Ypres
Ypres | ||
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State : | Belgium | |
Region : | Flanders | |
Province : | West Flanders | |
District : | Ypres | |
Coordinates : | 50 ° 51 ′ N , 2 ° 53 ′ E | |
Area : | 130.61 km² | |
Residents: | 34,845 (Jan 1, 2019) | |
Population density: | 267 inhabitants per km² | |
Post Code: | 8900, 8902, 8904, 8906, 8908 | |
Prefix: | 057 | |
Mayor: | Emmily Talpe | |
Local government address : |
Stadhuis Grote Markt 34 8900 IEPER |
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Website: | www.ieper.be |
Ypres [ ˈyːpɐn ] ( Dutch Ieper , French Ypres , West Flemish Yper ) is a town in the West Flanders province of the Flemish Community in the Flanders region , Belgium . Ypres has 34,845 inhabitants (January 1, 2019). The places Boezinge, Brielen, Dikkebus, Elverdinge, Hollebeke, Sint-Jan, Vlamertinge , Voormezele, Zillebeke and Zuidschote belong to Ypres.
history
Middle Ages and Early Modern Times
Baldwin II the Bald (879–918) fortified Ypres , which belongs to the county of Flanders, to defend itself against the Normans . In the late Middle Ages, Ypres, along with Ghent and Bruges, was one of the most important cities in Flanders, was a member of the Flemish Hanseatic League and became important in particular through the cloth trade . Around the year 1300 Ypres had about 20,000 inhabitants. Shortly thereafter, the doctor and author of a surgical textbook Jan Yperman was a jury surgeon of the city and worked at the Belle-Siechenhaus. From 1559 to 1801 Ypres was the seat of a bishopric .
20th century
First World War
In the First World War (1914–1918), Ypres was directly on the western front from autumn 1914 .
On November 4, 1914, the German General Berthold von Deimling had the famous medieval cloth halls of Ypres laid in ruins for no military reason and against the express instructions of his Commander-in-Chief, Crown Prince Rupprecht of Bavaria .
Ypres was hotly contested:
- First Battle of Flanders (October 20 to November 18, 1914),
- Second Battle of Flanders (April 22nd to May 25th 1915),
- Battle of Messines (from May 21, 1917); a kind of preliminary offensive for them
- Third Battle of Flanders (July 31 to November 6, 1917).
German troops tried several times to take the city; in the process they were repulsed (November 1914 and April 1915). On April 22, 1915, German troops used chlorine gas for the first time .
“London, April 27th. "Daily Chronicle" reports the following details from northern France about the use of poisonous gases by the Germans: On 22nd d. M. at 5 o'clock in the afternoon saw French soldiers in the foremost trenches between Langemarck and Knocks [= Fort Knokke ] thick yellow smoke rising from the German trenches and slowly moving towards the French positions. The northeast wind caused the smoke to spread like a carpet over the earth, which it covered at a height of 16 feet. The Germans used strong cylinders of compressed gas, tapped and opened as soon as the wind hit the enemy trenches. The use of gases came as a surprise to the French. Many of them were poisoned and died. Some managed to escape, but shortly afterwards their faces turned black, coughed up blood, and fell dead. The effects of the gas were noticed at the front at a width of six kilometers and a depth of two kilometers. Fifteen minutes later, the Germans advanced out of the trenches, soldiers in safety helmets leading the way to make sure they could breathe the air. Since the gas was now spreading, large crowds of Germans moved forward. "
On July 12, 1917, German troops - again near Ypres - tested mustard gas for the first time . It was also called yperite by many soldiers. "Yperite" is still a synonym for "poison gas" in France.
The city was held by the Allies until the end of the "Great War" ; soldiers from the British Empire fought in Ypres . To commemorate those who were buried there and the fact that Ypres was the only city in the country to withstand German occupation, The Last Post has been sounding every evening at the Menenpoort memorial at eight o'clock sharp since 1929 - with the exception of the time of German occupation during World War II .
Road to Poelkapelle , December 1918
reconstruction
After the war, the heavily destroyed city was partly rebuilt true to the original, partly freely historicizing . Historical awareness and memories have since had a lot of place in the history and culture of the city. There are numerous military cemeteries in the vicinity of Ypres .
Ypres itself is criss-crossed by a gigantic network of caves, which were created by workers during the First World War and in parts only rediscovered in 2009.
Second World War
During the Second World War , heavy fighting took place again in the area around Ypres during the German campaign in the west . Due to the retreat of the British Expeditionary Force to Dunkirk and the capitulation of the Belgian army on May 28, 1940, it was taken without a fight by Wehrmacht troops the following day . After the capture, the city and the surrounding battlefields of the First World War were visited by Adolf Hitler on a propaganda trip in early June, still during the Battle of Dunkirk .
Community structure
- I - Ypres
- II - Zillebeke
- III - Hollebeke
- IV - Voormezele
- V - dikkebus
- VI - Vlamertinge
- VII - Brielen
- VIII - Elverdinge
- IX - Zuidschote
- X - Boezinge
- XI - Sint-Jan
- XII - Pilkem
Attractions
- Market square , surrounded by town houses.
- Lakenhal ( Cloth Hall , Gewandhaus ), one of the largest secular Gothic building complexes in Europe with a 70 meter high belfry , which is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and contains a 49-part carillon . The building houses the multi-award-winning In Flanders Fields museum - an interactive exhibition of reports about the battlefield near Ypres. Also in the Lakenhal is the interactive Ieper Museum , which opened in 2018 and deals with the history of the old trading town outside of the First World War
- Saint Martin's Cathedral , episcopal church of the former diocese of Ypres , which existed from 1561 to 1801.
- War memorial Menenpoort ("Gedenktor").
- Old fortress and the trenches from the First World War .
- St. George's Memorial Church (Ypres) . Memorial to the more than 500,000 fallen soldiers from the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth .
- The Ypres Rally , a motorsport event as part of the Intercontinental Rally Challenge (IRC) and the European Rally Championship .
- The Bellewaerde Park is a zoo and amusement park and the oldest amusement park in Belgium. The over 50 hectare park is located just outside Ypres, in the village of Hooge, 6 km away .
economy
The city lives from trade and tourism. In addition, small and medium-sized industrial companies have settled in Ypres.
Town twinning
- Siegen (Germany), since 1967
- Lehrte (Germany)
- Saint-Omer (Pas-de-Calais) (France)
- Wa (Ghana)
Personalities
- Saint Adela (1009 / 14-1079), Countess of Flanders
- Jan Yperman (* around 1260; † around 1330), also an ophthalmologist, city doctor of Ypres and field surgeon
- Melchior Broederlam (* around 1350, † after 1409), painter, co-founder of the old Dutch art of painting
- Jacobus Probst (1486–1562), Augustinian prior and reformer
- Jacobus Clemens non Papa (1510 / 15–1555 / 56), Renaissance composer
- Andreas Gerhard Hyperius (1511–1564), reformed theologian, university professor and reformer
- Georg Robin (1522–1592), architect
- Jacobus de Kerle (1531 / 32–1591), Renaissance composer
- Cornelius Jansen (1585–1638), Bishop of Ypres, founder of Jansenism
- Christian Lupus (1611 / 1612–1681), Roman Catholic theologian
- Camille Durutte (1803–1881), music theorist and composer
- Jules Malou (1810-1886), statesman
- Eugène de Pruyssenaere (1826–1864), Africa explorer
- Aloïs Boudry (1851–1938), genre, portrait and still life painter
- Léon Vanderstuyft (1890–1964), racing cyclist
- Walter Fiers (1931–2019), molecular biologist
- Eric Defoort (1943–2016), politician and chairman of the European Free Alliance (EFA)
- Marc Vervenne (* 1949), theologian and rector of the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven
- Xavier Rogiers (1956-2019), transplant surgeon
- Nicholas Lens (* 1957), author and composer
- Yves Leterme (* 1960), politician and temporary prime minister
- David Saelens (* 1975), racing driver
- Rik Opsommer (* in the 20th century), head of the Ypres City Archives
Others
- The lowest geological stage of the Eocene, the Ypresium , was named after Ypres .
- Since mustard gas was used in Ypres for the first time, the warfare agent was given the name Yperit .
- The Canadian metal band Woods of Ypres names Ypres in their band name because Canadian soldiers fought here in the First World War .
- The asteroid (10120) Ypres , discovered in 1992, was named after the city.
See also
- Battle of Langemarck (November 10, 1914)
- Kylemore Abbey (founded in Ypres in 1665)
gallery
literature
- Ypres . In: La Grande Encyclopédie . 20 volumes, Larousse, Paris 1971–1976, pp. 14745–14746 (French).
Web links
- Official website
- www.toerisme-ieper.be (city map with sights)
- In Flanders Fields Museum
- History of Ypres
- Illustration by Daniel Meisner from 1625: Yperen; Nec Divitiis, Nec Auro ( digitized )
Individual evidence
- ↑ Gundolf Keil : Yperman, Jan (Jehan, Johan Y., Ieperman). In: Werner E. Gerabek et al. (Ed.): Enzyklopädie Medizingeschichte. De Gruyter, Berlin / New York 2005, p. 1513 f.
- ↑ The Fumigated French . In: Deutsches Volksblatt . April 28, 1915, p. 2 ( ANNO - AustriaN Newspapers Online [accessed May 5, 2020]).
- ^ R. Hanslian: The German gas attack near Ypres on April 22, 1915. A study of the history of war. Berlin: Verlag Gasschutz und Luftschutz, 1934
- ↑ Tobias Müller: Six horns against oblivion . In: The daily newspaper: taz . November 9, 2019, ISSN 0931-9085 , p. 32–33 ePaper, Alle, Nord 34–35 Berlin ( taz.de [accessed on November 11, 2019]).
- ↑ spiegel.de February 17, 2009: Discovery in Ypres: In the tunnel city of World War II soldiers
- ↑ The 1 June Visit to Flanders on erenow.net , accessed on July 30, 2019.
- ↑ Klaus Schlupp: Ypres is not just the First World War. grenzecho.net, accessed April 6, 2019 .
- ↑ www.stgeorgesmemorialchurchypres.com It is located near the cathedral (corner of Elverdinghse Straat). Architect: Reginald Blomfield
- ↑ Gundolf Keil: Yperman, Jan (Jehan, Johan Y., Ieperman). 2005
- ↑ Gundolf Keil: "blutken - bloedekijn". Notes on the etiology of the hyposphagma genesis in the 'Pommersfeld Silesian Eye Booklet' (1st third of the 15th century). With an overview of the ophthalmological texts of the German Middle Ages. In: Specialized prose research - Crossing borders. Volume 8/9, 2012/2013, pp. 7–175, here: pp. 23 f. and 32.
- ↑ Roger-A. Blondeau: Jan Yperman, vader van de Vlaamse heelkunde (approx. 1275–1331). Ypres 2005.