and yet, when all was lost and the
heel of the oppressor was planted firmly on their necks, they were made
happy by a circus procession.
FOOTNOTES.
[Footnote 30: Born at Brussels, June 24, 1322.]
[Footnote 31: The text of the Joyeuse Entrée of Jeanne and Wencelas is
given by Abbé Nameche, vol. iv., pp. 671-679, and the latest form which
it took will be found in Poullet's _Histoire de la Joyeuse Entrée de
Brabant_, pp. 339-350.]
[Footnote 32: Poullet, p. 3.]
[Footnote 33: 'Mais bientôt les intérêts communs formèrent des
Associations particulières dans le seins même de l'assemblée. Les
nobles étaient unis par le droit de la féodalité; au treizième et au
quatorzième siècle, les villes Brabançonnes conclurent entre elles des
traités d'alliance, et de là l'origine des ordres. On sentit alors
l'inconvénient du vote individuel, et l'on admit que les individualités
particulières seraient liées par la majorité des suffrages dans le même
ordre': (Poullet, p. 45).]
[Footnote 34: Wencelas and Jeanne had no children. Jeanne made a will
leaving the Duchy of Brabant to her niece Marguerite (daughter of Louis
of Maele and her sister), who had married Philip the Bold, Duke of
Burgundy. Philip the Bold and Marguerite of Maele had two sons--Jean,
who became Duke of Burgundy and Count of Flanders on the death of his
father; and Antoine, who became Duke of Brabant on the death of his
mother.]
[Footnote 35: In what is now the Rue des Petits Carmes.]
[Footnote 36: 'Then for the first time, from the lips of those reckless
nobles, rose the famous cry, which was so often to ring over land and
sea, amid blazing cities, on blood-stained decks, through the smoke
and carnage of many a stricken field.'--MOTLEY: _Rise of the Dutch
Republic_.]