Duchy of Brabant

Brabant ( German [ bʁa'bant ], Dutch [ ˈbraːbɑnt ], French [ bʁa.bɑ̃ ]) is a historical area that roughly consists of the Belgian provinces of Antwerp and Brabant (today in Flemish Brabant , Walloon Brabant and the Brussels region -Hauptstadt divided) and the south of the Netherlands located province of Noord-Brabant is.

Antiquity and early Middle Ages

The area of ​​Brabant was inhabited by Menapians at the time of the Roman Empire , after whose submission by the Romans it belonged to the province of Gallia Belgica . In the 5th century the Franks took possession of the area.

In 870 the area came to the East Franconian Empire as part of Lorraine and was then referred to as a Gaugrafschaft . The name Pagus Bracbantensis , to which the later country name goes back, is traced back to braecbant , which means swampy area or marshland ( braec : break or swamp ; bant : area). Between 900 and 923 Lorraine came to the West Franconian King Charles the Simple . Since 959 the Brabantgau was ruled by the Counts of Verdun .

In the 11th century, the four counties in the Brabantgau were divided into three territories:

• Around 1000 the county of Brussels (between the rivers Zenne and Dijle ) was acquired by Count Lambert I von Löwen († 1015) (from the Reginare family ).
• Around 1024, the southern part of the Brabantgau went to Count Reginar V. von Bergen, son-in-law of Count Herman von Verdun († 1028), whose sex placed before the Count in Brabantgau ( Wigeriche ). Since then, this county has remained part of Hainaut County .
• Between 1056 and 1059 the so-called County Ename (between the Schelde and Dender ) was entrusted to Count Baldwin V of Flanders (from the House of Flanders ) as an imperial fief (this area was later called Imperial Flanders ).
• Until 1085 the fourth county (between the rivers Dender and Zenne) remained an imperial fiefdom of Count Palatine Hermann II of Lorraine (from the Ezzone family ). After his death († 20 September 1085) was there by Emperor . Henry IV as Landgraf economy the Count Henry III. von Löwen (from the family of the Reginare ), who was also Count von Löwen and Brussels.

High and late Middle Ages

Count Gottfried I von Löwen received the Duchy of Lower Lorraine in 1106. His great-grandson Heinrich I also assumed the title of Duke of Brabant in the Landgraviate of Brabant in 1183 . In 1190, after Duke Gottfried III. Death, he also became Duke of Lower Lorraine, but the ducal power was limited to his own territories (Landtag of Schwäbisch Hall).

The Dukes of Brabant soon gained power and independence, but were embroiled in multiple feuds with their neighbors and wavered between leaning towards the Holy Roman Empire and France . Of these, the following are particularly noteworthy:

• Johann I , who united the duchies of Limburg and Brabant through the victory at Worringen (1288) and is also known as a minstrel .
• His son Johann II. , Who in 1312 laid the foundation for an estate constitution that was later regulated in the Blijde Inkomst ( Joyeuse Entrée ).
• Heinrich II. (Brabant) , * 1207, +1248, married in second marriage to Sophie von Brabant , daughter of Elisabeth of Thuringia (Saint Elisabeth) and Ludwig V of Thuringia; their son Heinrich * 1244, +1308 became the progenitor of the House of Hesse, Heinrich I of Hesse
• Johann III. , which expanded the provisions with the so-called Brabant Golden Bull 1349, according to which the Brabanters could only be judged by local courts according to Brabant law, which Emperor Charles IV confirmed.

After Johann III. Death in 1355 and with it the extinction of the older line of the Reginare , the husband of his daughter Johanna, Wenzel von Luxemburg , brother of Emperor Charles IV, united Brabant with his own hereditary land. But under him the country became very confused. After Wenzel's death in 1383, his widow Johanna appointed her niece Margaret of Flanders and her husband, Duke Philip the Bold of Burgundy , as heirs. The government initially took over Philip's second son, Anton , 1404, who also united Luxembourg with Brabant. Anton fell at Azincourt in 1415 . His two sons and successors died childless, and so Brabant, Limburg and Luxembourg fell to Philip the Good of Burgundy in 1430 , and finally, through the marriage of Mary of Burgundy to Archduke Maximilian in 1477 with the other Dutch provinces, to the House of Austria .

The Duchy of Brabant in the XV. century

Brabant was the main country of the Spanish Netherlands , Brussels its capital. With the division of the Holy Roman Empire into a circle , it became the Burgundian Empire .

An important east-west long-distance trade route, the Brabanter Straße , connected the trading and trade fair cities of Leipzig via Erfurt, Marburg, Siegen, Aachen and Cologne with Brabant in the high and late Middle Ages .

Modern times

Brabantia Ducatus in 1645

The Duchy of Brabant rebelled against Spain in the Dutch uprising and in 1579 joined the Union of Utrecht with Calvinist provinces (although mostly Roman Catholic themselves) . As a result of the uprising of the Netherlands , the northern part ( 's-Hertogenbosch ) was separated from the duchy and in 1648 was incorporated into the Dutch Union as part of the generational states (which meant for the population until 1816 that they were not allowed to practice the Catholic faith), while South Brabant up to 1714 remained with the Spanish-Austrian line. After the War of the Spanish Succession in 1714, Brabant and the other southern provinces of the Netherlands reverted to the Austro-Habsburg imperial family. When a violent dispute arose under Joseph II over the rights of Brabant, which it owned in the Joyeuse entrée , the Brabant estates renounced the House of Austria in 1790 , but gave in again when Leopold II gave them back the rights they had demanded.

In 1795 the Austrian Netherlands , including Brabant, were annexed by France and integrated into the French state . In the Peace of Campo Formio (1797), the Austrian Emperor Franz I formally ceded his Dutch possessions to France. The northern Brabant became the Deux-Nèthes department with the Antwerp prefecture , the southern one became the Dyle department with the Brussels prefecture.

As Napoleon I in 1810 and the Dutch Brabant with the French empire united, together with a part of was the same money the Bouches-du-Rhin formed. As a result of the Paris Peace of 1814 and the resolutions of the Congress of Vienna , Brabant became part of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands and formed the three provinces of Noord-Brabant , Antwerp and South Brabant . South Brabant with Brussels, the capital of Brabant, was the center of the Belgian uprising in 1830 . South Brabant (as Province of Brabant ) and the Province of Antwerp became part of the new Kingdom of Belgium , while Noord-Brabant remained part of the Netherlands . In 1995, as part of the federalization of the Belgian state, the province of Brabant was divided into the provinces of Flemish Brabant , Walloon Brabant and the Brussels-Capital Region .

Since the middle of the 19th century , the title “Duke of Brabant” has been given to the king's eldest son or, if the king has no son, to the ruler's eldest grandson. In this tradition, the first bearer of the title was the later King Leopold II. The eldest daughter of King Philippe , Elisabeth , now also bears this title.

Landgraves and Dukes of Brabant

Landgraves of Brabant

• Henry III. von Löwen, 1085 / 1086-1095 (already Count von Löwen and Brussels from 1078)

Dukes of Lower Lorraine and Landgraves of Brabant

• Gottfried I von Löwen , 1095–1139 (Duke of Lower Lorraine from 1106)
• Gottfried II von Löwen , 1139–1142
• Gottfried III. von Löwen , 1142–1190

Dukes of Brabant and Lower Lorraine

• Heinrich I , 1190–1235 (already Duke of Brabant from 1183/1184)
• Heinrich II. , (* 1207), 1235–1248, m. in 1st marriage with Maria von Staufen daughter of King Philip, in 2nd marriage with Sophie, daughter of St. Elisabeth of Thuringia, acc. Son Heinrich d. Child (1244–1308), later Landgrave Heinrich I of Hesse, ancestor of the Hessian Landgraves
• Henry III. , 1248-1260
• Henry IV. , 1261-1267

Dukes of Brabant, Limburg and Lower Lorraine

• Johann I , 1267–1294, from 1288 also Duke of Limburg
• John II , 1294-1312
• Johann III. , 1312-1355
• Johanna , 1355–1406 (∞ Wenceslaus of Luxemburg 1355–1383)
• Margaret of Flanders , whose niece was appointed heiress in 1404; † 1405; ∞ Philip the Bold from the House of Burgundy
• Anton of Burgundy appointed heir in 1404, Duke 1406–1415
• John IV , 1415-1427
• Philip of Saint-Pol , 1427-1430

Dukes of Burgundy

• Philip the Good , 1430–1467
• Charles the Bold , 1467–1477
• Mary of Burgundy , 1477-1483, married Maximilian I. The Duchy of Brabant falls to the House of Habsburg ( Spanish Netherlands ) together with all the countries of the Dukes of Burgundy

Dukes of Brabant in modern times

• Leopold II , 1835–1865 Duke of Brabant
• Leopold (eldest son of Leopold II) , 1865–1869 Duke of Brabant
• Leopold III. (1901-1983), 1901-1934 Duke of Brabant
• Baudouin (1930–1993), 1934–1951 Duke of Brabant
• Philippe (* 1960), 1993–2013 Duke of Brabant
• Elisabeth (* 2001), Duchess of Brabant since 2013

See also

• History of Belgium
• List of Chancellors of Brabant
• Genoveva of Brabant - traditional figure, daughter of a duke of Brabant
• The German composer Richard Wagner named a character Elsa von Brabant in his romantic opera Lohengrin, which premiered in 1850 .

Remarks

1. ^ Noord-Brabant bijzonder en Burgundian. (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on November 29, 2014 ; accessed on November 13, 2014 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
2. ↑ What is het favoriete en mooiste Brabantse woord? Retrieved November 13, 2014 . 
3. ^ Zondag 5 June 2011: 3rd Algemene meeting Noord Brabant. (No longer available online.) Archived from the original on November 27, 2014 ; accessed on November 13, 2014 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  
4. ↑ Duke of Brabant ( Memento of the original from 23 August 2013 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
5. ^ Amendment of the law from 2001 (text in French): "Le titre de Duc de Brabant ou de Duchesse de Brabant sera toujours porté, à l'avenir, par le Prince ou la Princesse, fils aîné ou fille aînée du Roi, et, à défaut, par le Prince ou la Princesse, fils aîné ou fille aînée du fils aîné de la fille aînée du Roi. »