Rabot

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Rabot with the three apartment blocks behind

The Rabot is a well-known monument in the Belgian city ​​of Ghent and at the same time the name of the surrounding district.

Origin of the term

In Dutch, Rabot is generally understood to be a hydraulic construction similar to a wooden weir , i.e. the predecessor of today's locks . The water of a canal or river is held in place by this closure, creating a difference in height between the sections of the watercourse. Before the lock was invented, boats had to be towed over sloping slopes. In the bank area there were grooves in which horizontal bars could be placed. The name is borrowed from the French 'rabattre' (amener à un niveau plus bas en abaissant), which means something like knock in, let in the horizontal wooden beams . Under the remainder of the city ​​fortifications , so-called in Ghent today, there was once a reversing lock in the Lieve . Over the years, the name has been transferred to the towers of the former city fortifications that protect this lock.

history

Rabot view in earlier times

In 1488 the Ghentians defeated the army of Emperor Frederick III on the Rabot . which withdrew from here after 40 days of siege. Street names in the area remind us of this: The Triomfstraat (Triumphstraße) and the Filips Van Cleeflaan , which are reminiscent of the Ghent leader Filips van Kleef (1459–1528). How did that happen?

During the War of the Burgundian Succession (1477-1493), the struggle to restore class autonomy against the Habsburgs ruling in the Burgundian Netherlands had repeatedly led to uprisings in the Dutch cities and provinces, and in particular made the rich cities of Flanders, at times allies of France. When the lower classes gained the upper hand in Ghent in the autumn of 1487, they got rid of the administration appointed by Maximilian von Habsburg , drove the Burgundian occupation out of the city and brought the French back. The intention of the Ghent people was to found a kind of city ​​republic under French feudal sovereignty. At the beginning of 1488 they conquered Courtrai , while Ypres also allied themselves with the advancing French. When Maximilian von Habsburg wanted to march from Bruges with 150 soldiers against the rebellious Ghent in 1488 - 200 horsemen and 300 foot soldiers had already left the city to march against Courtrai - the Bruges refused to open the city gates, occupied them instead and shouted Maximilian down. To exhort the citizens to calm down, Maximilian then appeared with his servants on the Grote Markt . When the mercenaries lowered their skewers - which was to be understood as a threat - the guilds occupied the market and demanded the withdrawal of all German soldiers from the city. Maximilian, who was unable to regain control of the city of Bruges, was arrested there on February 5, 1488 in the house of a spice merchant on the Grote Markt. In order to force the liberation of his son, Frederick III succeeded in raising an imperial army of 4,000 horsemen and 11,000 mercenaries. Although Maximilian was released from prison on May 16, 1488 under this pressure and had asked the emperor to forget what had happened, neither the emperor nor the imperial princes waived the planned punitive expedition to Flanders. The Imperial Army first besieged Ghent and devastated the area until the Ghent the army of Frederick III. struck after 40 days of siege and forced a withdrawal. Under the leadership of Philipp von Kleve , the Union of Flanders, Brabant, Zealand and Holland was able to assert itself against the foreign rule of the Habsburgs for many years . (For more details see: War of the Burgundian Succession → Turning of the war and new uprisings in Flanders (1487–1489) )

In 1491 the construction of the Rabot was completed. The reinforced lock was at the intersection of the Lieve and the city moat. On their side, the Lieve established the connection with the not yet silted up Zwin and further with the sea. In 1860 the brick wing was demolished in the direction of the city. In 1872 the street level was raised and the Lieve was closed. Ghent had long since had other approaches to the sea.

In the immediate vicinity of the Rabot, three large apartment blocks with a total of 573 apartments were built between 1972 and 1974 on the vacated site of the old Rabot train station and the gas factory , regardless of the surroundings and any demographic changes that might occur . The monument was literally encircled by the residential towers. In 2012 these apartment towers were to be demolished and replaced by eight new and lower buildings. In addition, the new Ghent courthouse was built on the same piece of land.

The area developed rapidly at the end of the 19th century as part of the flourishing textile industry and forms part of the so-called “19th century belt” around the city. At the corner of Rabot and Gebroeders de Smetstraat, the textile factory NV Loutex was once established; today, the technology campus Ghent of the Katholieke Hogeschool Sint-Lieven is housed there.

The centuries-old towers of the Rabot are popularly known as the Torekens . To this day, there are no exact boundaries of this part of the city, mostly the area around the monument is meant, which extends to the Wondelgemstraat and Griendeplein, the Gebroeders de Smetstraat, the Opgeëistenlaan and the Begijnhoflaan. The Rabotstraat itself is a connection between the Burgstraat and the Rabot.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Manfred Hollegger: Inner difficulties: The uprisings in Geldern, Flanders and Brabant In: (ders.): Maximilian I. (1459-1519) ruler and man of a turning point. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart 2005, ISBN 3-17-015557-1 , p. 50 ff.
  2. ↑ a b c d e f g h i Manfred Hollegger: Maximilians Captivity in Bruges 1488. In: (ders.): Maximilian I. (1459–1519) ruler and man of a turning point. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart 2005, ISBN 3-17-015557-1 , p. 54 ff.
  3. ↑ Het Nieuwsblad, March 27, 2009 - Gentse Rabottorens gaan dan toch tegen de vlakte