- published: 24 Sep 2010
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- author: NTDTV
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Albert Canal
The Albert Canal (Dutch: Albertkanaal, French: Canal Albert) is a canal located in northeastern Belgium, named after King Albert I of Belgium. It connects the major cities Antwerp and Liège and the Meuse and Scheldt rivers. It has a depth of 3.4 metres (11 ft), a free height of 6.7 metres (22 ft) and a total length of 129.5 kilometres (80.5 mi). The maximum capacity is a barge of 10,000 tons.
Between Antwerp and Liège, there is a height difference of 56 metres (184 ft), and a total of 6 canal locks were needed to overcome the difference in elevation. Five canal locks each have a height difference of 10 metres (33 ft), located in Genk, Diepenbeek, Hasselt, Kwaadmechelen and Olen, while the canal lock at Wijnegem has a height difference of 5.45 metres (17.9 ft).
In the 1930s, it took about 7 days to travel from Antwerp to Liege over water. These days the same distance is covered in 18 hours. Since the completion of the Rhine-Main-Danube Canal in 1992, a barge can now travel from Antwerp all the way across Europe to the Black Sea.
wn.com/Albert_Canal -
Arelerland
The Land of Arlon (Luxembourgish/German: Arelerland; French: Pays d'Arlon; Dutch: Land van Aarlen) is the traditionally Luxembourgish-speaking part of Belgian Lorraine, but now predominantly French-speaking. Arlon is the main city of this region.
The area borders in the west to the Gaume and in the east to the Grand-Duchy of Luxembourg. It lies to the south of the Ardennes. It coincides largely with the arrondissement of Arlon, part of the province of Luxembourg.
In the Land of Arlon, the traditional language is Luxembourgish, which is also spoken in the adjacent Grand-Duchy of Luxembourg. In 1990, the French Community of Belgium recognised the regional languages on its territory, of which Luxembourgish, however without taking any further measures.
The following data are the linguistic results of the census as they appeared in the Belgian Official Journal. Here is the language shift from Luxembourgish to French clearly visible.
Language that is mostly or exclusively spoken.
Known languages
These are the municipalities, with their sections and villages, in the Land of Arlon.
wn.com/Arelerland -
Battle of Waterloo
Coordinates: 50°40′45″N 4°24′25″E / 50.67917°N 4.40694°E / 50.67917; 4.40694 The Battle of Waterloo was fought on Sunday, 18 June 1815 near Waterloo in present-day Belgium, then part of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands. An Imperial French army under the command of Emperor Napoleon was defeated by combined armies of the Seventh Coalition, an Anglo-Allied army under the command of the Duke of Wellington combined with a Prussian army under the command of Gebhard von Blücher. It was the culminating battle of the Waterloo Campaign and Napoleon's last. The defeat at Waterloo ended his rule as Emperor of the French, marking the end of his Hundred Days return from exile.
Upon Napoleon's return to power in 1815, many states that had opposed him formed the Seventh Coalition and began to mobilise armies. Two large forces under Wellington and Blücher assembled close to the north-eastern border of France. Napoleon chose to attack in the hope of destroying them before they could join in a coordinated invasion of France with other members of the coalition. The decisive engagement of this three-day Waterloo Campaign (16–19 June 1815) occurred at the Battle of Waterloo. According to Wellington, the battle was "the nearest-run thing you ever saw in your life."
wn.com/Battle_of_Waterloo -
Bavay
Coordinates: 50°17′53″N 3°47′56″E / 50.2981°N 3.7989°E / 50.2981; 3.7989
Bavay is a commune in the Nord department in northern France.
It lies 15 m. ESE of Valenciennes by railway.
Under the name of Bagacum or Bavacum, the town was the capital of the Nervii and, under the Roman Empire, an important center of roads, the meeting-place of which was marked by a milestone, destroyed in the 17th century and replaced in the 19th century by a column. Bavay was destroyed during the barbarian invasions and never recovered its old importance. It suffered much during the wars of the 15th, 16th and 17th centuries. One of the Roman highways connected Bavay to Tongeren via the relay of Liberchies, and later on continued to Cologne.
The town carries on the manufacture of iron goods and of fertilizers.
wn.com/Bavay -
Belgian Lorraine
Belgian Lorraine is the part of Lorraine that lies in the south of the Belgian province of Luxembourg, part of Wallonia.
The term is used in a geological context, bordering the Ardennes in the north. Culturally and linguistically, it is made up of two sub-regions:
Coordinates: 49°39′N 5°39′E / 49.65°N 5.65°E / 49.65; 5.65
wn.com/Belgian_Lorraine -
Belgium
Belgium (
i/ˈbɛldʒəm/ BEL-jəm), officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO. Belgium covers an area of 30,528 square kilometres (11,787 sq mi), and it has a population of about 11 million people. Straddling the cultural boundary between Germanic and Latin Europe, Belgium is home to two main linguistic groups, the Dutch-speakers, mostly Flemish (about 60%), and the French-speakers, mostly Walloons (about 40%), plus a small group of German-speakers. Belgium's two largest regions are the Dutch-speaking region of Flanders in the north and the French-speaking southern region of Wallonia. The Brussels-Capital Region, officially bilingual, is a mostly French-speaking enclave within the Flemish Region. A German-speaking Community exists in eastern Wallonia. Belgium's linguistic diversity and related political conflicts are reflected in the political history and a complex system of government.
wn.com/Belgium -
Borinage
The Borinage is an area in the Walloon province of Hainaut. The provincial capital Mons is located in the east of the Borinage. In French the inhabitants are called Borains. But there was a great sociological difference between Mons and the Borains of all the villages around Mons.
Charles White wrote for the Belgian revolution: The Borains, like the dark spirits of the melo-drame, rose from their mines, and helter-skelter pushed upon the capital But he was using this name for all the inhabitants in the Province of Hainaut which is an error.
From the 18th century to 1850, the economy of thirty municipalities in the Borinage was founded on coal mining. Between 1822 and 1829, production more than doubled in that region i.e. from 602.000 to 1.260.000 tons. That was more than the total production of France and Germany at the time! The Borinage exported its coal mostly to France and Flanders...
In 1957 out of 64,800 people recorded as being in employment in the Borinage 23,000 worked in the coal industry. Only 7,000 people in services, although in Belgium as a whole 49 percent of employment was in the tertiary sector.
wn.com/Borinage -
Brussels
Brussels (French: Bruxelles, pronounced [bʁysɛl] (
listen); Dutch: Brussel, pronounced [ˈbrʏ.səɫ] ( listen); German: Brüssel, pronounced [ˈbʁyː.səl]), officially the Brussels Region or Brussels-Capital Region (French: 
Région de Bruxelles-Capitale (help·info), Dutch: Brussels Hoofdstedelijk Gewest (help·info)), is the capital of Belgium and the de facto capital of the European Union (EU). It is also the largest urban area in Belgium, comprising 19 municipalities, including the municipality of the City of Brussels, which is the de jure capital of Belgium, in addition to the seat of the French Community of Belgium and of the Flemish Community.
Brussels has grown from a 10th-century fortress town founded by a descendant of Charlemagne into a metropolis of more than one million inhabitants. The metropolitan area has a population of over 1.8 million, making it the largest in Belgium.
Since the end of the Second World War, Brussels has been a main centre for international politics. Hosting principal EU institutions as well as the headquarters of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), the city has become the polyglot home of numerous international organisations, politicians, diplomats and civil servants.
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Brussels Airport
Brussels Airport (IATA: BRU, ICAO: EBBR) (also called Brussel Nationaal/Bruxelles-National/Brussel-Zaventem (Brussels National)) is an international airport 6 NM (11 km; 6.9 mi) northeast of Brussels, Belgium. The airport is partially in Zaventem and partially in the Diegem area of Machelen, both located in the Flemish Region of Belgium.
Brussels Airport currently consists of 54 contact gates, and a total of 109 gates. It is home to around 260 companies, together directly employing 20,000 people.
In 2005, the airport was awarded Best Airport in Europe by Airports Council International/International Air Transport Association (ACI/IATA), based on a survey conducted with over 100,000 passengers worldwide.
The company operating the airport is known as "The Brussels Airport Company N.V./S.A."; before 19 October 2006, the name was BIAC (Brussels International Airport Company), which was created by Belgian law through a merger of BATC with the ground operations departments of the RLW/RVA. It is currently owned by the Australian group MAp Airports (75%) and the Belgian State (25%).
wn.com/Brussels_Airport -
Cambrai
Coordinates: 50°10′36″N 3°14′08″E / 50.1767°N 3.2356°E / 50.1767; 3.2356
Cambrai ([kɑ̃bʁɛ]; Dutch: Kamerijk; German: Kamerich; old spelling Cambray) is a commune in the Nord department in northern France on the Escaut river. It is a sub-prefecture of the department.
Cambrai is the seat of an archdiocese whose jurisdiction was immense during the Middle Ages. The territory of the Bishopric of Cambrai, roughly coinciding with the shire of Brabant, included the central part of the Low Countries. The bishopric had some limited secular power.
Cambrai was the Duke of Wellington's headquarters, for the British Army of Occupation, from 1815 to 1818.
The Battle of Cambrai (20 November 1917 – 3 December 1917), a campaign of World War I took place there. It was noted for the first successful use of tanks. A second Battle of Cambrai took place between 8 October 1918 – 10 October 1918 as part of the Hundred Days Offensive.
Little is known with certainty of the beginnings of Cambrai. Camaracum or Camaraco, as it was known to the Romans, is mentioned for the first time on the Peutinger table in the middle of the 4th century. It was a town of the Nervii, whose "capital" was at Bagacum, present-day Bavay.
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Cornwall
Cornwall ( /ˈkɔrnwɔːl/ or /ˈkɔrnwəl/;Cornish: Kernow [ˈkɛrnɔʊ]; Latin: Cornubia or Cornuvia) is a unitary authority and ceremonial county of England, within the United Kingdom. It is bordered to the north and west by the Celtic Sea, to the south by the English Channel, and to the east by the county of Devon, over the River Tamar. Cornwall has a population of 537,400 and covers an area of 3,563 km2 (1,376 sq mi). The administrative centre and only city is Truro.
The area now known as Cornwall was first inhabited in the Palaeolithic and Mesolithic periods. It continued to be occupied by Neolithic and then Bronze Age peoples, and later (in the Iron Age) by Brythons with distinctive cultural relations to neighbouring Wales and Brittany. There is little evidence that Roman rule was effective west of Exeter and few Roman remains have been found. Cornwall was a division of the Dumnonii tribe—whose tribal centre was in the modern county of Devon—known as the Cornovii, separated from Wales after the Battle of Deorham, often coming into conflict with the expanding English kingdom of Wessex before King Athelstan in AD 936 set the boundary between English and Cornish at the Tamar. From the early Middle Ages, British language and culture was apparently shared by Brythons trading across both sides of the Channel, evidenced by the corresponding high medieval Breton kingdoms of Domnonee and Cornouaille and the Celtic Christianity common to both territories.
wn.com/Cornwall -
County of Hainaut
The County of Hainaut (French: Comté de Hainaut, Dutch: Graafschap Henegouwen) was a historical region in the Low Countries with its capital at Mons (Bergen). In English sources it is often given the archaic spelling Hainault.
It consisted of what is now the Belgian province of Hainaut and the southern part of the French département Nord. In Roman times, Hainaut was situated in the Roman provinces of Belgica and Germania Inferior and inhabited by Celtic tribes, until Germanic peoples replaced them and ended Roman Imperial rule. Its most important cities were Mons (Bergen), Cambrai (Kamerijk) and Charleroi. Today the historic county of Hainaut is territorially divided between Belgium and France.
The County of Hainaut (pronounced: ĕ nō') arose about 900 in the Lotharingia region, when Duke Reginar I of Lorraine, a grandson of Frankish Emperor Lothair I, appeared as a "Count of Hainaut". After the death of the last Carolingian king in East Francia, Louis the Child in 911, Reginar joined the West Frankish realm under King Charles the Simple. His son and successor Duke Gilbert in 925 in turn submitted himself to the German king Henry the Fowler, whereafter the Duchy of Lotharingia remained a part of the German kingdom at the border with France.
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Dunkirk
Coordinates: 51°02′18″N 2°22′39″E / 51.0383°N 2.377500°E / 51.0383; 2.377500
Dunkirk (French: Dunkerque, pronounced: [dœ̃kɛʁk]; Dutch: Duinkerke(n) [ˈdœynkɛrkə(n)] ( listen); Flemish: [ˈdyŋkarkə] ( listen)) is a commune in the Nord department in northern France. It lies 10 kilometres (6.2 mi) from the Belgian border. The population of the city (commune) at the 1999 census was 70,850 inhabitants (71,300 inhabitants as per February 2004 estimates). The population of the metropolitan area was 265,974 inhabitants as per the 1999 census.
The name of Dunkirk derives from West Flemish "dun(e)" (dune) and "kerke" (church). Until the middle of the 20th century the city was situated in the French Flemish area; today the local Flemish dialect, a variety of the Dutch language, can still be found but has been largely replaced by French.
Dunkirk was first mentioned in 1067 as Dunkirk (Dutch: “Church of the Dune” or "Dune Church").[citation needed]
The area was much disputed between Spain, the Netherlands, England and France.
wn.com/Dunkirk -
East Flanders
East Flanders (Dutch: Oost-Vlaanderen [ˌoːst.ˈflaːn.də.rə(n)] ( listen), French: (Province de) Flandre-Orientale, German: Ostflandern) is a province of Flanders, one of the three regions of Belgium. It borders (clockwise from the North) on the Netherlands and in Belgium on the provinces of Antwerp, Flemish Brabant (both in Flanders), of Hainaut (Wallonia) and of West Flanders (Flanders). It has an area of 2,991 km² which is divided into six administrative districts (arrondissementen in Dutch) containing 65 municipalities. The provincial population is 1,408,484 and the capital is Ghent.
The flag has a black lion with red tongue and claws, on a background of horizontal white and green stripes. This is a recent adaptation. The flag of East-Flanders used to be the same as that of the Flanders region; a black lion on a yellow background. The old flag is still publicly used, e.g. for road signs.
The provincial parliament, Provincieraad, has 84 members. Six people chosen by and from the parliament are the deputies, bestendige deputatie, and form the daily government. The daily government is led by the governor, who is appointed by the Flemish government.
wn.com/East_Flanders -
Flanders
Flanders (Dutch: Vlaanderen (help·info)) is the (political) community of the Flemings, one of the communities of Belgium, and also a geographical region located in parts of present-day Belgium, France and the Netherlands.
"Flanders" can also refer to the northern part of Belgium that contains Brussels, Bruges, Ghent and Antwerp. Over the course of history, the geographical territory that was called "Flanders" has varied. In the second half of the twentieth century, there has been a gradual shift of political and economic power from French-speaking Wallonia (which was industrialized earlier) to the Flemish.
To the English-speaking peoples, Flanders meant historically (from circa 1000 AD) the land situated along the North Sea from the Strait of Dover to the Scheldt estuary. The southern borders were generally ill-defined. Over the last millennium, it was mostly the southern and western borders that receded to give the present day borders within northern Belgium.
Flanders has figured prominently in European history. Between the early 17th century and 1945, the political outcomes of modern Spain, France, Great Britain, the Netherlands, Germany and Austria were often decided by battles on the plains of Flanders. Even earlier in British and Irish history, the Flemings (or Flemish) were important allies of the Normans in their conquest of England (1066) and invasion of Ireland (1169–71).
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Flemish Brabant
Flemish Brabant (Dutch Vlaams-Brabant [ˌvlaːms.ˈbraː.bɑnt] ( listen), French Brabant flamand) is a province of Flanders, one of the three regions of Belgium. It borders on (clockwise from the North) the Belgian provinces of Antwerp, Limburg, Liège, Walloon Brabant, Hainaut and East Flanders. Flemish Brabant also surrounds the Brussels-Capital Region. Its capital is Leuven. It has an area of 2,106 km² which is divided into two administrative districts (arrondissementen in Dutch) containing 65 municipalities.
Flemish Brabant was created in 1995 by the splitting of the former province of Brabant into three parts: two new provinces, Flemish Brabant and Walloon Brabant; and the Brussels-Capital Region, which no longer belongs to any province. The split was made to accommodate the eventual division of Belgium in three regions (Flanders, Wallonia and the Brussels-Capital Region).
It is a province with a rich cultural history and a great diversity of typical products, among them several of the world-famous Belgian beers.
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Flemish Community
The term Flemish Community (Dutch: Vlaamse Gemeenschap [ˈvlaːmsə ʝəˈmeːnsxɑp] ( listen); French: Communauté flamande; German: Flämische Gemeinschaft [ˈflɛːmɪʃə ɡəˈmaɪ̯nʃaft]) has two distinct, though related, meanings:
Under the Belgian constitution, the Flemish Community has legal responsibility for the following:
As the Flemish Community's institutions (parliament, government and ministry) absorbed all competencies of the Flemish region, they became also competent for the following areas:
Members of the Flemish Parliament who were elected in Brussels region, have no right to vote on Flemish regional affairs. They can only vote on community affairs, since affairs concerning their region are governed by the Brussels Parliament.
Legally speaking, in the regions of Brussel-Capital as well as of Flanders, the Flemish Community is responsible not for individual people, but for Flemish institutions such as schools, theatres, libraries and museums. The reason for this is that no distinct sub-national status exists in Belgium.
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Flemish Region
The Flemish Region (Dutch: Vlaams Gewest (help·info)) is one of the three official regions of the Kingdom of Belgium—alongside the Walloon Region and the Brussels-Capital Region. Colloquially, it is usually simply referred to as Flanders, of which it is the institutional iteration within the context of the Belgian political system. It occupies the northern part of Belgium and covers an area of 13,522 km2 (44.29% of Belgium). It is one of the most densely populated regions of Europe with around 455 inhabitants per square kilometer.
Immediately after its establishment in 1980, the region transferred all its constitutional competencies to the Flemish Community. The current Flemish authorities (Flemish Parliament, Flemish Government) therefore represent all the Flemish people, including those living in the Brussels-Capital Region. Hence, the Flemish Region is governed by the Flemish Community institutions. However, members of the Flemish Community parliament who were elected in Brussels-Capital Region, have no right to vote on Flemish regional affairs.
wn.com/Flemish_Region -
France
France (Englishi/ˈfræns/ FRANSS or /ˈfrɑːns/ FRAHNSS; French: [fʁɑ̃s] ( listen)), officially the French Republic (French: République française [ʁepyblik fʁɑ̃sɛz]), is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, and from the Rhine to the Atlantic Ocean. It is often referred to as l’Hexagone ("The Hexagon") because of the geometric shape of its territory. It is the largest western European country and it possesses the second-largest exclusive economic zone in the world, covering 11,035,000 km2 (4,260,000 sq mi), just behind that of the United States (11,351,000 km2 / 4,383,000 sq mi).
Over the past 500 years, France has been a major power with strong cultural, economic, military and political influence in Europe and around the world. During the 17th and 18th centuries, France colonised great parts of North America and Southeast Asia; during the 19th and early 20th centuries, France built the second largest colonial empire of the time, including large portions of North, West and Central Africa, Southeast Asia, and many Caribbean and Pacific Islands.
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Gaume
Gaume is a region in the far south of Belgium. Situated at a lower altitude than the Ardennes, it is delineated by borders with France, the Land of Arlon and the Belgian Ardennes. Gaume is the roman part of the Belgian Lorraine region (the Land of Arlon, being the Luxembourgish-speaking part of the Belgian Lorraine).
Gaume is composed by these districts : Chiny, Etalle, Florenville, Habay, Meix-devant-Virton, Musson, Rouvroy, Tintigny and Virton, even if some villages in the northern districts are not in Gaume (as Suxy or Hachy). The unofficial capital of the Gaume region is Virton.
Temperatures in this region are often 1°C to 3°C higher than in other parts of Belgium due to a distinctive microclimate.
Gaume is a destination for tourism in Belgium.
The Lorrain language, a langue d'oïl distinct from the Walloon language, is a minority language in Gaume where it is known as Gaumais. Although it is in decline, several local authors are trying to revive usage. Lorrain is recognised as a regional language of Wallonia.
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Germany
Germany (i/ˈdʒɜrməni/), officially the Federal Republic of Germany (German: Bundesrepublik Deutschland, pronounced [ˈbʊndəsʁepuˌbliːk ˈdɔʏtʃlant] ( listen)), is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate. With 81.8 million inhabitants, it is the most populous member state and the largest economy in the European Union. It is one of the major political powers of the European continent and a technological leader in many fields.
A region named Germania, inhabited by several Germanic peoples, was documented before AD 100. During the Migration Period, the Germanic tribes expanded southward, and established successor kingdoms throughout much of Europe. Beginning in the 10th century, German territories formed a central part of the Holy Roman Empire. During the 16th century, northern German regions became the centre of the Protestant Reformation while southern and western parts remained dominated by Roman Catholic denominations, with the two factions clashing in the Thirty Years' War, marking the beginning of the Catholic–Protestant divide that has characterized German society ever since. Occupied during the Napoleonic Wars, the rise of Pan-Germanism inside the German Confederation resulted in the unification of most of the German states into the German Empire in 1871 which was Prussian dominated. After the German Revolution of 1918–1919 and the subsequent military surrender in World War I, the Empire was replaced by the Weimar Republic in 1918, and partitioned in the Treaty of Versailles. Amidst the Great Depression, the Third Reich was proclaimed in 1933. The latter period was marked by Fascism and World War II. After 1945, Germany was divided by allied occupation, and evolved into two states, East Germany and West Germany. In 1990 Germany was reunified.
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Luxembourg
Luxembourg (i/ˈlʌksəmbɜrɡ/ LUKS-əm-burg), officially the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg (Luxembourgish: Groussherzogtum Lëtzebuerg, French: Grand-Duché de Luxembourg, German: Großherzogtum Luxemburg, Dutch: Groothertogdom Luxemburg), is a landlocked country in western Europe, bordered by Belgium, France, and Germany. It has two principal regions: the Oesling in the North as part of the Ardennes massif, and the Gutland ("good country") in the south. Luxembourg has a population of over half a million people in an area of approximately 2,586 square kilometres (998 sq mi). A representative democracy with a constitutional monarch, it is ruled by a grand duke. It is now the world's only remaining sovereign grand duchy. The country has a highly developed economy, with the world's highest GDP (nominal) per capita according to the IMF. Its historic and strategic importance dates back to its founding as a Roman era fortress site and Frankish count's castle site in the Early Middle Ages. It was an important bastion along the Spanish Road when Spain was the principal European power influencing the whole western hemisphere and beyond in the 16th–17th centuries.
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Maastricht
Coordinates: 50°51′4.47″N 5°41′26.65″E / 50.8512417°N 5.6907361°E / 50.8512417; 5.6907361
Maastricht ([maːˈstʁɪçt] (southern Dutch) or [maːˈstɾɪxt] ( listen) (northern); Limburgish (incl. Maastrichtian) Mestreech [məˈstʁeːç]; French Maëstricht (archaic); Spanish Mastrique (archaic)) is a city in the Netherlands. It is located in the southern part of the Dutch province of Limburg, of which it is the capital.
Maastricht is widely known as a city of history, culture, local folklore, education. Furthermore, it has become known, by way of the Maastricht Treaty, as the birthplace of the European Union, European citizenship, and the single European currency, the euro. The town is popular with tourists for shopping and recreation, and has a large growing international student population. Maastricht is a member of the Most Ancient European Towns Network.
Maastricht is situated on both sides of the Meuse river (Dutch: Maas) in the south-eastern part of the Netherlands, on the Belgian border (with both the Dutch-speaking Flemish and French-speaking Walloon region within easy reach from the city centre) and near the German border. The city is part of the Meuse-Rhine Euroregion, the Euregio that includes Aachen, Hasselt and Liège in respectively Germany and Belgium.
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Meuse
Meuse (French pronunciation: [møz]) is a department in northeast France, named after the River Meuse.
Meuse is one of the original 83 departments created during the French Revolution on March 4, 1790. It was created from the former provinces of Barrois (area of Bar-le-Duc) and Three Bishoprics (area of Verdun).
The department was one of the great battlefields of World War I; an important battle was fought in 1916 at Verdun.
Meuse is part of the current region of Lorraine and is surrounded by the French departments of Ardennes, Marne, Haute-Marne, Vosges, Meurthe-et-Moselle, and Belgium on the north. Parts of Meuse belong to Parc naturel régional de Lorraine.
The important rivers are the following:
The population has decreased sharply since the 19th century, with the rural exodus to the cities.
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Netherlands
The Netherlands (
i/ˈnɛðərləndz/; Dutch: Nederland [ˈneːdə(r)lɑnt] or [ˈneɪ̯də(r)lɑnt] (
listen); West Frisian: Nederlân; Papiamento: Hulanda) is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with some islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders with Belgium, Germany and the United Kingdom. It is a parliamentary democracy organised as a unitary state. The country capital is Amsterdam and the seat of government is The Hague. The Netherlands in its entirety is often referred to as Holland, although North and South Holland are actually only two of its twelve provinces (a case of pars pro toto; see terminology of "the Netherlands").
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Orval Brewery
Orval Brewery (French: Brasserie d'Orval) is a Belgian trappist brewery located within the walls of the Abbaye Notre-Dame d'Orval in the Gaume region of Belgium.
The brewery produces two beers, which are marketed as trappist beer, Orval and Petite Orval.
Evidence of brewing goes back to the earliest days of the monastery. A document written by the abbot in 1628 directly refers to the consumption of beer and wine by the monks. The last of the brewers to be a monk was Brother Pierre, up until the 1793 fire.
In 1931 the present day brewery was built, employing lay people and intended to provide a source of funds for the monastery reconstruction. It was designed by Henry Vaes, who also designed the distinctive Orval beer glass. The first beer was shipped from the brewery on 7 May 1932, and was sold in barrels rather than the bottles of today. Orval was the first Trappist beer to be sold nationally around Belgium.
Orval is the main brand. It is a 6.2% abv beer. It was first made in 1931, and has a complex and unusual flavor and aroma produced by a unique strain of yeast. The beer is light in color, slightly cloudy, and has a large, foamy head. There is a complex aroma of leather, spice, and many other earthy components.
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Rotterdam
Rotterdam (
/ˈrɒtərdæm/; Dutch [ˌrɔ.tər.ˈdɑm] ( listen)) is the second-largest city in the Netherlands and one of the largest ports in the world. Starting as a dam constructed in 1270 on the Rotte River, Rotterdam has grown into a major international commercial centre. Its strategic location at the Rhine-Meuse-Scheldt delta on the North Sea and at the heart of a massive rail, road, air and inland waterway distribution system extending throughout Europe is the reason that Rotterdam is often called the "Gateway to Europe".
Located in the Province of South Holland, Rotterdam is found in the west of the Netherlands and at the south end of the Randstad. The population of the city proper was 616,250 on February 1st 2012. The population of the greater Rotterdam area, called "Rotterdam-Rijnmond" or just "Rijnmond", is around 1.3 million people. Rotterdam is one of Europe's most vibrant, multicultural cities. The city is known for its university (Erasmus), its cutting-edge architecture, its lively cultural life, its striking riverside setting, its maritime heritage and the Rotterdam Blitz.
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Vesdre
The Weser (German) or Vesdre (French) is a river in eastern Belgium, in the province of Liège, and is a right tributary to the river Ourthe. Its source lies in the High Fens (Hohes Venn, Hautes Fagnes), close to the border with Germany near Monschau. It flows through an artificial lake (fr:Barrage de la Vesdre), and then through the towns Eupen, Verviers, Pepinster and Chaudfontaine. The Vesdre flows into the Ourthe a few kilometers from Liège. Its total length is approximately 60 kilometers.
The water of the Vesdre has a high acidity (due to the Hautes Fagnes bogs), which made it very suitable for the textiles industry around Verviers. The Vesdre was the far eastern end of the sillon industriel, the backbone of Walloon industry. Nowadays, the water of the Vesdre is mainly used as drinking water.
Coordinates: 50°37′N 5°37′E / 50.617°N 5.617°E / 50.617; 5.617
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Waha
Waha is a Belgian village located in the Province of Luxembourg in Wallonia. In 1977 the village merged with Aye, Hargimon, Humain, Marche-en-Famenne, Marloie, On, Champlon and Roy to form the municipality of Marche-en-Famenne.
The name "Waha" comes from the Celtic proper name "Wachart". The Latin name of the location was "Wachardi mansus", meaning "Wachart's dwelling".
Waha in the 10th century belonged to the territory of count Immon. The first church was built only 100 meters from the present church and was dedicated to Saint Martin of Tours. In 1050 the present church of Saint Étienne was dedicated by the Liège bishop Theodwin (French: Théoduin).
The collegiate chapter of Saint Étienne was dissolved during the time of the French First Republic.
The church of Saint Étienne in Waha is one of the oldest Romanesque churches in Belgium. The nave of the church is only four arches long. The choir has a rectangular shape and is unvaulted. It is also lower than the nave ceiling, which is not uncommon in early Mosan architecture. The westwork tower is slightly younger than the rest of the church.
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Wales
Walesi/ˈweɪlz/ (Welsh: Cymru;Welsh pronunciation: [ˈkəm.rɨ] ( listen)) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom and the island of Great Britain,bordered by England to its east and the Atlantic Ocean and Irish Sea to its west. It has a population of three million, and a total area of 20,779 km2 (8,023 sq mi). Wales has over 1,200 km (750 mi) of coastline, including its offshore islands; the largest, Anglesey (Ynys Môn), is also the largest island in the Irish Sea. Wales is largely mountainous, with its highest peaks in the north and central areas, especially in Snowdonia (Eryri), which contains Snowdon (Yr Wyddfa), its highest summit.
During the Iron Age and early medieval period, Wales was inhabited by the Celtic Britons. A distinct Welsh national identity emerged in the centuries after the Roman withdrawal from Britain in the 5th century, and Wales is regarded as one of the modern Celtic nations today. Gruffydd ap Llywelyn was recognised as King of Wales in 1057. Llywelyn ap Gruffydd's death in 1282 marked the completion of Edward I of England's conquest of Wales. The castles and town walls erected to ensure its permanence are now UNESCO World Heritage Sites. Owain Glyndŵr briefly restored independence to what was to become modern Wales, in the early 15th century. Wales was subsequently annexed by England under the Laws in Wales Acts 1535–1542 since when, excluding those matters now devolved to Wales, English law has been the legal system of Wales and England. Distinctive Welsh politics developed in the 19th century. Welsh Liberalism, exemplified in the early 20th century by Lloyd George, was displaced by the growth of socialism and the Labour Party. Welsh national feeling grew over the century; Plaid Cymru was formed in 1925 and The Welsh Language Society in 1962. The National Assembly for Wales, created in 1999 following a referendum, holds responsibility for a range of devolved policy matters.
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Wallachia
Wallachia or Walachia (Romanian: Țara Românească pronounced [ˈt͡sara romɨˈne̯askə] or Valahia pronounced [vaˈlahi.a]; archaic: Țeara Rumânească, Cyrillic: Цѣра Румѫнѣскъ / Цѣра Рȣмѫнѣскъ) is a historical and geographical region of Romania. It is situated north of the Danube and south of the Southern Carpathians. Wallachia is sometimes referred to as Muntenia (Greater Wallachia), through identification with the larger of its two traditional sections; the smaller being Oltenia (Lesser Wallachia).
Wallachia was founded as a principality in the early 14th century by Basarab I, after a rebellion against Charles I of Hungary, although the first mention of the territory of Wallachia west of the river Olt dates to a charter given to the voievod Seneslau in 1246 by Béla IV of Hungary. In 1415, Wallachia accepted the suzerainty of the Ottoman Empire; this lasted until the 19th century, albeit with brief periods of Russian occupation between 1768 and 1854. In 1859, Wallachia united with Moldavia (as United Principalities), to form the basis of the modern state of Romania, with Transylvania joining 59 years later (1918) to form the new Kingdom of Romania which was first established 1881.
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Wallonia
Wallonia (French: Wallonie [wa.lɔ.ni], German: Wallonie(n), Dutch: Wallonië [wɐˈloːnɪə] ( listen) or [βɐˈloːnɪə], Walloon: Walonreye) is the predominantly French-speaking southern region of Belgium. It is governed as the Walloon Region, which makes up 55% of the territory of Belgium but with only a third of its population. Contrary to the situation in Flanders, the Walloon Region was not merged with the French Community of Belgium, a political level responsible for matters related mainly to culture and education. The small German-speaking minority in the east forms the German-speaking Community of Belgium, which has its own government and parliament for culture-related issues. The demonym for Wallonia is Walloon.
During the industrial revolution, Wallonia trailed only the United Kingdom in industrialization, capitalizing on its extensive deposits of coal and iron. This brought the region wealth, and, from the beginning of the 19th to the middle of the 20th centuries, Wallonia was the more prosperous half of Belgium. Since World War II, however, the importance of heavy industry has greatly declined, and the Flemish Region surpassed Wallonia in wealth as Wallonia economically declined. Wallonia now suffers from high unemployment and has a significantly lower GDP per capita than Flanders. The economic inequalities and linguistic divide between the two are major sources of political conflict in Belgium.
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Walloon Brabant
Walloon Brabant (French: Brabant wallon, Dutch: Waals-Brabant (help·info), Walloon: Roman Payis) is a province of Wallonia in Belgium. It borders on (clockwise from the North) the province of Flemish Brabant (Flemish Region) and the provinces of Liège, Namur and Hainaut (Wallonia). Its capital is Wavre. It has an area of 1,093 km² and contains only one administrative district (arrondissement in French), the Arrondissement of Nivelles, with 27 municipalities.
Walloon Brabant was created in 1995 when the former Province of Brabant was split into three parts: two new provinces, Walloon Brabant and Flemish Brabant; and the Brussels Capital Region, which no longer belongs to any province. The split was made to accommodate the federalisation of Belgium in three regions (Flanders, Wallonia and Brussels).
The provincial population was recorded at 347,423 in January 1999, giving a population density of 318 inhabitants / km²
The history of Brabant is at Brabant; see also Duke of Brabant.
Nivelles District:
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Walloon Parliament
Coordinates: 50°27′50.31″N 4°52′24.64″E / 50.463975°N 4.8735111°E / 50.463975; 4.8735111
The Walloon Parliament (French: Parlement wallon), formerly the Walloon Regional Council (Conseil régional wallon), is the Parliament of the Walloon Region, commonly called Wallonia, one of the self-governing Regions of Belgium with Flanders and the Brussels-Capital Region. The parliament building, the former Hospice Saint-Gilles, is situated in Namur, the capital of the Walloon Region, at the symbolic confluence of the Meuse and the Sambre, the two main rivers of the most inhabited parts of the country, the Sillon industriel. On the other side of the Meuse, facing the Parliament, is the Élysette, the seat of the Walloon government.
All members of the Walloon Parliament are also members of the Parliament of the French Community, except for Monika Dethier-Neumann who represents the German-speaking population and is an advisory member of the Parliament of the German-speaking Community.
This is the composition of the Walloon Parliament following the 2009 regional election. The PS, Ecolo and CDH formed together a government.
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West Flanders
West Flanders (Dutch: West-Vlaanderen [ˌβ̞ɛst.ˈflaːn.də.rə(n)] ( listen); West Flemish: West Vloandern; French: (Province de) Flandre-Occidentale; German: Westflandern) is the westernmost province of the Flemish Region, also named Flanders, in Belgium. It borders (clockwise from the North) on the Netherlands, the Flemish province of East Flanders (Oost-Vlaanderen) and the Walloon province of Hainaut (Henegouwen) in Belgium, on France, and the North Sea. Its capital is Bruges (Brugge). Other important cities are Kortrijk in the south and Ostend along the coastline. The province has an area of 3,125 km² which is divided into eight administrative districts (arrondissementen) containing 64 municipalities.
The whole Belgian North Sea coast, an important tourism destination, lies in West Flanders. A tram line runs the length of the coast, from De Panne on the French border to Knokke-Heist on the Dutch frontier.
West Flanders consists of the North Sea coast, followed by a very flat polder landscape. Only in the south are some small hills, with the Kemmelberg (159 m) being the highest point in the province. The Leie and IJzer are the main rivers. West Flanders is the only Belgian province that borders both France and The Netherlands.
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Wépion
Located 8 km the south of Namur, Wépion is the Belgian capital of the strawberry.
The strawberry has been cultivated there for more than 150 years because Wépion benefits from a micro-climate, sun-exposed plantations on west sloping ground and has a perfect ground for this type of culture.
It produces a strawberry beer under the brand name La Wépionnaise.
Coordinates: 50°25′N 4°52′E / 50.417°N 4.867°E / 50.417; 4.867
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Adolphe Sax
Antoine-Joseph "Adolphe" Sax (6 November 1814 – c. 4 February 1894) was a Belgian musical instrument designer and musician who played the flute and clarinet, and is best known for having invented the saxophone.
Adolphe Sax was born in Dinant in Wallonia, Belgium. His father, Charles-Joseph Sax, was an instrument designer himself, who made several changes to the design of the horn. Adolphe began to make his own instruments at an early age, entering two of his flutes and a clarinet into a competition at the age of fifteen. He subsequently studied those two instruments at the Royal School of Singing in Brussels.
Having left the school, Sax began to experiment with new instrument designs, while his father continued to produce conventional instruments to bring money into the household. Adolphe's first important invention was an improvement of the bass clarinet design, which he patented at the age of twenty-four.
In 1841, Sax relocated permanently to Paris, and began work on a new set of instruments that were exhibited there in 1844. These were valved bugles, and although he had not invented the instrument itself, his examples were so much more successful than those of his rivals that they became known as saxhorns. They range in approximately seven different sizes, and paved the path to the creation of the flugelhorn. Today, they are widely used in concert bands and sometimes in orchestras. The saxhorn also laid the groundwork for the modern euphonium.
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Albert Claude
Albert Claude (24 August 1899 – 22 May 1983) was a Belgian biologist who shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1974 with Christian de Duve and George Emil Palade. He studied engineering, and then medicine (at the University of Liège, Belgium). During the winter of 1928-29 he worked in Berlin, first at the Institut für Krebsforschung, and then at the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Biology, Dahlem. In the summer of 1929 he joined the Rockefeller Institute. While working at Rockefeller University in the 1930s and 1940s, he used the electron microscope to make images of cells which deepened the scientific understanding of cellular structure and function. He discovered the chloroplasts in the cell.
In 1930, Claude discovered the process of cell fractionation, which was groundbreaking in his time. The process consists of grinding up cells to break the membrane and release the cell's contents. Claude then filtered out the cell membranes and placed the remaining cell contents in a centrifuge to separate them according to mass. He divided the centrifuged contents into fractions, each of a specific mass, and discovered that particular fractions were responsible for particular cell functions.
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Albert Mockel
Albert Mockel (27 December 1866 - 30 January 1945) was a Belgian Symbolist poet. Born in Ougrée, he was the editor of La Wallonie, an influential journal of Belgian Symbolism. He died on January 1930 in Ixelles.
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Alfred Jarry
Alfred Jarry (8 September 1873 – 1 November 1907) was a French writer born in Laval, Mayenne, France, not far from the border of Brittany; he was of Breton descent on his mother's side.
Best known for his play Ubu Roi (1896), which is often cited as a forerunner to the surrealist theatre of the 1920s and 1930s, Jarry wrote in a variety of genres and styles. He wrote plays, novels, poetry, essays and speculative journalism. His texts present some pioneering work in the field of absurdist literature. Sometimes grotesque or misunderstood (e.g. the opening line in his play Ubu Roi, "Merdre!", has been translated into English as "Pshit!", "Shitteth!", "Shittr!", "Shikt!", "Shrit!", "Pschitt!", and "Shitsky!"), he invented a pseudoscience called 'Pataphysics.
A precociously brilliant student, Jarry enthralled his classmates with a gift for pranks and troublemaking.
At the lycée in Rennes when he was 15, he led of a group of boys who devoted much time and energy to poking fun at their well-meaning, but obese and incompetent physics teacher, a man named Hébert. Jarry and classmate Henri Morin wrote a play they called Les Polonais and performed it with marionettes in the home of one of their friends. The main character, Père Heb, was a blunderer with a huge belly; three teeth (one of stone, one of iron, and one of wood); a single, retractable ear; and a misshapen body. In Jarry's later work Ubu Roi, Père Heb would develop into Ubu, one of the most monstrous and astonishing characters in French literature.
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André Antoine
André Antoine (31 January 1858 – 23 October 1943) was a French actor, theatre manager, film director, author, and critic who is considered the father of modern mise en scène in France.
André Antoine was a clerk at the Paris Gas Utility and worked in the Archer Theatre when he asked to produce a dramtization of a novel by Émile Zola. The amateur group refused it, so he decided to create his own theatre to realize his vision of the proper development of dramatic art.
Antoine founded the Théâtre Libre in Paris in 1887. This was a théâtre d'essai, a workshop theatre, where plays were produced whether they would perform at the box office or not. It was also a stage for new writing whose subject matter or form had been rejected in other theatres. Over a seven year period, until 1894, the Théâtre Libre staged some 111 plays. His work had enormous influence on the French stage, as well as on similar companies elsewhere in Europe, such as the Independent Theatre Society in London and the Freie Buhne in Germany.
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André Blavier
André Blavier (1922–2001) was a Belgian poet.
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André Souris
André Souris (10 July 1899 – 12 February 1970) was a Belgian composer, conductor, musicologist, and writer associated with the surrealist movement.
Souris was born in Marchienne-au-Pont, Belgium, and studied at the Conservatory in Brussels from 1911 to 1918, winning first prizes in music history (1915), harmony (1916), counterpoint and fugue (1917), and the violin (1918). Following postgraduate studies in composition and orchestration with Gilson, he won the Rubens prize in 1927. This enabled him to move to Paris, where he sought out the leaders of the avant garde. He took conducting lessons with Scherchen in 1935, and was a conductor for the Belgian radio from 1937 to 1946 (Vanhulst 2001).
Up until 1923 Souris composed a great deal of music under the strong influence of Claude Debussy, but after discovering other musical styles at the Pro Arte Concerts, he repudiated these early works and adopted Eric Satie and Igor Stravinsky as his models. Joining the Belgian surrealists of the group Correspondance around Paul Nougé, he wrote deliberately banal music, beginning with the Choral, marche et galop for four brass instruments (1925), which became his op. 1—a work clearly indebted to L'Histoire du soldat (Vanhulst 2001). He lived in Italy, France, and Austria, and died in Paris (Anon. 2009).
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Antoine Wiertz
Antoine Joseph Wiertz (22 February 1806 – 18 June 1865) was a Belgian romantic painter and sculptor.
Born in Dinant from a relatively poor family, he entered the Antwerp art academy in 1820. Thanks to his protector Pierre-Joseph de Paul de Maibe, a member of the Second Chamber of the States-General, king William I of the Netherlands awarded an annual stipend to Wiertz from 1821 onwards. Between November 1829 and May 1832, he stayed in Paris, where he studied the old masters at the Louvre.
In 1828, Wiertz took part in the Grand Concours, also known as Concours de Rome, but came out only second. He landed the prestigious Prix de Rome only at his second attempt in 1832, which enabled him to go to Rome, where he resided from May 1834 until February 1837. Upon his return, he established himself in Liège with his mother.
During his stay in Rome, Wiertz worked on his first great work, Les Grecs et les Troyens se disputant le corps de Patrocle ("Greeks and Trojans fighting for the body of Patrocles", finished in 1836), on a subject borrowed from canto XVII of Homer's Iliad. It was exhibited in Antwerp in 1837, where it met with some success. Wiertz submitted the work for the Paris Salon of 1838, but it arrived too late and was refused.
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Anton Webern
Anton Webern (help·info) (3 December 1883 – 15 September 1945) was an Austrian composer and conductor. He was a member of the Second Viennese School. As a student and significant follower of Arnold Schoenberg, he became one of the best-known exponents of the twelve-tone technique; in addition, his innovations regarding schematic organization of pitch, rhythm and dynamics were formative in the musical technique later known as total serialism.
Webern was born in Vienna, Austria, as Anton Friedrich Wilhelm von Webern. He was the only surviving son of Carl von Webern, a civil servant, and Amelie (née Geer) who was a competent pianist and accomplished singer — the only obvious source of the future composer's talent. He never used his middle names and dropped the von in 1918 as directed by the Austrian government's reforms after World War I. After spending much of his youth in Graz and Klagenfurt, Webern attended Vienna University from 1902. There he studied musicology with Guido Adler, writing his thesis on the Choralis Constantinus of Heinrich Isaac. This interest in early music would greatly influence his compositional technique in later years by employing palindromic form on both the micro- and macro-scale and the economical use of musical materials.
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Aristide Maillol
Aristide Joseph Bonaventure Maillol (December 8, 1861 – September 27, 1944) was a French Catalan sculptor, painter, and printmaker.
Maillol was born in Banyuls-sur-Mer, Roussillon. He decided at an early age to become a painter, and moved to Paris in 1881 to study art. After several applications, his enrollment in the École des Beaux-Arts was accepted in 1885, and he studied there under Jean-Léon Gérôme and Alexandre Cabanel. His early paintings show the influence of his contemporaries Pierre Puvis de Chavannes and Paul Gauguin.
Gauguin encouraged his growing interest in decorative art, an interest that led Maillol to take up tapestry design. In 1893 Maillol opened a tapestry workshop in Banyuls, producing works whose high technical and aesthetic quality gained him recognition for renewing this art form in France. He began making small terracotta sculptures in 1895, and within a few years his concentration on sculpture led to the abandonment of his work in tapestry.
The subject of nearly all of Maillol's mature work is the female body, treated with a classical emphasis on stable forms. The figurative style of his large bronzes is perceived as an important precursor to the greater simplifications of Henry Moore and Alberto Giacometti, and his serene classicism set a standard for European (and American) figure sculpture until the end of World War II.
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Arthur Grumiaux
Arthur Grumiaux (21 March 1921–16 October 1986) was a Belgian violinist who was also proficient in piano.
Grumiaux was born in Villers-Perwin, Belgium to a working-class family, and it was his grandfather who urged him to begin music studies at the age of only 4. He trained on violin and piano with the Fernand Quintet at the Charleroi Conservatory, where he took first prize at the age of 11. The following year he advanced his studies by working with Alfred Dubois at the Royal Conservatory in Brussels, and also worked on counterpoint and fugue with Jean Absil. He received his first few major awards prior to reaching the age of 20; he took the Henry Vieuxtemps and François Prume prizes in 1939, and received the Prix de Virtuosité from the Belgian government in 1940. During this time he also studied composition privately in Paris with the famous Romanian violinist George Enescu, Yehudi Menuhin's teacher.
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Arthur Koestler
Arthur Koestler CBE (5 September 1905, Budapest – 1 March 1983, London) was a Hungarian-British author and journalist. Koestler was born in Budapest and, apart from his early school years, was educated in Austria. In 1931 Koestler joined the Communist Party of Germany but, disillusioned by Stalinist atrocities, he resigned in 1938. In 1940 he published his novel Darkness at Noon, an anti-totalitarian work, which gained him international fame.
Over the next 43 years from his residence in Great Britain, Koestler espoused many political causes and wrote novels, memoirs, biographies, and numerous essays. In 1968, he was awarded the prestigious Sonning Prize "for outstanding contribution to European culture" and, in 1972, he was made a Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE). In 1976, Koestler was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease and, in 1979, with terminal leukaemia. In 1983 he and his wife committed suicide at home in London.
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Benoît Mariage
Benoît Mariage (born 19 July 1961 in Virton, Belgium) is a Belgian film director.
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Bertholet Flemalle
Bertholet Flemalle, Flemal, or Flamael (1614 – 1675) was a Flemish Baroque painter.
The son of a glass painter, he was instructed in his art by Henri Trippet and Gerard Douffet successively. He visited Rome in 1638, and was invited by the Duke of Tuscany to Florence and employed in decorating one of his galleries. Thence he moved to Paris where he carried out some elaborate decorative work at Versailles and painted for the sacristy of the church of the Augustinians his picture of the Adoration of the Magi. He returned to Liège in 1647 and executed many paintings for the churches of his native town. In 1670 he was invited to return to Paris, and painted the ceiling of the audience room in the Tuileries. Louis XIV made him a professor of the Royal Academy of Paris. Towards the close of his life he returned to Liège and was elected a lay canon of the church of St. Paul, and painted several works for the Prince-Bishop of the city. His The Glorification of the Holy Cross is in St Bartholomew's Church, Liege. A few years before he died he reportedly fell into a state of profound melancholy and had to be placed under the care of a medical man, in whose house he died. It has been argued that his colouring is pale and weak and his figures somewhat artificial. He is believed to have painted a portrait of Colbert and by some writers is stated to have been a pupil at one time of Jordaens, but this has never been verified. Gerard de Lairesse was one of his pupils.
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Celts
The Celts (usually pronounced /ˈkɛlts/ but sometimes /ˈsɛlts/, see pronunciation of Celtic) or Kelts were an ethno-linguistic group of tribal societies in Iron Age and Medieval Europe who spoke Celtic languages and had a similar culture.
The earliest archaeological culture that may justifiably be considered as Proto-Celtic is the Late Bronze Age Urnfield culture of central Europe from the last quarter of the second millennium BC. Their fully Celtic descendants in central Europe were the people of the Iron Age Hallstatt culture (c. 800-450 BC) named for the rich grave finds in Hallstatt, Austria. By the later La Tène period (c. 450 BC up to the Roman conquest), this Celtic culture had expanded over a wide range of regions, whether by diffusion or migration: to the British Isles (Insular Celts), France and The Low Countries (Gauls), much of Central Europe, the Iberian Peninsula (Celtiberians, Celtici and Gallaeci) and northern Italy (Golaseccans and Cisalpine Gauls) and following the Gallic invasion of the Balkans in 279 BC as far east as central Anatolia (Galatians).
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Charlemagne
Charlemagne ( /ˈʃɑrlɨmeɪn/ or /ˈʃɑrləmeɪn/; French pronunciation: [ʃaʁ.lə.maɲ]; c. 742 – 28 January 814), also known as Charles the Great (Latin: Carolus Magnus or Karolus Magnus), was King of the Franks from 768 and Emperor of the Romans (Imperator Romanorum) from 800 to his death in 814. He expanded the Frankish kingdom into an empire that incorporated much of Western and Central Europe. During his reign, he conquered Italy and was crowned Imperator Augustus by Pope Leo III on 25 December 800 in Rome.
His rule is also associated with the Carolingian Renaissance, a revival of art, religion, and culture through the medium of the Catholic Church. Through his foreign conquests and internal reforms, Charlemagne helped define both Western Europe and the European Middle Ages. He is numbered as Charles I in the regnal lists of Germany, the Holy Roman Empire, and France.
The son of King Pepin the Short and Bertrada of Laon, a Frankish queen, he succeeded his father in 768 and was initially co-ruler with his brother Carloman I. It has often been suggested that the relationship between Charlemagne and Carloman was not good, but it has also been argued that tensions were exaggerated by Carolingian chroniclers.
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Charles Plisnier
Charles Plisnier (1896 – 1952) was a Belgian writer from Wallonia. He was a Communist in his youth and briefly belonged to the Trotskyist movement in the late 1920s.
He disavowed communism, and became a Roman Catholic, remaining nevertheless a Marxist. He turned to literature, writing family sagas against bourgeois society. Mariages (1936; "Nothing to Chance") deals with the limitations of social conventions; the five-volume Meurtres (1939–41; "Murders") centres on an idealistic tragic hero, Noël Annequin, in his fight against hypocrisy. In 1937, he won the Prix Goncourt for Faux passeports, short stories denouncing Stalinism, in the same spirit as Arthur Koestler. He was the first foreigner to receive Prix Goncourt. He was also a Walloon movement activist and at the end of the Walloon National Congress there was a standing ovation after his speech, the assembly then singing La Marseillaise.
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Charles the Bold
Charles the Bold (or Charles the Rash) (Dutch: Karel de Stoute, French: Charles le Téméraire or Charles le Hardi) (10 November 1433 – 5 January 1477), baptised Charles Martin, was Duke of Burgundy from 1467 to 1477. Known as Charles the Terrible to his enemies, he was the last Valois Duke of Burgundy and his early death was a pivotal, if under-recognised, moment in European history.
After his death, his domains began an inevitable slide towards division between France and the Habsburgs (who through marriage to his heiress Mary became his heirs). Neither side was satisfied with the results and the disintegration of the Burgundian state was a factor in most major wars in Western Europe for more than two centuries.
Charles the Bold was born in Dijon, the son of Philip the Good and Isabella of Portugal. In his father's lifetime (1433–1467) he bore the title of Count of Charolais; afterwards, he assumed all of his father's titles, including that of "Grand Duke of the West". He was also made a Knight of the Golden Fleece just twenty days after his birth, being invested by Charles I, Count of Nevers and the seigneur de Croÿ.
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Christian De Duve
Christian René, viscount de Duve (born 2 October 1917) is a Nobel Prize-winning cytologist and biochemist. De Duve was born in Thames Ditton, Surrey, Great Britain, as a son of Belgian refugees. They returned to Belgium in 1920. De Duve was educated by the Jesuits at Onze-Lieve-Vrouwecollege in Antwerp, before studying at the Catholic University of Leuven, where he became a professor in 1947. He specialized in subcellular biochemistry and cell biology and discovered peroxisomes and lysosomes, cell organelles.
In 1962 de Duve joined the faculty of what is now Rockefeller University in New York City, dividing his time between New York and Leuven. He took emeritus status at Université catholique de Louvain in 1985 and at Rockefeller in 1988, though he continued to conduct research.
Amongst other subjects, de Duve studied the distribution of enzymes in rat liver cells using rate-zonal centrifugation. De Duve's work on cell fractionation provided an insight into the function of cell structures.
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Clovis I
Clovis (c. 466 – 511) or Chlodowech (Latin Chlodovechus) was the first King of the Franks to unite all the Frankish tribes under one ruler, changing the leadership from a group of royal chieftains, to rule by kings, ensuring that the kingship was held by his heirs. He was also the first Catholic King to rule over Gaul, known today as France. He was the son of Childeric I and Basina. In 481, when he was fifteen, he succeeded his father. Clovis was not only a Frankish king, he was also a Roman official. The Salian Franks were one of two Frankish tribes who were then occupying the area west of the lower Rhine, with their center in an area known as Toxandria, between the Meuse and Scheldt (in what is now the Netherlands and Belgium). Clovis's power base was to the southwest of this, around Tournai and Cambrai along the modern frontier between France and Belgium. Clovis conquered the neighboring Salian Frankish kingdoms and established himself as sole king of the Salian Franks before his death. The small church in which he was baptized stood in the vicinity of the subsequent abbey of Saint-Remi in Reims, and a statue of him being baptized by Saint Remigius can be seen there. Clovis and his wife Clotilde were buried in the St. Genevieve church (St. Pierre) in Paris, the original name of the Church was the Church of the Holy Apostles. An important part of Clovis' legacy is that he locally succeeded to the power of the Romans in 486 by beating the Gallo-Roman ruler Syagrius in the battle of Soissons.
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César Franck
César-Auguste-Jean-Guillaume-Hubert Franck (10 December 1822 – 8 November 1890) was a composer, pianist, organist, and music teacher who worked in Paris during his adult life.
He was born at Liège, in what is now Belgium (though at the time of his birth it was under the Netherlands' control). In that city he gave his first concerts in 1834. He studied privately in Paris from 1835, where his teachers included Anton Reicha. After a brief return to Belgium, and a disastrous reception to an early oratorio Ruth, he moved to Paris, where he married and embarked on a career as teacher and organist. He gained a reputation as a formidable improviser, and travelled widely in France to demonstrate new instruments built by Aristide Cavaillé-Coll.
In 1858 he became organist at Sainte-Clotilde, a position he retained for the rest of his life. He became professor at the Paris Conservatoire in 1872; he took French nationality, a requirement of the appointment. His pupils included Vincent d'Indy, Ernest Chausson, Louis Vierne, Charles Tournemire, Guillaume Lekeu, and Henri Duparc. After acquiring the professorship Franck wrote several pieces that have entered the standard classical repertoire, including symphonic, chamber, and keyboard works.
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Dardenne brothers
Brothers Jean-Pierre Dardenne (born 21 April 1951 in Liège, Belgium) and Luc Dardenne (born 10 March 1954 in Liège, Belgium) are a Belgian filmmaking duo. They write, produce and direct their films together.
The Dardennes began making narrative and documentary films in the late 1970s, but they first came to international attention in the mid-1990s with La Promesse (The Promise). They won their first major international film prize when Rosetta won the Palme d'Or at the 1999 Cannes Film Festival. All their films since have played at the Cannes main competition and won one of the major prizes.
In 2002, Olivier Gourmet won Best Actor at Cannes for the Dardennes' Le Fils (The Son) In 2005, they won the Palme d'Or a second time for their film L’Enfant (The Child), putting them in an elite club of only 7 with the likes of Francis Ford Coppola. Their film, Le silence de Lorna (Lorna's Silence), won Best Screenplay at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival and was released in Europe in the fall. Their latest film The Kid with a Bike won the Grand Prix at the 2011 Cannes Film Festival. Jean-Pierre has been announced as the jury president for the Cinéfoundation and Short Films sections of the 2012 Cannes Film Festival.
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Ernest Solvay
Ernest Gaston Joseph Solvay (16 April 1838 – 26 May 1922) was a Belgian chemist, industrialist and philanthropist.
Born at Rebecq, he was prevented by acute pleurisy from going to university. He worked in his uncle's chemical factory from the age of 21.
In 1861, he developed the ammonia-soda process for the manufacture of soda ash (anhydrous sodium carbonate) from brine (as a source of sodium chloride) and limestone (as a source of calcium carbonate). The process was an improvement over the earlier Leblanc process.
He founded the company Solvay & Cie and established his first factory at Couillet (now merged into Charleroi, Belgium) in 1863 and further perfected the process until 1872, when he patented it. Soon, Solvay process plants were established in the United Kingdom, the United States, Germany and Austria. Today, about 70 Solvay process plants are still operational worldwide.
The exploitation of his patents brought Solvay considerable wealth, which he used for philanthropic purposes, including the establishment in 1894 of the "Institut des Sciences Sociales" (ISS) or Institute for Sociology at the Free University of Brussels (now split into the Université Libre de Bruxelles and the Vrije Universiteit Brussel), as well as International Institutes for Physics and Chemistry. In 1903, he founded the Solvay Business School which is also part of the Free University of Brussels. In 1911, he began a series of important conferences in physics, known as the Solvay Conferences, whose participants included luminaries such as Max Planck, Ernest Rutherford, Marie Curie, Henri Poincaré, and (then only 32 years old) Albert Einstein. A later conference would include Niels Bohr, Werner Heisenberg, Max Born, and Erwin Schrödinger.
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Eugène Ysaÿe
Eugène Ysaÿe (French pronunciation: [øʒɛn iza.i]; 16 July 1858 – 12 May 1931) was a Belgian violinist, composer and conductor born in Liège. He was regarded as "The King of the Violin", or, as Nathan Milstein put it, the "tzar". His brother was pianist and composer Théo Ysaÿe (1865–1918), and his great-grandson is Marc Ysaÿe, drummer of rock band Machiavel.
Eugène-Auguste Ysaÿe came from a background of peasants, though a large part of his family played instruments. As violinist Arnold Steinhardt describes, a legend was passed down through the Ysaÿe family about the first violin brought to the lineage:
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Fernand Verhaegen
Fernand Verhaegen (1883–1975) was a Belgian painter and etcher.
He was born in Marchienne-au-Pont, near Charleroi in Wallonia. He took courses at the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts from 1900 to 1906 and there became friends with Rik Wouters and Edgard Tytgat. After graduation he exhibited his works in Belgium and abroad (Biennale of Venice in 1920 and 1922). His style gradually evolved from impressionism and Belgian luminism to a synthetic form of capturing reality. In his later years, he came back to a personal form of impressionism.
Verhaegen specialized in painting Walloon folklore: Carnival of Binche (he was soon recognised as the painter of "the Gilles of Binche"), Doudou of Mons, Giants of Ath, Chinelles of Fosses, Chaudia of Leernes, Pasqueye, and so on. He also created a series of etchings devoted to the folklore in Wallonia. In his book about this artist, Robert Magremanne has named him "the great master of the Walloon folklore". He died in Montigny-le-Tilleul in 1975.
Verhaegen's works are in many museums of Belgium (Antwerp, Brussels, Charleroi, Ixelles, Liège, Mons) and abroad (Genève, Grenoble, Indianapolis).
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Franks
The Franks (Latin: Franci or gens Francorum) were a confederation of Germanic tribes first attested in the third century AD as populating a broad strip of land on the right bank of the Lower and Middle Rhine River. From the third to fifth centuries some Franks raided Roman territory while other Franks joined the Roman troops in Gaul. Only the Salian Franks formed a kingdom on Roman-held soil that was acknowledged by the Romans after 357. In the climate of the collapse of imperial authority in the West, the Frankish tribes were united under the Merovingians and conquered all of Gaul except Septimania in the 6th century. The Salian political elite was one of the most active forces in spreading Christianity over western Europe. The Franks had created one of the most strong and stable barbaric kingdoms.
The Merovingian dynasty, descended from the Salians, founded one of the Germanic monarchies which replaced the Western Roman Empire from the fifth century. The Frankish state consolidated its hold over large parts of western Europe by the end of the eighth century, developing into the Carolingian Empire which dominated most of Western Europe. This empire would gradually evolve into France and the Holy Roman Empire.
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Franz Schubert
Franz Peter Schubert (German pronunciation: [ˈfʁants ˈʃuːbɛɐ̯t]; 31 January 1797 – 19 November 1828) was an Austrian composer.
Although he died at the age of 31, Schubert was a prolific composer, having written some 600 Lieder, nine symphonies (including the famous "Unfinished Symphony"), liturgical music, operas, some incidental music, and a large body of chamber and solo piano music. Appreciation of Schubert's music during his lifetime was limited, but interest in his work increased significantly in the decades following his death. Franz Liszt, Robert Schumann, Johannes Brahms and Felix Mendelssohn, among others, discovered and championed his works in the 19th century. Today, Schubert is seen as one of the leading exponents of the early Romantic era in music and he remains one of the most frequently performed composers.
Schubert was born in Himmelpfortgrund (now a part of Alsergrund), Vienna, on 31 January 1797. His father, Franz Theodor Schubert, the son of a Moravian peasant, was a parish schoolmaster; his mother, Elisabeth Vietz, was the daughter of a Silesian master locksmith, and had also been a housemaid for a Viennese family prior to her marriage. Of Franz Theodor's fourteen children (one illegitimate child was born in 1783), nine died in infancy; five survived. Their father was a well-known teacher, and his school in Lichtental, a part of Vienna's 9th district, was well attended. He was not a musician of fame or with formal training, but he taught his son some elements of music.
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Félicien Rops
Félicien Rops (7 July 1833 - 23 August 1898) was a Belgian artist, and printmaker in etching and aquatint.
Rops was born in Namur, the only son to Nicholas Rops and Sophie Maubile. He was educated at the University of Brussels. Rops's forté was drawing more than painting in oils. He first won fame as a caricaturist.
In 1857, he married Charlotte Polet de Faveaux, with whom he had two children: Paul and Juliette. Juliette died at a young age.
After the failure of his marriage, he moved to Paris in 1874. There, he lived with the Duluc sisters: Aurélie and Léontine Duluc. With Léontine Duluc, he had one daughter, Claire. Claire went on to marry Belgian author Eugène Demolder.
Rops's eyesight began to fail in 1892. He kept up his literary associations until his death.
Félicien Rops was a freemason and a member of the Grand Orient of Belgium.
Rops met Charles Baudelaire towards the end of the poet's life in 1864, and Baudelaire left an impression upon him that lasted until the end of his days. Rops created the frontispiece for Baudelaire's Les Épaves, a selection of poems from Les Fleurs du mal that had been censored in France, and which therefore were published in Belgium.
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George Grard
George Grard (1901-1984) was a Belgian sculptor, known above all for his representations of the female, in the manner of Pierre Renoir and Aristide Maillol, modelled in clay or plaster, and cast in bronze.
Grard was born in Tournai to a family of modest means and entered the Académie de Tournai in 1915, but his real calling as a sculptor became apparent when he followed a course in sculpture in 1922 with Maurice De Korte (1889–1971). In his native city he met Pierre Caille, and later, in a Brussels foundry, Charles Leplae. Having won the Prix Rubens (1930), he left for Paris, where he encountered the sculpture of Charles Despiau, Aristide Maillol and Pierre Renoir, which influenced his mature style. In 1931, he set up his studio at Saint-Idesbald on the coast, where his house became a rendez-vous of artists including Pierre Caille, the Haesaerts brothers, Edgard Tytgat and Paul Delvaux.
In 1935, he was commissioned to create a sculpture for the rose garden at the Exposition universelle et internationale. Two years later Henry Van de Velde asked him for a work for the Belgian pavilion of the Exposition internationale, 1937. In the nineteen-fifties Grard, still in full possession of his mature powers, received repeated public commissions: the Seated Figure at the Banque Nationale, Brussels (1950), La Mer, fronting the post office at Ostend (1955, illustration), the Naïade at Tournai (1950), and Earth and Water, near the Albert Bridge at Liège (1964).
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Georges Lemaître
Monsignor Georges Henri Joseph Édouard Lemaître ( lemaitre.ogg (help·info) 17 July 1894 – 20 June 1966) was a Belgian priest, astronomer and professor of physics at the Catholic University of Leuven. He was the first person to propose the theory of the expansion of the Universe, widely misattributed to Edwin Hubble. He was also the first to derive what is now known as the Hubble's law and made the first estimation of what is now called the Hubble constant which he published in 1927, two years before Hubble's article. Lemaître also proposed what became known as the Big Bang theory of the origin of the Universe, which he called his 'hypothesis of the primeval atom'. As he was a secular priest, he was called Abbé, then, after being made a canon, Monseigneur.
After a classical education at a Jesuit secondary school (Collège du Sacré-Coeur, Charleroi), Lemaître began studying civil engineering at the Catholic University of Leuven at the age of 17. In 1914, he interrupted his studies to serve as an artillery officer in the Belgian army for the duration of World War I. At the end of hostilities, he received the Belgian War Cross with palms.
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Georges Simenon
Georges Joseph Christian Simenon (French pronunciation: [ʒɔʁʒ simˈnɔ̃]) 13 February 1903 – 4 September 1989) was a Belgian writer. A prolific author who published nearly 200 novels and numerous short works, Simenon is best known as the creator of the fictional detective Jules Maigret.
Georges Simenon was born at 26 rue Léopold (now number 24) in Liège to Désiré Simenon and his wife Henriette. Désiré Simenon worked in an accounting office at an insurance company and had married Henriette in April 1902. Although Georges Simenon was born on 13 February 1903 superstition resulted in his birth being registered as having been on the 12th. This story of his birth is recounted at the beginning of his novel Pedigree.
The Simenon family traces its origins back to the Limburg region, his mother's family being from Dutch Limburg. One of her more notorious ancestors was Gabriel Brühl, a criminal who preyed on Limburg from the 1720s until he was hanged in 1743. Later, Simenon would use Brühl as one of his many pen names.
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Germanic peoples
The Germanic peoples (also called Teutonic or Gothic in older literature) are an Indo-European ethno-linguistic group of Northern European origin, identified by their use of the Germanic languages which diversified out of Proto-Germanic during the Pre-Roman Iron Age.
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Gilles Binchois
Gilles de Binche (called Binchois), also known as Gilles de Bins (ca. 1400 – 20 September 1460), was a Franco-Flemish composer, one of the earliest members of the Burgundian School, and one of the three most famous composers of the early 15th century. While often ranked behind his contemporaries Guillaume Dufay and John Dunstaple, at least by contemporary scholars, his influence was arguably greater than either, since his works were cited, borrowed and used as source material more often than those by any other composer of the time.
Binchois was probably from Mons, the son of Jean and Johanna de Binche, who may have been from the nearby town of Binche. His father was a councillor to Duke Guillaume IV of Hainault, and also had a position in a church in Mons. Nothing is known about Gilles until 1419, when he became organist at the church of Ste. Waudru in Mons. In 1423 went to live in Lille. Around this time he may have been a soldier in the service of the Burgundians, or perhaps the English Earl of Suffolk, as indicated by a line in the memorial motet written on his death by Ockeghem.
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Guillaume Dufay
Guillaume Dufay (Du Fay, Du Fayt) (August 5, 1397? – November 27, 1474) was a Franco-Flemish composer of the early Renaissance. As the central figure in the Burgundian School, he was the most famous and influential composer in Europe in the mid-15th century.
From the evidence of his will, he was probably born in Beersel, in the vicinity of Brussels. Circumstantial evidence claims him to have been born the illegitimate child of an unknown priest and a woman named Marie Du Fayt, though this suggestion is as of yet unproven. Marie moved with her son to Cambrai early in his life, staying with a relative who was a canon of the cathedral there. Soon Dufay's musical gifts were noticed by the cathedral authorities, who evidently gave him a thorough training in music; he studied with Rogier de Hesdin during the summer of 1409, and he was listed as a choirboy in the cathedral from 1409 to 1412. During those years he studied with Nicolas Malin, and the authorities must have been impressed with the boy's gifts because they gave him his own copy of Villedieu’s Doctrinale in 1411, a highly unusual event for one so young. In June 1414, at the age of only 16, he had already been given a benefice as chaplain at St. Géry, immediately adjacent to Cambrai. Later that year he probably went to the Council of Konstanz, staying possibly until 1418, at which time he returned to Cambrai.
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Guillaume Lekeu
Guillaume Lekeu (January 20, 1870 – January 21, 1894) was a Belgian composer of classical music.
Lekeu, who was born in Verviers, Belgium, took his first lessons at the conservatoire in that city. In 1879, his parents moved to Poitiers, France. There, he finished school while he continued his music studies autodidactically. At the age of 15, he composed his first piece.
In 1888, his family settled down in Paris where Lekeu became a student of César Franck. After Franck's death, Vincent d'Indy became his new teacher. He obtained in 1891 a second prize in the Belgian Prix de Rome for his cantata Andromède.
The famous violin virtuoso Eugène Ysaÿe, who had been friendly with Franck, asked Lekeu to write for him a violin sonata. Ysaÿe played this composition for the first time in March 1893, and it remains Lekeu's most popular piece. At the age of 23, Lekeu fell ill with typhoid fever and died in Angers only one day after his 24th birthday. He was buried in a suburb of Verviers.
Lekeu composed about 50 works. Several of them have been recorded a number of times, notably the violin sonata. His style shows influences of Franck, Wagner and Beethoven, though he was never a mere imitator of those masters. He used cyclic principles; that is to say, themes in his works will often recur from movement to movement, as they do in a good many of Franck's and d'Indy's compositions. In general, Lekeu is regarded as a highly talented composer who died far too young.
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Henri Pousseur
Henri Pousseur (23 June 1929, Malmedy – 6 March 2009, Brussels) was a Belgian composer.
Pousseur studied at the Academies of Music in Liège and in Brussels from 1947 to 1953. He was closely associated with Pierre Froidebise and André Souris. He encountered Pierre Boulez, Karlheinz Stockhausen and Luciano Berio and thereafter devoted himself to avant-garde research.
In 1954 he married Théa Schoonbrood with whom he had four children: Isabelle (1957), Denis (1958), Marianne (1961), and Hélène (1965).
Beginning around 1960, he collaborated with Michel Butor on a number of projects, most notably the opera Votre Faust (1961–68).
Pousseur taught in Cologne, Basel, and in the United States at SUNY Buffalo, as well as in his native Belgium. From 1970 until his retirement in 1988 he taught at the University and Conservatory of Liège where he also founded the Centre de recherches et de formation musicales de Wallonie. He died aged 79, on the morning of 6 March 2009, of bronchial pneumonia (Machart 2009).
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Henri Storck
Henri Storck (1907, Ostend – 17 September 1999) was a Belgian author, film-maker and documentarist.
In 1933, he directed, with Joris Ivens, Misère au Borinage, a film about the miners in the Borinage area. In 1938, with Andre Thirifays and Pierre Vermeylen, he founded the Cinémathèque Royale de Belgique (Royal Belgian Film Archive). He was an actor in two key films of the history of the cinema: Jean Vigo's Zéro de conduite (1933) in the role of the priest, and Chantal Akerman's Jeanne Dielman, 23 Quay Commercial, 1080 Brussels (1976) in the role of a customer of the prostitute.
Jacqueline Aubenas wrote about him, in her expository work, It's been going on for 100 years: a history of the francophone cinema of Belgium: "There emerges forcefully the personality of a cineaste who is not a militant in the sense that this term had in the 1930s for Soviet directors who held an ideology, but in the sense of a generous man who will never choose the wrong side and who will be, in ethics as well as in esthetics, in the first line of battle".
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Henri Vieuxtemps
Henri François Joseph Vieuxtemps (French pronunciation: [ɑ̃ʁi fʁɑ̃swa ʒɔzɛf vjøtɑ̃ ]) (17 February 1820 – 6 June 1881) was a Belgian composer and violinist. He occupies an important place in the history of the violin as a prominent exponent of the Franco-Belgian violin school during the mid-19th century.
Vieuxtemps was born in Verviers, Belgium, son of a weaver and amateur violinist and violin-maker. He received his first violin instruction from his father and a local teacher and gave his first public performance at the age of six, playing a concerto by Pierre Rode. Soon he was giving concerts in various surrounding cities, including Liège and Brussels where he met the violinist Charles Auguste de Bériot, with whom he began studies. In 1829, Bériot took him to Paris where he made a successful concert debut, again with a concerto by Rode, but he had to return the next year because of the July Revolution and Bériot's marriage to his mistress Maria Malibran and departure on concert tour. Back in Brussels, Vieuxtemps continued developing his violin technique on his own, his musicianship deepened by playing with the deeply musical mezzo-soprano Pauline Viardot, Malibran's sister. A tour of Germany in 1833 brought friendship with Louis Spohr and with Robert Schumann, who compared the boy to Niccolò Paganini. During the following decade he visited various European cities, impressing with his virtuosity not only audiences but also famous musicians such as Hector Berlioz and Paganini himself, whom he encountered at his London debut in 1834.
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Henry van de Velde
Henry Clemens Van de Velde (Dutch pronunciation: [ɑ̃ˈʁi vɑndəˈvɛldə]) (3 April 1863, Antwerp – 15 October 1957, Zürich) was a Belgian Flemish painter, architect and interior designer. Together with Victor Horta and Paul Hankar he could be considered one of the main founders and representatives of Art Nouveau in Belgium. Van de Velde spent the most important part of his career in Germany and had a decisive influence on German architecture and design at the beginning of the 20th century.
Van de Velde studied painting in Antwerp, under Charles Verlat and in Paris under Carolus-Duran. As a young painter he was thoroughly influenced by Paul Signac and Georges Seurat and soon adopted a neo-impressionist style. In 1889 he became a member of the Brussels-based artist group "Les XX". After Vincent Van Gogh exhibited some work on the yearly exhibition of Les XX van de Velde became one of the first artists to be influenced by the Dutch painter. During this period he developed a lasting friendship with the painter Théo van Rysselberghe and the sculptor Constantin Meunier.
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Herri met de Bles
Herri met de Bles (also known as Herri de Dinant, Herry de Patinir, and Civetta) (c. 1510 – c. 1555–1560) was a Flemish Northern Renaissance and Mannerist landscape painter. He is also defined as a ’’Mosan landscape painter active during the second third of the 16th century (i.e., second generation of landscape painters).’’
Very little is positively known about the artist. He is believed to be a certain Herry de Patenir who joined Antwerp's Guild of St. Luke in 1535 as a painter and is also believed to be a court painter for the d'Este Dukes of Ferrara, where he ended his career known as "Il Civetta". He contributed, along with his possible-uncle Joachim Patinir, to a distinct style of Northern Renaissance landscape painting that combined small history or religious scenes into compositions defined by perspective and atmospheric effects. Also, along with a group of Antwerp-based followers of Hieronymus Bosch that included Jan Mandyn, Pieter Huys, and Jan Wellens de Cock, Met de Bles continued the tradition of fantastic imagery into northern Mannerism.
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Hervé Hasquin
Hervé Hasquin (born 31 December 1942, Charleroi) is a Belgian university professor, historian and politician.
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Jacques Daret
Jacques Daret (c. 1404 - c. 1470) was an Early Netherlandish painter born in Tournai (now in Belgium), where he would spend much of his life. Daret spent 15 years as a pupil in the studio of Robert Campin, alongside Rogier or Rogelet de le Pasture (assumed by scholars to be Rogier van der Weyden, both words meaning "field" or "meadow" in French and Dutch respectively), and afterwards became a master in his own right. He became a favorite of the Burgundian court, and his patron for 20 years was the abbot of St. Vaast in Arras, Jean de Clercq.
Though many works of Daret are mentioned in Jean de Clercq's account books, only four panels of Daret's works are known to have survived: all are from the so-called Arras Altarpiece or Saint-Vaast Altarpiece, painted for the abbot between 1433 and 1435. These paintings show a striking resemblance to the Flemish realism of the Master of Flémalle. This is argued by most scholars to be evidence that the Master of Flémalle was Daret's master, Robert Campin.
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Jacques du Broeucq
Jacques du Broeucq (1505 ?, Mons ? – 1584, Mons) was a sculptor and architect from Southern Netherlands.
Jacques du Broeucq is perhaps best known as the teacher of Giambologna in Antwerp.
Du Broeucq rebuilt the castle of Binche south of Brussels for Queen Mary of Hungary, governess of the Spanish Netherlands, in 1545-49; Binche, the center of Mary's patronage, was intended to rival Fontainebleau; it was demolished by the soldiers of Henry II of France in 1554.
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Jean Del Cour
Jean Delcour, or Del Cour (Hamoir 1627-1707), was a Flemish Baroque sculptor from Liège.
At the age of 15 he became a sculpture pupil in Liege of the monk Arnold Henrard. After this training he traveled to Rome and became a pupil of Gian Lorenzo Bernini. He was also influenced by Ercole Ferrata. In 1661 he returned to Liege where he started a workshop on the street Soeurs-de-Hasques. He sculpted wood, marble, and ivory for the wealthy leaders of the Prince-Bishopric of Liège.
An altar from his hand in Cararra marble is now in the Virga Jesse Basilica that was originally commissioned for Herkenrode Abbey by the abbess there, Anna Catharina de Lamboy. He also made the mausoleum van Allamont in the Saint Bavo Cathedral in Ghent.
His only pupil, Jean Hans, never left his service and stayed with him until he died.
Monument to Del Cour on Place Saint-Paul, Liege
St Hubertus sculpture, 1689, Sint-Jacobskerk, Liege
St James sculpture, 1691, Sint-Jacobskerk, Liege
John the Baptist, 1682, Sint-Pauluskathedraal, Liege
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Jean Froissart
Jean Froissart (c. 1337 – c. 1405), often referred to in English as John Froissart, was a medieval French chronicle writer. For centuries, Froissart's Chronicles have been recognized as the chief expression of the chivalric revival of the 14th century Kingdom of England and France. His history is also an important source for the first half of the Hundred Years' War.
Little is known of Froissart's life and what is known comes mainly from his chronicle and his poems. Froissart originated from Valenciennes, Hainaut, and his writings suggest his father was a painter of armorial bearings. Froissart began working as a merchant but soon gave that up to become a clerk. By about age 24, he had gained distinction and carried with him a letter of recommendation from Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor, (who was also the King of Bohemia) when he became a court poet and a an official historian to Philippa of Hainault, queen consort of Edward III of England.
The memoirs of his time in Philippa's service, between 1361 and 1369, were later put together with reports of other events he had witnessed, in his Chroniques ("Chronicles"). He took a serious approach to his work:
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Jean Stengers
Jean Stengers (1922 – 15 August 2002) was a Belgian historian.
A precocious and brilliant student, Stengers entered the Free University of Brussels in 1939, at the age of 17. He published his first scholarly article two years later in the Belgian Review of Philology and History. In 1948, he presented his doctoral thesis under the direction of Professor Bonenfant on the historical bases of the national sentiments of Belgium.
"From this time," said the historian Ginette Kurgan, "the astonishing eclecticism of his interests is manifest, reinforced by a rigour of approach stimulated by his training as a medievalist." From 1949 he taught colonial history as assistant to professor Franz Van Kalke, and in 1951 he took over Van Kalken's entire curriculum in modern history.
Stengers was promoted to professeur ordinaire in 1954. He helped found the Institute of the History of Christianity, and in 1967 succeeded Guillaume Jacquemyns as director of the seminar of contemporary history. Though his interests were wide-ranging, his scholarly reputation was built on his treatment of the Belgian colonial history. His work Congo, Mythes et réalités was published in 1989.
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Joachim Patinir
Joachim Patinir, also called de Patiner (c. 1480 – 5 October 1524), was a Flemish Northern Renaissance history and landscape painter from the area of modern Wallonia. He was probably the uncle of Herri met de Bles, his follower in establishing a distinct style of panoramic northern Renaissance landscapes.
Originally from Dinant or Bouvignes in present-day Belgium, Patinir became registered as a member of Antwerp's painters’ guild Guild of Saint Luke in 1515, where he spent the rest of his life. He may have studied with Gerard David at Bruges, who had been registered as a guild member in the same year as Patinir. In 1511, Patinir is believed to have travelled to Genoa with David and Adrien Ysenbrandt.
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Johannes Brassart
Johannes Brassart (also Jean Brasart) (c. 1400 – before 22 October 1455) was a Burgundian composer of the early Renaissance. Of his output, only sacred vocal music has survived, and it typifies early 15th century practice.
He most likely was born in the town of Lauw near Tongeren in the province of Limburg, though the date is only known approximately. From 1422 to 1431 he was at the church of St. Jean l'Evangéliste in Liège, where he was a succentor. In the mid 1420s he visited Rome, moving there in 1431, where he was employed in the papal chapel as a singer and probably as a composer as well; he was in the choir at the same time as composers Arnold de Lantins and Guillaume Dufay. During this period Brassart most likely composed the motet O flos fragrans, which was popular enough to appear in several manuscripts of the time, as well as Te dignitas presularis.
In 1432 Brassart went to Basle, where he was a singer at the Council chapel, and two years later Emperor Sigismund employed him as rector of the chapel, a post which he retained until 1443. In 1445 he moved to Liège, where he had a post at the collegiate church of St. Paul. A notice of 22 October 1455 of a supplication for his benefice there indicates he had recently died.
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Johannes Ciconia
Johannes Ciconia (c. 1370 – between 10 June and 13 July 1412) was a Flemish composer and music theorist of the late Middle Ages who worked most of his adult life in Italy, particularly in the service of the Papal Chapels and at the cathedral of Padua.
Ciconia was born in Liège, the son of a priest also named Johannes Ciconia and a woman of high standing. The composer had the same name as at least three other men around Liège, and this has created confusion about his biography. A Johannes Ciconia, probably the composer's father, worked in Avignon in 1350 as a clerk for the wife of the nephew of Pope Clement VI. Another Johannes Ciconia is recorded in Liège in 1385 as a duodenus, generally a person of young age; scholars agree that this is the composer himself.
Papal records suggest that Ciconia was in the service of Pope Boniface IX in Rome in 1391. His whereabouts between the early 1390s and 1401 are unknown. From this time until his death in 1412, he remained connected with the cathedral of Padua. It is unclear whether he arrived in Padua earlier than 1401. His lament, Con lagrime bagnadome, is described in one source as written for the death of Francesco of Carrara. If this refers to Francesco il Nuovo, then it would date from after 1406. If, however, it was written for the death of Francesco il Vecchio, as scholars have assumed, then it would place him in Padua by 1393. The possibility of an intermediate stay in Pavia has also been suggested by Nádas and Ziino, on the grounds that this is where he would have formed his connection with the House of Visconti and acquired knowledge of the ars subtilior style and the compositions of Philipoctus de Caserta quoted in his Sus un fontayne (see below).
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Jules Bordet
Jules Jean Baptiste Vincent Bordet (13 June 1870 – 6 April 1961) was a Belgian immunologist and microbiologist. The bacterial genus Bordetella is named after him.
Bordet was born at Soignies, Belgium. He graduated in the year 1892 as Doctor of Medicine at the Université Libre de Bruxelles (Brussels, Belgium) and began his work at the Pasteur Institute in Paris in 1894, where, in the laboratory of Elie Metchnikoff, he described phagocytosis of bacteria by white blood cells. In 1898 he described hemolysis evoked by exposure of blood serum to foreign blood cells.
In 1900, he left Paris to found the Pasteur Institute in Brussels, and made his discovery that the bacteriolytic effect of acquired specific antibody is significantly enhanced in vivo by the presence of innate serum components which he termed alexine (but which are now known as complement). This mechanism became the basis for complement-fixation testing methods that enabled the development of serological tests for syphilis (specifically, the development of the Wassermann test by August von Wassermann). The same technique is used today in serologic testing for countless other diseases.
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Julius Caesar
Gaius Julius Caesar (Classical Latin: [ˈɡaː.i.ʊs ˈjuː.lɪ.ʊs ˈkaj.sar], July 100 BC – 15 March 44 BC) was a Roman general and statesman and a distinguished writer of Latin prose. He played a critical role in the gradual transformation of the Roman Republic into the Roman Empire.
In 60 BC, Caesar, Crassus and Pompey formed a political alliance that was to dominate Roman politics for several years. Their attempts to amass power through populist tactics were opposed by the conservative elite within the Roman Senate[citation needed], among them Cato the Younger with the frequent support of Cicero. Caesar's conquest of Gaul, completed by 51 BC, extended Rome's territory to the English Channel and the Rhine. Caesar became the first Roman general to cross both when he built a bridge across the Rhine and conducted the first invasion of Britain.
These achievements granted him unmatched military power and threatened to eclipse Pompey's standing. The balance of power was further upset by the death of Crassus in 53 BC. Political realignments in Rome finally led to a standoff between Caesar and Pompey, the latter having taken up the cause of the Senate. Ordered by the Senate to stand trial in Rome for various charges, Caesar marched on Rome with one legion—legio XIII—from Gaul to Italy, crossing the Rubicon in 49 BC. This sparked a civil war from which he emerged as the unrivaled leader of the Roman world.
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Lambert Lombard
Lambert Lombard (Liège, 1505 – 1566) was a Renaissance painter, architect and theorist for the Prince-Bishopric of Liège. During his career he worked for Jan Gossaert in Middelburg and trained Frans Floris. In 1532 he became court painter and architect in Liège. A few paintings and many drawings have been preserved.
In 1537 he was sent to Rome by Erard de la Marck, prince-bishop of Liège, to buy works of art, and he discovered the wonders of the Italian Renaissance. On his return he brought not only works of art, but also the new ideas concerning art and the position of the artist, to Liège.
Dominicus Lampsonius wrote a biography of Lombard, The Life of Lambert Lombard.
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Léon Mignon
Léon Mignon (Liège 1847 — Schaerbeek 1898) was a Belgian sculptor working in a realist idiom, known for his depiction of bulls.
Born at Liège, Léon Mignon completed his studies at the Académie royale des Beaux-Arts de Liège in 1871. He made his first showing at the Salon of Ghent, and obtained a fellowship from the Fondation Darchis for further study in Italy.
He set up his studio in Paris in 1876 in collaboration with Paul de Vigne, then settled permanently at Schaerbeek. He won a gold medal at the Paris Salon for his sculpture Li Tore, the Bull-Tamer (illustration) which provoked polemics from critics for its combination of nudity with forthright realism.
Li Tore, set up at Liège, became the mascot of the students, who hid it in the cellars of the Académie to protect it during World War II. The bull has become an emblem for all Liège, with the city motto "Liège, forcer l’avenir!", "Liège, make the future happen!"
A bronze on a similar theme, his Le Dompteur de Taureaux (1881), which had been noticed at the retrospective exhibition of Belgian sculpture the previous year (in its plaster model), and was championed by Gustave Rolin-Jaequemyns, Minister of the Interior, stands on the Terrasses d'Avroy, Liège. Though a scarf had been added to the model to disguise the figure's nudity, the sculpture scandalised the editors of the Catholic daily, La Gazette de Liège.
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Michel Butor
Michel Butor (French pronunciation: [miʃɛl byˈtɔʁ]; born 14 September 1926) is a French writer.
Michel Marie François Butor was born in Mons-en-Barœul. He studied philosophy at the Sorbonne, graduating in 1947. He has taught in Egypt, Manchester, Salonika, the United States, and Geneva. He has won many literary awards for his work, including the Prix Apollo, the Prix Fénéon and the Prix Renaudot.
Journalists and critics associated his novels with the nouveau roman, but Butor himself has long resisted that association. The main point of similarity is a very general one, not much beyond that; like exponents of the nouveau roman, he can be described as an experimental writer. His best-known novel, La Modification, for instance, is written entirely in the second person.[citation needed] In his 1967 La critique et l'invention, he famously said that even the most literal quotation is already a kind of parody because of its "trans-contextualization."
For decades now, he has chosen to work in other forms, from essays to poetry to artist's books to unclassifiable works like Mobile. Literature, painting and travel are subjects particularly dear to Butor. Part of the fascination of his writing is the way it combines the rigorous symmetries that led Roland Barthes to praise him as an epitome of structuralism (exemplified, for instance, by the architectural scheme of Passage de Milan or the calendrical structure of L'emploi du temps) with a lyrical sensibility more akin to Baudelaire than to Robbe-Grillet.
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Noël Godin
Noël Godin (born 13 September 1945) is a Belgian writer, critic, actor and notorious cream pie flinger or entarteur. Godin gained global attention in 1998 when his group ambushed Microsoft CEO Bill Gates in Brussels, pelting the software magnate with cream pies. After bombarding Gates, Godin allegedly said, "My work is done here."
Godin claims his goal has long been to "entarte" as many people like Gates as possible - people he feels are particularly self-important and lacking a sense of humor. Godin told The New York Times he chooses "to function in the service of the capitalist status quo, without really using his intelligence or his imagination." He says his sworn enemies are "authority, depressing laws, the return of the moral order, nuclear power, any form of political power."
Since 1969, when Godin planted a cream pie on the face of the French novelist Marguerite Duras, he has cream-pied dozens more, including choreographer Maurice Béjart, France's best-known television anchorman Patrick Poivre d'Arvor, French president Nicolas Sarkozy and film maker Jean-Luc Godard.
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Orlande de Lassus
Orlande de Lassus (also Orlandus Lassus, Orlando di Lasso, Roland de Lassus, or Roland Delattre) (1532 (possibly 1530) – 14 June 1594) was a Franco-Flemish composer of the late Renaissance. He is today considered to be the chief representative of the mature polyphonic style of the Franco-Flemish school, and one of the three most famous and influential musicians in Europe at the end of the 16th century (the other two being Palestrina and Victoria).
Lassus was born in Mons in the County of Hainaut (modern day Belgium). Information about his early years is scanty, although some uncorroborated stories have survived, the most famous of which is that he was kidnapped three times because of the singular beauty of his singing voice. At the age of twelve, he left the Low Countries with Ferrante Gonzaga and went to Mantua, Sicily, and later Milan (from 1547 to 1549). While in Milan, he made the acquaintance of the madrigalist Spirito l'Hoste da Reggio, a formative influence on his early musical style.
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Paul Delvaux
Paul Delvaux (23 September 1897 – 20 July 1994) was a Belgian painter, associated with Surrealism, famous for his paintings of female nudes.
Delvaux was born in Antheit in the Belgian province of Liège, the son of a lawyer. The young Delvaux took music lessons, studied Greek and Latin, and absorbed the fiction of Jules Verne and the poetry of Homer. All of his work was to be influenced by these readings, starting with his earliest drawings showing mythological scenes. He studied at the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts in Brussels, albeit in the architecture department owing to his parents' disapproval of his ambition to be a painter. Nevertheless, he pursued his goal, attending painting classes taught by Constant Montald and Jean Delville. The painters Frans Courtens and Alfred Bastien also encouraged Delvaux, whose works from this period were primarily naturalistic landscapes. He completed some 80 paintings between 1920 and 1925, which was the year of his first solo exhibition.
Delvaux's paintings of the late 1920s and early 1930s, which feature nudes in landscapes, are strongly influenced by such Flemish Expressionists as Constant Permeke and Gustave De Smet. A change of style around 1933 reflects the influence of the metaphysical art of Giorgio de Chirico, which he had first encountered in 1926 or 1927. In the early 1930s Delvaux found further inspiration in visits to the Brussels Fair, where the Spitzner Museum, a museum of medical curiosities, maintained a booth in which skeletons and a mechanical Venus figure were displayed in a window with red velvet curtains. This spectacle captivated Delvaux, supplying him with motifs that would appear throughout his subsequent work. In the mid-1930s he also began to adopt some of the motifs of his fellow Belgian René Magritte, as well as that painter's deadpan style in rendering the most unexpected juxtapositions of otherwise ordinary objects.
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Paul Hankar
Paul Hankar (11 December 1859 - 17 January 1901) was a Belgian architect and designer who, along with Victor Horta and Henry Van de Velde, is considered one of the principal architects to work in the Art Nouveau style in Brussels at the turn of the twentieth century.
Hankar was born at Frameries. He began his career as a sculptor. He studied at the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts in Brussels, where he met a fellow student named Victor Horta, with whom he became fast friends. Like Horta, Hankar studied closely the techniques of forged iron which he would later use in many of his projects.
In 1888, Hankar began his activity as an architect and furniture designer in Brussels and collaborated with the interior designer Adolphe Crespin. One well-known poster by Crespin from about 1893 advertises Hankar's practice on the rue Defacqz in Brussels. He then was commissioned to design the Palacio de Chávarri in Bilbao, Spain, which was constructed for the businessman Víctor Chávarri in 1889.
Five years later, in 1893, he built his own house, which along with Victor Horta's Hôtel Tassel (constructed at the same time) is considered one of the first two houses in the world built in the Art Nouveau style.
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Pierre Paulus
Baron Pierre Paulus de Châtelet (16 March 1881 in Châtelet – 17 August 1959 in Brussels) was a Walloon expressionist painter, most known as the designer of "the bold rooster" (French: le coq hardi) adopted on 3 July 1913 by the Walloon Assembly for the flag of Wallonia.
He gained notability during the Wallon Art Exposition of Charleroi in 1911 and, in the interwar period, he made several exhibitions in Europe and in the USA.
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Pierre Renoir
Pierre Renoir (21 March 1885–11 March 1952) was a French stage and film actor and served briefly as the director of the Théâtre de l'Athénée in Paris, taking over after the death of Louis Jouvet in 1951.
He was the elder brother of the Academy Award winning film director Jean Renoir and son of impressionist painter Pierre-Auguste Renoir.
Pierre Renoir was born on March 21, 1885 in Paris, on 18 rue Houdon, about a hundred meters from place Pigalle, to painter Pierre-Auguste Renoir.
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Raymond Queneau
Raymond Queneau (French pronunciation: [ʁɛ'mɔ̃ kə'no]; 21 February 1903 – 25 October 1976) was a French poet and novelist and the co-founder of Ouvroir de littérature potentielle (Oulipo).
Born in Le Havre, Seine-Maritime, Queneau was the only child of Auguste Queneau and Joséphine Mignot. He received his first baccalauréat in 1919 for Latin and Greek, and a second in 1920 for philosophy, then studied at the Sorbonne (1921–1923) where he was a fair student of both letters and mathematics, graduating with certificates in philosophy and psychology.
Queneau performed military service as a zouave in Algeria and Morocco during the years 1925–1926. He was drafted in 1939 after Germany's invasion of Poland, but he was demobilized in 1940. Through the remainder of World War II, he and his family lived with the painter Élie Lascaux in Saint-Léonard-de-Noblat.
He married Janine Kahn in 1928, with whom he had a son, Jean-Marie, in 1934. They remained married until Janine's death in 1972.
Queneau spent much of his life working for the Gallimard publishing house, where he began as a reader in 1938. He later rose to be general secretary, and eventually became director of l'Encyclopédie de la Pléiade in 1956. During some of this time, he also taught at l'École Nouvelle de Neuilly. He entered the Collège de ‘Pataphysique in 1950, where he became Satrap.
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Renier de Huy
Renier de Huy (or Rainer of Huy) (also Reiner, van, etc in any combination) was a 12th century metalworker and sculptor to whom is attributed a major masterpiece of Mosan art, the baptismal font at St Bartholomew's Church, Liège in Liege, Belgium of 1107–18. The Meuse River valley in modern Belgium and France, roughly comprising the Diocese of Liège, was the leading 12th century centre of Romanesque metalwork, which was still the most prestigious medium in art. Nothing is known of Rainer's life other than that a "Reinerus aurifaber" witnessed a charter of the Bishop of Liège relating to a church in Huy in 1125, but the 15th century Liège chronicle mentions him as the artist of the font. He may have died about 1150. Another equally shadowy figure in Mosan metalwork from the next generation, Godefroid de Huy/de Claire, also came from the small but prosperous city of Huy on the Meuse.
The only other work generally agreed to be by the same master as the font is a small bronze crucifix figure (Schnütgen Museum, Cologne); another in Brussels is probably from the same mould, with extra chasing. Others in Brussels and Dublin are probably from the workshop as they have many similarities.
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Rennequin Sualem
Rennequin Sualem was a Walloon carpenter and engineer (Jemeppe-sur-Meuse (Walloon Country) 1645 - Bougival (France 1708 ).
In 1667-1668 Lieutenant-Governor of the castle of Huy ordered the building of an hydraulic machine in order to pump up the water of the Hoyoux to his Castle in Modave 50 m higher. Rennequin Sualem was commissionned to build the mechanism.
This mechanism is the model of the huge Machine de Marly which lifted the waters from the Seine to the palace of Louis XIV in Versailles, in this case 150 m higher. Rennequin built also a pump for the coalmine of Decize. The originality of the Rennequin's performance in Versailles was a transfer of a Walloon technology with a change of size which let reach it to its limits... Rennequin died in Bougival, at the machine, in 1708.
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René Magritte
René François Ghislain Magritte (21 November 1898 – 15 August 1967) was a Belgian surrealist artist. He became well known for a number of witty and thought-provoking images that fell under the umbrella of surrealism. His work challenges observers' preconditioned perceptions of reality.
Magritte was born in Lessines, in the province of Hainaut, in 1898, the eldest son of Léopold Magritte, who was a tailor and textile merchant, and Régina (née Bertinchamps), a milliner until her marriage. Little is known about Magritte's early life. He began lessons in drawing in 1910. On 12 March 1912, his mother committed suicide by drowning herself in the River Sambre. This was not her first attempt at taking her own life; she had made many over a number of years, driving her husband Léopold to lock her into her bedroom. One day she escaped, and was missing for days. She was later discovered a mile or so down the nearby river, dead. According to a legend, 13-year-old Magritte was present when her body was retrieved from the water, but recent research has discredited this story, which may have originated with the family nurse. Supposedly, when his mother was found, her dress was covering her face, an image that has been suggested as the source of several of Magritte's paintings in 1927–1928 of people with cloth obscuring their faces, including Les Amants.
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Robert Campin
Robert Campin (c. 1375 – 26 April 1444), now usually identified as the artist known as the Master of Flémalle, is usually considered the first great master of Flemish and Early Netherlandish painting. This had been a matter of controversy for decades; Campin's life is relatively well documented for the period, but no works in assessable condition could be securely connected with him, whilst a corpus of work had been attached to the unidentified "Master of Flémalle", named after the supposed origin of a work.
Campin first appears as settled in Tournai from the archives of 1405-6, as a free master of the guild of painters, and there has been a lot of speculation about his origin and birthplace which is actually unknown. However, in 1410 he bought citizenship, which suggests he was not born there. He eventually attained the office of dean of the guild, and wardenship of a church and other civic offices, and was running a large workshop. By 1432, however, he lost his civic positions because of scandals, and probably his role in political disturbances in the city. In 1429 he was found guilty of withholding evidence, and sentenced to go on a pilgrimage, and in 1432 was convicted of adultery and banished for a year. Margaret of Burgundy, wife of the Count of Holland and sister of John the Fearless, Duke of Burgundy intervened on his behalf, and this was reduced to a fine. The dated Werl Altarpiece (1438) shows he continued to work (the two outer wings are in the Prado; the main panel is lost).
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Rudy Demotte
Rudy W.G. Demotte (born 3 June 1963 in Ronse) is a Belgian socialist politician and present Minister-President of Wallonia since 19 July 2007, replacing Elio Di Rupo, one month after an historical defeat of the socialists in the federal election. On 20 March 2008, he was also appointed Minister-President of the French Community, replacing Marie Arena.
Of mixed Flemish and Walloon ascent, Rudy Demotte is one of the few Walloon politicians to be perfectly bilingual in French and Dutch.
From 1988 to 1990 he served on the cabinet of the Minister of Social Affairs. He was first elected to the Belgian House of Representatives in 1995 and was reflected in 1999 and 2003. In 1999, he became the federal Minister for Economic Affairs and Scientific Research. In 2002, he became the Minister for Budget, Culture and Sport of the French Community of Belgium. From July 2003 to 2007, he became Minister for Social Affairs and Public Health in the federal government.
Having served as a council member from 1994 on, he became mayor of Flobecq in 2000.
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Rémy Belvaux
Rémy Nicolas Lucien Belvaux (10 November 1966,Namur, Belgium – 4 September 2006, Orry-la-Ville, France) was a Belgian actor, director, producer and screenwriter. He was the brother of Lucas Belvaux, also an actor and film director, and of Bruno Belvaux, a theater director.
In 1992, he was with André Bonzel and Benoît Poelvoorde, director, producer and actor of the feature film Man Bites Dog. This film, which was his most famous movie, and originally titled "C'est arrivé près de chez vous" (translated as: "It happened in your neighborhood") (1992), is about a camera crew filming a documentary about the life of a serial killer. Belvaux plays one of the journalists. The film won the Special Jury Prize for Belvaux and Bonzel at the 5th Yubari International Fantastic Film Festival in February 1994.
He committed suicide on 4 September 2006.
On 4 February 1998 he was one of the four people (including Noël Godin and Jan Bucquoy), one of which who threw a cream pie in the face of the American businessman and Microsoft founder, Bill Gates, during Gates' visit to Brussels.
wn.com/Rémy_Belvaux -
Saint George
Saint George (c. 275/281 – 23 April 303) was, according to tradition, a Roman soldier from Syria Palaestina and a soldier in the Guard of Diocletian, who is venerated as a Christian martyr. In hagiography Saint George is one of the most venerated saints in the Catholic (Western and Eastern Rites), Anglican, Eastern Orthodox, and the Oriental Orthodox churches. He is immortalized in the tale of Saint George and the Dragon and is one of the Fourteen Holy Helpers. His memorial is celebrated on 23 April, and he is regarded as one of the most prominent military saints.
Many Patronages of Saint George exist around the world, including: Georgia, England, Egypt, Bulgaria, Aragon, Catalonia, Romania, Ethiopia, Greece, India, Iraq, Lithuania, Palestine, Portugal, Serbia, Ukraine and Russia, as well as the cities of Genoa, Amersfoort, Beirut, Botoşani, Drobeta Turnu-Severin, Timişoara, Fakiha, Bteghrine, Cáceres, Ferrara, Freiburg, Kragujevac, Kumanovo, Ljubljana, Pérouges, Pomorie, Preston, Qormi, Rio de Janeiro, Lod, Lviv, Barcelona, Moscow, Tamworth and the Maltese island of Gozo, as well as of the Scout Movement and a wide range of professions, organizations and disease sufferers.
wn.com/Saint_George -
Thierry Michel
Thierry Michel (born 13 October 1952) is a Belgian film director, mostly making social and political documentaries. His office and company Les films de la passerelle is located in Liège, where he works with the producer Christine Pireaux. Over a twenty-year period he has made a series of documentaries on different aspects of Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo). Taken together his films provide a unique overview of the social, economic and political life of the country.
Thierry Michel was born in Charleroi in Belgium on 13 October 1952 in an industrial region called "The Black Country". At the age of 16 he began cinema studies at the Institute of broadcast arts in Brussels. While there he experienced the last student upheavals of 1968. He became one of the leaders of an emerging Walloon cinema movement. His 1982 Chronique d'une saison d'acier (Chronicle of a steel season) is set in the mining and steel region of his childhood. This "factional" film, combining fiction and fact, analyzes the rapid decline of the Walloon steel industry that began in 1974 and the way in which this affected the region. His first feature film Hiver 60 (Winter 60) which tells of the 1960–1961 Winter General Strike in Belgium was made in 1982. He was among the signatories of the Manifesto for Walloon culture in 1983.[citation needed] He again combined fiction and fact with his 1985 Hôtel Particulier (Mansion) about the prison system.
wn.com/Thierry_Michel -
Thierry Zéno
Thierry Zéno (born 22 April 1950 in Namur) is a Belgian author-filmmaker. His films include the controversial Vase de Noces (1974), and a documentary ¡Ya basta! Le cri des sans-visage (1995–1997) on the Zapatista rebels of Chiapas, Mexico,
Zéno created a "video" department at the Académie de Dessin et des Arts décoratifs de Molenbeek-Saint-Jean, where he was a teacher from 1985 to 1999 and since 1999 is director.
wn.com/Thierry_Zéno -
Treaty of Verdun
The Treaty of Verdun (Verdun-sur-Meuse, August 843) was a treaty between the three surviving sons of Louis the Pious, the son and successor of Charlemagne, which divided the Carolingian Empire into three kingdoms. It ended the three year long Carolingian Civil War.
When Louis the Pious died in 840, his eldest son, Lothair I, claimed overlordship over his brothers' kingdoms and supported the claim of his nephew Pepin II as king of Aquitaine, a large province in western France. After his brother Louis the German and his half-brother Charles the Bald defeated his forces at the Battle of Fontenay (841) and sealed their alliance with the Oaths of Strasbourg (842), Lothair became willing to negotiate instead of continuing the warfare.
Each of the three brothers was already established in one kingdom: Lothair in Italy, Louis the German in Bavaria, and Charles the Bald in Aquitaine. In the settlement, Lothair (who had been named co-emperor in 817) retained his title as emperor and:
After the death of Lothair in 855, Upper and Lower Burgundy (Arles and Provence) passed to his third son Charles of Provence, and the remaining territory north of the Alps to his second son Lothair II, after whom the hitherto nameless territory was called Lotharingia, which name eventually evolved into the modern Lorraine. Lothair's eldest son, Louis II inherited Italy and his father's claim to the Imperial title.
wn.com/Treaty_of_Verdun -
Victor Horta
Victor, Baron Horta (6 January 1861 - 8 September 1947) was a Belgian architect and designer. John Julius Norwich described him as "undoubtedly the key European Art Nouveau architect." Indeed, Horta is one of the most important names in Art Nouveau architecture; the construction of his Hôtel Tassel in Brussels in 1892-3 means that he is sometimes credited as the first to introduce the style to architecture from the decorative arts. The French architect Hector Guimard was deeply influenced by Horta and further spread the "whiplash" style in France and abroad.
In 1932 King Albert I of Belgium conferred on Horta the title of Baron for his services to architecture. Four of the buildings he designed have been designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Born in Ghent, Horta was first attracted to the architectural profession when he helped his uncle on a building site at the age of twelve.[citation needed]
Horta had had a great interest in music since childhood and, in 1873, went to study musical theory at the Ghent Conservatory. After being expelled for bad behaviour he joined the Department of Architecture at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Ghent instead. In 1878 Horta left for Paris, finding work with architect and designer Jules Debuysson in Montmartre. There he was inspired by the emerging impressionist and pointillist artists, and also by the possibilities of working in iron and glass.
wn.com/Victor_Horta -
Walloons
Walloons (/wɑːˈluːnz/; French: Wallons, IPA: [walɔ̃]; Walloon: Walons) are a French-speaking people who live in Belgium, principally in Wallonia. Walloons are a distinctive community within Belgium. Important historical and anthropological criteria (religion, language, traditions, folklore) bind Walloons to the French people. More generally, the term also refers to the inhabitants of the Walloon Region. They speak regional languages such as Walloon (with Picard in the West and Lorrain in the South).
The term Walloon is derived from *walha, a Proto-Germanic term used to refer to Celtic and Latin speakers.
Walloon originated in Romance languages alongside other related terms, but it supplanted them. Its oldest written trace is found in Jean de Haynin's Mémoires de Jean, sire de Haynin et de Louvignies in 1465, where it refers to Roman populations of the Burgundian Netherlands. Its meaning narrowed yet again during the French and Dutch periods and at Belgian independence the term designated only Belgians speaking a Romance language (French, Walloon, Picard, etc.) The linguistic cleavage in the politics of Belgium adds a political content to «the emotional cultural, and linguistic concept».Walloon also designates the inhabitants of Wallonia — a monolingual French-speaking territory — as opposed to Flemish. The words Walloon and Wallons can be seen in the book of Charles White, The Belgic revolution (1835): "The restless Wallons, with that adventurous daring which is their historical characteristic, abandoned their occupations, and eagerly seizing the pike and the musket marched towards the center of the commotion.". The Spanish term Walon and Walona from XVII Century were referred to a Royal Guard Corps recruited in the Spanish Flanders. They were involved in many of the most significant battles of the Spanish Empire. The French word Wallons in English is also used in the Encyclopædia Britannica.
wn.com/Walloons -
Waltrude
Saint Waltrude (French: Waudru, Dutch: Waldetrudis) (d. April 9, c. 688) is the patron saint of Mons, Belgium, where she is known in French as Sainte Waudru, and of Herentals, Belgium, where she is known in Dutch as Sint-Waldetrudis or -Waltrudis. Both cities boast a large medieval church that bears her name.
Married to the Count of Hainault, she raised four children. After her husband retired to an abbey, she herself became a nun in 656. She founded her own convent (Sainte-Waudru) and the city of Mons grew around it.
The shrine of Saint Waltrude is kept in the collegiate church dedicated to her in Mons. Each year as part of the Ducasse de Mons festival, the shrine is placed on the car d'or, a gilded cart, and drawn by horses through the city streets.
wn.com/Waltrude
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EUROPINION—Should Belgium Separate into Flanders and Wallonia?
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 2:20
- Updated: 10 Jan 2013
Now for our Europinion segment we go to Belgium. After the latest round of elections held there in June, negotiations on forming a Belgian government have stranded because of ongoing tensions between French speaking and Dutch speaking politicians. Some French-speaking Wallonian politicians have already stated that separating Belgium into an independent Flanders and Wallonia might be the only way to solve the problem. We went to the city of St. Truiden and asked people on the streets for their opinion. "I think that would be a good idea. Then all that fighting would be over." "I just read an article about it. I'm not in favor. I still feel Belgian." "It'll have its positive and negative sides for the Flemish, as well as for the people of Wallonia." "That's a good idea. They can't reach an agreement anyway." "We have a Flemish Government. Let them take care of things here in Flanders and let the government in Wallonia do the same on their side. Then that problem in Brussels will be solved immediately." "I have nothing against the people of Wallonia, only against the politicians. So that's my opinion." "Something has to be done anyway. They've been negotiating for 90 days already. They didn't get one step further. Nothing." "I think they are going a little too far now. That's not doing politics anymore, that's attacking each other." "Forming a government with seven different parties, that' impossible anyway. That means seven different ideas." "They're fighting with each ...
http://wn.com/EUROPINION—Should_Belgium_Separate_into_Flanders_and_Wallonia?
Now for our Europinion segment we go to Belgium. After the latest round of elections held there in June, negotiations on forming a Belgian government have stranded because of ongoing tensions between French speaking and Dutch speaking politicians. Some French-speaking Wallonian politicians have already stated that separating Belgium into an independent Flanders and Wallonia might be the only way to solve the problem. We went to the city of St. Truiden and asked people on the streets for their opinion. "I think that would be a good idea. Then all that fighting would be over." "I just read an article about it. I'm not in favor. I still feel Belgian." "It'll have its positive and negative sides for the Flemish, as well as for the people of Wallonia." "That's a good idea. They can't reach an agreement anyway." "We have a Flemish Government. Let them take care of things here in Flanders and let the government in Wallonia do the same on their side. Then that problem in Brussels will be solved immediately." "I have nothing against the people of Wallonia, only against the politicians. So that's my opinion." "Something has to be done anyway. They've been negotiating for 90 days already. They didn't get one step further. Nothing." "I think they are going a little too far now. That's not doing politics anymore, that's attacking each other." "Forming a government with seven different parties, that' impossible anyway. That means seven different ideas." "They're fighting with each ...
Flanders-Wallonia
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 1:16
- Updated: 08 Jan 2013
"Star Grêle De La Mer" Flanders-Wallonia is a country in Western Europe. It is bordered by Netherlands to the east, Germany to the south and Commune of France to the west. The Belgian army, commanded by King Albert himself, was the first that fought the German armies during the Weltkrieg and among the other vanquished armies during the defeat of France. With the land under German occupation, Belgium was forced to comply to every single term: Belgian Congo becoming another German holding in Africa, most of Wallonia annexed to Germany, and the country itself ceased to function under the same name. Inspired by the speeches of Jules Destrée, German experts concluded that a federal state was the only chance to avoid riots between the Flemish and Walloons. Thus, the kingdom of Flanders-Wallonia (Flandern-Wallonien in German) was created, headed by the Kaiser's third son, Adalbert von Hohenzollern, and the former head of German occupation authorities, August Borms, still de facto head of the government.
http://wn.com/Flanders-Wallonia
"Star Grêle De La Mer" Flanders-Wallonia is a country in Western Europe. It is bordered by Netherlands to the east, Germany to the south and Commune of France to the west. The Belgian army, commanded by King Albert himself, was the first that fought the German armies during the Weltkrieg and among the other vanquished armies during the defeat of France. With the land under German occupation, Belgium was forced to comply to every single term: Belgian Congo becoming another German holding in Africa, most of Wallonia annexed to Germany, and the country itself ceased to function under the same name. Inspired by the speeches of Jules Destrée, German experts concluded that a federal state was the only chance to avoid riots between the Flemish and Walloons. Thus, the kingdom of Flanders-Wallonia (Flandern-Wallonien in German) was created, headed by the Kaiser's third son, Adalbert von Hohenzollern, and the former head of German occupation authorities, August Borms, still de facto head of the government.
- published: 25 Oct 2010
- views: 4027
- author: KaiserreichAnthems
WALLONIA - The South of Belgium
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 3:14
- Updated: 22 Jun 2012
Timelapse
http://wn.com/WALLONIA_The_South_of_Belgium
Moving wallonia to France?
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 3:01
- Updated: 03 Apr 2012
On the WEB: Belgian webusers seriously think about joining French territories - Ethnic violences rage in Afghanistan - battle -- New lawsuit for eBay
http://wn.com/Moving_wallonia_to_France?
On the WEB: Belgian webusers seriously think about joining French territories - Ethnic violences rage in Afghanistan - battle -- New lawsuit for eBay
- published: 31 Jul 2008
- views: 2001
- author: france24english
The Official Wallonian Singles Charts Top 50 12/01/13
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 13:54
- Updated: 14 Jan 2013
The official Wallonian singles charts top 50 + top 5 of Ultratip. Comment please. Dropouts: - Wiill.i.am feat. Eva Simons: This is Love (50) - Nolwenn Leroy: Juste Pour Me Souvenir (48) - Cauet: La Fin Du Monde (47) - Parachute Youth: Can't Get Better Than This (46) - One Direction: Live While We're Young (41) - Gotye feat. Kimbra: Somebody That I Used To Know (35) - Emeli Sandé: Read All About It (Pt III) (31)
http://wn.com/The_Official_Wallonian_Singles_Charts_Top_50_12_01_13
The official Wallonian singles charts top 50 + top 5 of Ultratip. Comment please. Dropouts: - Wiill.i.am feat. Eva Simons: This is Love (50) - Nolwenn Leroy: Juste Pour Me Souvenir (48) - Cauet: La Fin Du Monde (47) - Parachute Youth: Can't Get Better Than This (46) - One Direction: Live While We're Young (41) - Gotye feat. Kimbra: Somebody That I Used To Know (35) - Emeli Sandé: Read All About It (Pt III) (31)
- published: 12 Jan 2013
- views: 51
- author: thib971
Lutgen CDH (Wallonia) : Somewhere between Braives and Hannut, the shameful road
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 4:13
- Updated: 04 Jan 2013
One of Belgium's worst scandals. This road did cost 300.000 euros to belgian tax payers (Belgium is a tiny country known for political corruption and denial of democracy), The first day it became ridable, cars crashed... Thankfully, there are no such aberrations here,in Russia, the largest country on earth.
http://wn.com/Lutgen_CDH_Wallonia_Somewhere_between_Braives_and_Hannut,_the_shameful_road
One of Belgium's worst scandals. This road did cost 300.000 euros to belgian tax payers (Belgium is a tiny country known for political corruption and denial of democracy), The first day it became ridable, cars crashed... Thankfully, there are no such aberrations here,in Russia, the largest country on earth.
- published: 31 May 2011
- views: 193522
- author: benzonawan
The Official Wallonian Singles Charts Top 50 (10/11/12)
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 13:31
- Updated: 08 Dec 2012
This the official Wallonian single charts + top 5 of Ultratip Dropouts - Lana Del Rey/Summertime Sadness (48) - Gossip/Move In The Right Direction (46) - Lou Doillon/ICU (45) - Gotye feat. Kimbra/Somebody That I Used To Know (43) - Taylor Swift/We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together (42) - Pascal Obispo/Tu M'avais Dit (36) - Puggy/To Win The World (31)
http://wn.com/The_Official_Wallonian_Singles_Charts_Top_50_10_11_12
This the official Wallonian single charts + top 5 of Ultratip Dropouts - Lana Del Rey/Summertime Sadness (48) - Gossip/Move In The Right Direction (46) - Lou Doillon/ICU (45) - Gotye feat. Kimbra/Somebody That I Used To Know (43) - Taylor Swift/We Are Never Ever Getting Back Together (42) - Pascal Obispo/Tu M'avais Dit (36) - Puggy/To Win The World (31)
- published: 10 Nov 2012
- views: 345
- author: thib971
Promotion of Wallonia-Belgium in China 视频: 比利时瓦隆州－湖北的姐妹城市
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 3:50
- Updated: 02 Jan 2013
In light of the partnership between the Belgian Region of Wallonia and the Chinese Province of Hubei, our media company, Medianext is making a promotion campaign focused strategically on Chinese social and professional networks. The campaign attracts investments from both Wallonia and Hubei. Through a comprehensive video film describing the economics and the cultural assets of Wallonia broadcasting on our Weibo page, we have developed a few adapted brandings about Wallonia/China through cultural Chinese sensitivities.
http://wn.com/Promotion_of_Wallonia-Belgium_in_China_视频_比利时瓦隆州－湖北的姐妹城市
In light of the partnership between the Belgian Region of Wallonia and the Chinese Province of Hubei, our media company, Medianext is making a promotion campaign focused strategically on Chinese social and professional networks. The campaign attracts investments from both Wallonia and Hubei. Through a comprehensive video film describing the economics and the cultural assets of Wallonia broadcasting on our Weibo page, we have developed a few adapted brandings about Wallonia/China through cultural Chinese sensitivities.
- published: 09 Oct 2012
- views: 995
- author: Medianext EuroChina
Why safeguard ICH? Answers from Belgium (Wallonia)
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 2:14
- Updated: 26 Nov 2012
Interview of Mr Jean-Pierre Ducastelle, President of the Oral and Intangible Heritage Commission of the Wallonia-Brussels Federation (Belgium) Fourth session of the General Assembly of the Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage (UNESCO, 04-08/06/2012). Read more on ICH: www.unesco.org
http://wn.com/Why_safeguard_ICH?_Answers_from_Belgium_Wallonia
Interview of Mr Jean-Pierre Ducastelle, President of the Oral and Intangible Heritage Commission of the Wallonia-Brussels Federation (Belgium) Fourth session of the General Assembly of the Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage (UNESCO, 04-08/06/2012). Read more on ICH: www.unesco.org
- published: 26 Nov 2012
- views: 38
- author: unesco
The Official Wallonian Singles Charts Top 50 ( 27/10/12 )
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 13:22
- Updated: 08 Jan 2013
This is the official Wallonian singles charts + top 5 song of ultratip. Sorry for any problems of sounds.
http://wn.com/The_Official_Wallonian_Singles_Charts_Top_50_27_10_12_
This is the official Wallonian singles charts + top 5 song of ultratip. Sorry for any problems of sounds.
- published: 28 Oct 2012
- views: 1391
- author: thib971
Making Of - Cinema Made In Wallonia
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 3:28
- Updated: 19 Oct 2012
http://wn.com/Making_Of_Cinema_Made_In_Wallonia
Anvi & Kong - Wallonia (Original Mix)
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 7:25
- Updated: 13 Dec 2012
New colab with Kong, Rate and comment ! Unsigned! Contact victoor@live.se or nilsgronvall@gmail.com !
http://wn.com/Anvi_Kong_Wallonia_Original_Mix
New colab with Kong, Rate and comment ! Unsigned! Contact victoor@live.se or nilsgronvall@gmail.com !
- published: 04 Dec 2011
- views: 2542
- author: OfficialAnvi
Cinema Made In Wallonia - Spot
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 1:05
- Updated: 08 Jan 2013
Spot promotionnel pour le Cinéma fabriqué en Wallonie.
http://wn.com/Cinema_Made_In_Wallonia_Spot
Spot promotionnel pour le Cinéma fabriqué en Wallonie.
- published: 01 Oct 2012
- views: 729
- author: Bernard Devillers
Le patrimoine en Wallonie - The heritage in Wallonia
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 5:44
- Updated: 21 Sep 2012
link: www.walloonheritage.be Cultura Europa: www.culturaeuropa.be www.facebook.com
http://wn.com/Le_patrimoine_en_Wallonie_The_heritage_in_Wallonia
link: www.walloonheritage.be Cultura Europa: www.culturaeuropa.be www.facebook.com
- published: 16 Aug 2011
- views: 1099
- author: CulturaEuropa
Rudy Demotte, Prime Minister of Wallonia, on the future of cohesion policy
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 1:45
- Updated: 26 Nov 2010
Rudy Demotte, Prime Minister of Wallonia and Chairman of the informal meeting of ministers responsible for cohesion policy, 22 November 2010, Liège, Belgium. Further information is available on the Committee of the Regions website: www.cor.europa.eu.
http://wn.com/Rudy_Demotte,_Prime_Minister_of_Wallonia,_on_the_future_of_cohesion_policy
Rudy Demotte, Prime Minister of Wallonia and Chairman of the informal meeting of ministers responsible for cohesion policy, 22 November 2010, Liège, Belgium. Further information is available on the Committee of the Regions website: www.cor.europa.eu.
- published: 23 Nov 2010
- views: 112
- author: pressecdr
Interview with Johan Derouane, Hydrogeologist for the Wallonia region, Belgium
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 1:53
- Updated: 02 Apr 2012
Johan Derouane, expert hydrogeologist, explains the public-private partnership between the group Spadel, the city of Spa and the region of Wallonia in Belgium, working together to protect and manage the underground water resources of the area.
http://wn.com/Interview_with_Johan_Derouane,_Hydrogeologist_for_the_Wallonia_region,_Belgium
Johan Derouane, expert hydrogeologist, explains the public-private partnership between the group Spadel, the city of Spa and the region of Wallonia in Belgium, working together to protect and manage the underground water resources of the area.
- published: 08 Dec 2011
- views: 173
- author: BottledWatersEurope
Animation Creative Wallonia
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 1:15
- Updated: 16 Oct 2012
http://wn.com/Animation_Creative_Wallonia
Merida Wallonia Cup - Dinant 2009
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 4:15
- Updated: 27 Aug 2010
Merida Wallonia Cup - Dinant Trèfle Dinantais 2009 le 15/03/09
http://wn.com/Merida_Wallonia_Cup_Dinant_2009
Merida Wallonia Cup - Dinant Trèfle Dinantais 2009 le 15/03/09
- published: 17 Mar 2009
- views: 3046
- author: Célestin Carbonnelle
Brussels & Wallonia by Joseph Jeanmart - Music by Luc Baiwir
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 3:54
- Updated: 28 Jul 2012
An introduction to the fun loving, hedonist and French - speaking regions of Belgium, Brussels & Wallonia, by one of the most talented Belgian photographers, Joseph Jeanmart, music by Belgian composer Luc Baiwir.
http://wn.com/Brussels_Wallonia_by_Joseph_Jeanmart_Music_by_Luc_Baiwir
An introduction to the fun loving, hedonist and French - speaking regions of Belgium, Brussels & Wallonia, by one of the most talented Belgian photographers, Joseph Jeanmart, music by Belgian composer Luc Baiwir.
- published: 03 Jul 2009
- views: 2338
- author: Belgium
Invest in Wallonia
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 0:32
- Updated: 23 Aug 2012
TV ad for "Invest in Wallonia", Belgium (AWEX), music by Cyril Orcel, performed by Dominique Corbiau, Counter tenor
http://wn.com/Invest_in_Wallonia
TV ad for "Invest in Wallonia", Belgium (AWEX), music by Cyril Orcel, performed by Dominique Corbiau, Counter tenor
- published: 12 Sep 2011
- views: 629
- author: Sferartefact
eWON, Innovation Prize in Wallonia 2009 - Prix de l'Innovation Technologique en Wallonie 2009 -
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 2:44
- Updated: 13 Aug 2012
Innovation Prize in Wallonia 2009 goes to eWON for Talk2M, a new, smart Web-based remote access method to machines.
http://wn.com/eWON,_Innovation_Prize_in_Wallonia_2009_Prix_de_l'Innovation_Technologique_en_Wallonie_2009_-
Innovation Prize in Wallonia 2009 goes to eWON for Talk2M, a new, smart Web-based remote access method to machines.
- published: 30 Oct 2009
- views: 542
- author: eWONtv
Wallonia... Another Belgium
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 5:25
- Updated: 10 Oct 2010
Wallonia by Joseph Jeanmart Music by Karl Off © Joseph Jeanmart - BTO London 2010
http://wn.com/Wallonia_Another_Belgium
Wallonia by Joseph Jeanmart Music by Karl Off © Joseph Jeanmart - BTO London 2010
- published: 12 Apr 2010
- views: 517
- author: Jeanmart Joseph
The Official Wallonian Singles Charts Top 50 (24/11/12)
- Order: Reorder
- Duration: 13:40
- Updated: 19 Dec 2012
The official Wallonian single charts + top 5 of Ultratip. Comment please. Dropouts: - Dry feat. Maître Gims: Ma Mélodie (48) - Fun.: Some Nights (46) - DJ Rebel & Robert Abigail feat. MO: Culo (45) - Fun. feat. Janelle Monáe: We Are Young (43) - Lou Doillon: ICU (41) - Benjamin Biolay: Aime Mon Amour (39)
http://wn.com/The_Official_Wallonian_Singles_Charts_Top_50_24_11_12
The official Wallonian single charts + top 5 of Ultratip. Comment please. Dropouts: - Dry feat. Maître Gims: Ma Mélodie (48) - Fun.: Some Nights (46) - DJ Rebel & Robert Abigail feat. MO: Culo (45) - Fun. feat. Janelle Monáe: We Are Young (43) - Lou Doillon: ICU (41) - Benjamin Biolay: Aime Mon Amour (39)
- published: 24 Nov 2012
- views: 219
- author: thib971
photo: AP / Adj Nicolas-Nelson Richard, ECPAD
14 Jan 2013
Bamako/Paris - French fighter jets pounded Islamist rebel strongholds deep in northern Mali on Sunday as Paris poured more troops into the capital, Bamako, awaiting a West African force to dislodge al-Qaeda-linked insurgents from the country’s north ... Defence Minister Jean-Yves le Drian said France’s intervention on Friday prevented the advancing rebels from seizing Bamako and vowed air strikes would continue ... – ... Doubt....(size: 6.6Kb)
photo: Creative Commons / INABA Tomoaki
16 Jan 2013
YURI KAGEYAMA. AP Business Writers= TOKYO (AP) — Boeing Co.'s 787 planes were grounded for safety checks Wednesday by two major Japanese airlines after one was forced to make an emergency landing in the latest blow for the new jet ... The 787, known as the Dreamliner, is Boeing's newest and most technologically advanced jet, and the company is counting heavily on its success ... The grounding was done voluntarily by the airlines ... The U.S ... U.S....(size: 11.1Kb)
photo: AP / Carolyn Kaster
16 Jan 2013
JULIE PACE. Associated Press= WASHINGTON (AP) — Braced for a fight, President Barack Obama on Wednesday unveiled the most sweeping proposals for curbing gun violence in two decades, pressing a reluctant Congress to pass universal background checks and bans on military-style assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition magazines like the ones used in the Newtown, Conn., school shooting ... "And Congress must act soon." ... World news....(size: 9.2Kb)
photo: AP / BP
16 Jan 2013
IN what could be the first spillover from France's intervention in Mali, Islamist militants attacked and occupied a natural gas complex partly operated by energy company BP in southern Algeria. Two foreigners were killed and dozens of others, including Americans, were taken hostage ... It said it was holding 41 foreigners, including seven Americans ... Recommended Coverage. Al-Qaeda seize hostages in Algeria. End of sidebar ... . ....(size: 7.4Kb)
photo: WN / Jamal Penjweny
15 Jan 2013
WASHINGTON. Suicides in the U.S. military surged to a record 349 last year, far exceeding American combat deaths in Afghanistan, and some private experts are predicting the dark trend will grow worse this year. The Pentagon has struggled to deal with the suicides, which Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and others have called an epidemic ... Last year’s total is the highest since the Pentagon began closely tracking suicides in 2001 ... ....(size: 5.0Kb)
The Guardian
08 Jan 2013
A Guardian Weekly reader on a life well-travelled and the perspective of raising two families 40 years apart. Good to meet you … John Graham. I was born in England, bred in Wales and buttered in the United States. I lived in Canada and then, for a longer time, in the US again before settling in Belgium ... fortunately overlapping periods ... (Let me tell you about Flanders and Wallonia some time!) ... ....(size: 3.3Kb)
The Examiner
04 Jan 2013
Brussels is conveniently located less than an hour and a half from Paris and just two hours from Amsterdam ... Audi puts on a jazz festival from September to December in various Belgian cities, and for classical music lovers, there’s the Festival of Wallonia from June to October held in castles, abbeys and churches in the southern region of the country ... Spend some time in Namur, an hour drive from Brussels and the capital of Wallonia ... ....(size: 7.1Kb)
The State
01 Jan 2013
But there were other less noticed 2012 headlines that will have as much or more impact in our future. Many of them did not even appear on the front pages of most U.S. and Latin American newspapers ... Video from around the world ... Many fear that if Catalonia secedes from Spain, Corcega and the Basque region may seek independence from France, Scotland may split from Britain and Flanders and Wallonia from Belgium, among others ... Happy new year!....(size: 4.9Kb)
Kansas City Star
30 Dec 2012
But there were other less noticed 2012 headlines that will have as much or more impact in our future. Many of them did not even appear on the front pages of most U.S. and Latin American newspapers ... • The Nov ... • The Nov ... Many fear that if Catalonia secedes from Spain, Corcega and the Basque region may seek independence from France, Scotland may split from Britain and Flanders and Wallonia from Belgium, among others....(size: 4.6Kb)
Sacramento Bee
30 Dec 2012
But there were other less noticed 2012 headlines that will have as much or more impact in our future. Many of them did not even appear on the front pages of most U.S. and Latin American newspapers ... • The Nov ... • The Nov ... Many fear that if Catalonia secedes from Spain, Corcega and the Basque region may seek independence from France, Scotland may split from Britain and Flanders and Wallonia from Belgium, among others....(size: 4.7Kb)
Sacramento Bee
28 Dec 2012
But there were other less-noticed 2012 headlines that will have as much or more impact in our future. Many of them did not even appear on the front pages of most U.S. and Latin American newspapers ... • The Nov ... • The Nov ... Many fear that if Catalonia secedes from Spain, Corcega and the Basque region may seek independence from France, Scotland may split from Britain and Flanders and Wallonia from Belgium, among others....(size: 4.6Kb)
The Miami Herald
24 Dec 2012
But there were other less noticed 2012 headlines that will have as much or more impact in our future. Many of them did not even appear on the front pages of most U.S. and Latin American newspapers ... • The Nov ... • The Nov ... Many fear that if Catalonia secedes from Spain, Corcega and the Basque region may seek independence from France, Scotland may split from Britain and Flanders and Wallonia from Belgium, among others ... ....(size: 4.8Kb)
CounterPunch
24 Dec 2012
Paris. “At some point, Mr Abbas must admit to his people that most of the refugees will never return to Israel. that is the price of partition”. This statement appeared on page 14 of the issue of the Economist dated September 24th to 30th, 2011 ... The logic of partition is that it is two sides of the some coin ... Such arrangement exists in Belgium between the French speaking province (Wallonia) and the Dutch-speaking province (Flanders) ... ....(size: 9.4Kb)
noodls
20 Dec 2012
(Source. CORDIS - Community Research & Development Information Service) News. Scientists uncover cells at the origin of basal cell carcinoma. [Date ... Funding for this study also came from the Fonds de la Recherche Scientifique (FNRS), the programme d'excellence CIBLES of the Wallonia Region, the Fondation contre le Cancer, the Fondation ULB, the Fonds Yvonne Boël, the Fond Gaston Ithier and the EMBO Young Investigator Programme ... 35155....(size: 4.6Kb)
noodls
17 Dec 2012
(Source. CORDIS - Community Research & Development Information Service) News ... [Date. 2012-12-17] ... Other funding for this study came from the Fonds de la Recherche Scientifique (FNRS), the program d'excellence CIBLES of the Wallonia Region, a research grant from the Fondation contre le Cancer, the Fondation ULB, the Fonds Yvonne Boël, the Fond Gaston Ithier and the EMBO Young Investigator Programme. For more information, please visit.....(size: 5.0Kb)
noodls
13 Dec 2012
(Source. Government of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam). 17.18 . 13/12/2012 ... Representatives from the Wallonia Foreign Trade and Investment Agency (AWEX) also briefed Vietnamese businesses on the potential of Wallonie and other regions for cooperation in bio-technology, farm produce, health, construction, and hi-tech industry. Representatives from VIETRADE spoke of Viet Nam's need for more investment to promote economic growth ... (noodl....(size: 2.7Kb)
noodls
05 Dec 2012
Sixteen new elements inscribed on UNESCO's Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity ... The new elements are from Belgium, Bolivia, Brazil, Burkina Faso, Colombia, Côte d'Ivoire, Croatia, Ecuador, France, Hungary, India, Iran, Italy, Japan, Mali, Morocco, Oman, Republic of Korea ... The Marches of Entre-Sambre-et-Meuse are a major component of the cultural identity of Entre-Sambre-et-Meuse in Wallonia, Belgium....(size: 12.9Kb)
This article is about the subject of Wallonia as whole. For specifics of the federal region itself, see Walloon Region (federal region).
| Walloon Region Région wallonne (French) Wallonische Region (German) |
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|---|---|---|---|
| — Region of Belgium — | |||
|
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| Anthem: "Le Chant des Wallons" | |||
 |
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 |
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| Country | Belgium | ||
| Capital | Namur | ||
| Government | |||
| • Minister-President | Rudy Demotte | ||
| Area | |||
| • Total | 16,844 km2 (6,504 sq mi) | ||
| Population (January 1, 2010) | |||
| • Total | 3,498,384 | ||
| • Density | 210/km2 (540/sq mi) | ||
| Demographics | |||
| • Languages | French, German (also Dutch in Municipalities with language facilities)[1] | ||
| ISO 3166 code | BE-WAL | ||
| Celebration Day | 3rd Sunday of September | ||
| Website | www.wallonie.be | ||
.svg)
Wallonia (French: Wallonie [wa.lɔ.ni], German: Wallonie(n), Dutch: Wallonië [wɐˈloːnɪə] ( listen) or [βɐˈloːnɪə], Walloon: Walonreye) is the predominantly French-speaking southern region of Belgium. It is governed as the Walloon Region, which makes up 55% of the territory of Belgium but with only a third of its population. Contrary to the situation in Flanders, the Walloon Region was not merged with the French Community of Belgium, a political level responsible for matters related mainly to culture and education. The small German-speaking minority in the east forms the German-speaking Community of Belgium, which has its own government and parliament for culture-related issues. The demonym for Wallonia is Walloon.
During the industrial revolution, Wallonia trailed only the United Kingdom in industrialization, capitalizing on its extensive deposits of coal and iron. This brought the region wealth, and, from the beginning of the 19th to the middle of the 20th centuries, Wallonia was the more prosperous half of Belgium. Since World War II, however, the importance of heavy industry has greatly declined, and the Flemish Region surpassed Wallonia in wealth as Wallonia economically declined. Wallonia now suffers from high unemployment and has a significantly lower GDP per capita than Flanders. The economic inequalities and linguistic divide between the two are major sources of political conflict in Belgium.
The capital of Wallonia is Namur, and its largest metropolitan area is Liège, while its most populous municipality proper is Charleroi. Most of Wallonia's major cities and two-thirds of its population lie along the Sambre and Meuse valley, the former industrial backbone of Belgium. To the north lies the Central Belgian Plateau, which, like Flanders, is relatively flat and agriculturally fertile. In the southeast lie the Ardennes; the area is sparsely populated and mountainous. Wallonia borders Flanders and the Netherlands in the north, France to the south and west, and Germany and Luxembourg to the east.
Contents |
Terminology[link]
The term Wallonia can mean slightly different things in different contexts. One of the three federal regions of Belgium is still constitutionally defined as the Walloon Region, but the region's government has renamed it Wallonia, and it is commonly called Wallonia.[2][3] Preceding April 1, 2010, when the renaming came into effect, Wallonia would sometimes refer to the territory governed by the Walloon Region, whereas Walloon Region referred specifically to the government. In practice, the difference between the different meanings is small, and what is meant is usually clear based on context.
The root of the word Wallonia, like the words Wales, Cornwall and Wallachia,[4] is the Germanic word Walha, meaning the strangers. Wallonia is named after the Walloons, the population of the Burgundian Netherlands speaking Romance languages. In Middle Dutch (and French), the term Walloons also included the French-speaking population of the Prince-Bishopric of Liège[5] or the whole population of the Romanic sprachraum within the medieval Low Countries.
History[link]
Main article: History of Wallonia
Julius Caesar conquered Gaul in 57 BC. The Low Countries became part of the larger Gallia Belgica province which originally stretched from southwestern Germany to Normandy and Holland. The population of this territory was Celtic with a Germanic influence which was stronger in the north than in the south of the province. Gallia Belgica became progressively romanized. The ancestors of the Walloons became Gallo-Romans and were called the "Walha" by their Germanic neighbours. The "Walha" abandoned their Celtic dialects and started to speak Vulgar Latin.[7]
The Merovingians gradually gained control of the region during the 5th century, under Clovis. Due to the fragmentation of the former Roman Empire, Vulgar Latin regionally developed along different lines and evolved into several langue d'oïl dialects, which in Wallonia became Picard, Walloon and Lorrain.[7] The oldest surviving text written in a langue d'oïl, the Sequence of Saint Eulalia, has characteristics of these three languages and was likely written in or very near to what is now Wallonia around 880 AD.[6] From the 4th to the 7th century, the Franks established several settlements, probably mostly in the north of the province where the romanization was less advanced and some Germanic trace was still present. The language border began to crystallize between 700 under the reign of the Merovingians and Carolingians and around 1000 after the Ottonian Renaissance.[8] French-speaking cities, with Liège as the largest one, appeared along the Meuse river and Gallo-Roman cities such as Tongeren, Maastricht and Aachen became Germanized.
The Carolingian dynasty dethroned the Merovingians in the 8th century. In 843, the Treaty of Verdun gave the territory of present-day Wallonia to Middle Francia, which would shortly fragment, with the region passing to Lotharingia. On Lotharingia's breakup in 959, the present-day territory of Belgium became part of Lower Lotharingia, which then fragmented into rival principalities and duchies by 1190. Literary Latin, which was taught in schools, lost its hegemony during the 13th century and was replaced by old French.[7]
In the 15th century, the Dukes of Burgundy took over the Low Countries. The death of Charles the Bold in 1477 raised the issue of succession, and the Liégeois took advantage of this to regain some of their autonomy.[7] From the 16th to the 18th centuries, the Low Countries were governed successively by the Habsburg dynasty of Spain (from the early 16th century until 1713-14) and later by Austria (until 1794). This territory was enlarged in 1521-22 when Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor gained the Tournai region from France.[7]
Present-day Belgium was conquered in 1795 by the French Republic during the French Revolutionary Wars. It was annexed to the Republic, which later became the Napoleonic Empire. After the Battle of Waterloo, Wallonia became part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands under King William of Orange.[7] The Walloons played an active part in the Belgian Revolution in 1830. The Provisional Government of Belgium proclaimed Belgium's independence and held elections for the National Congress.[7]
Industrial revolution[link]
In the 19th century, the area began to industrialize, and Wallonia was the first fully industrialized area in continental Europe.[9] This brought the region great economic prosperity, which was not mirrored in poorer Flanders and the result was a large amount of Flemish immigration to Wallonia. Belgium was divided into two divergent communities. On the one hand, the very catholic Flemish society was characterized by an economy centered on agriculture, and, on the other hand, Wallonia was the center of the continental European industrial revolution where liberal and socialist movements were rapidly emerging.[10] Major strikes and general strikes took place in Wallonia, including the Walloon jacquerie of 1886, the Belgian general strike of 1893, 1886, 1893, 1902, 1913 (for universal suffrage), 1932 (depicted in Misère au Borinage), and 1936, the general strike against Leopold III of Belgium (1950), and the 1960-1961 Winter General Strike for autonomy for Wallonia.
The profitability of the heavy industries to which Wallonia owed its prosperity started declining in the first half of the 20th century, and the center of industrial activity shifted north to Flanders. Wallonia would be surpassed in economic development by Flanders only in the 1960s, when industrial production in the northern part of Belgium would catch up with Wallonia. The loss of prosperity caused social unrest, and Wallonia sought greater autonomy in order to address its economic problems. In the wake of the 1960-1961 Winter General Strike, the State reform in Belgium process got under way. This reform started partly with the linguistic laws of 1962-63, which defined the four language areas within the constitution. But the strikes of 1960 which took place in Wallonia more than in Flanders are not principally linked with the four language areas nor with the Communities but with the Regions. In 1968, the conflict between the communities burst out. The French speakers were driven out of the Catholic University of Leuven amid shouts of "Walen buiten!" ("Walloons out!").[10] This led to State reform in Belgium, which resulted in the creation of the Walloon Region and the French Community, which have considerable autonomy.
Geography[link]
Wallonia is landlocked, with an area of 16,844 km², or 55% of the total area of Belgium. The Sambre and Meuse valley, from Liège (70 m) to Charleroi (120 m) is an entrenched river in a fault line which separates Middle Belgium (elevation 100–200 m) and High Belgium (200–700 m). This fault line corresponds to a part of the southern coast of the late London-Brabant Massif. The valley, along with Haine and Vesdre valleys form the sillon industriel, the historical centre of the Belgian coalmining and steelmaking industry, and is also called the Walloon industrial backbone. Due to their long industrial historic record, several segments of the valley have received specific names: Borinage, around Mons, le Centre, around La Louvière, the Pays noir, around Charleroi and the Basse-Sambre, near Namur.
To the north of the Sambre and Meuse valley lies the Central Belgian plateau, which is characterized by intensive agriculture. The Walloon part of this plateau is traditionally divided into several regions: Walloon Brabant around Nivelles, Western Hainaut (French: Wallonie picarde, around Tournai), and Hesbaye around Waremme. South of the sillon industriel, the land is more rugged and is characterized by more extensive farming. It is traditionally divided into the regions of Entre-Sambre-et-Meuse, Condroz, Fagne-Famenne, the Ardennes and Land of Herve, as well as the Belgian Lorraine around Arlon and Virton. Dividing it into Condroz, Famenne, Calestienne, Ardennes (including Thiérache), and Belgian Lorraine (which includes the Gaume) is more reflective of the physical geography. The larger region, the Ardennes, is a thickly forested plateau with caves and small gorges. It is host to much of Belgium's wildlife but little agricultural capacity. This area extends westward into France and eastward to the Eifel in Germany via the High Fens plateau, on which the Signal de Botrange forms the highest point in Belgium at 694 metres (2,277 ft).
Subdivisions[link]
Administratively, Wallonia consists of the provinces of Walloon Brabant, Hainaut, Liège, Luxembourg, and Namur, respectively numbered one to five on the map at right. It is also divided into 20 administrative arrondissements and 262 municipalities.
Cities[link]
The largest cities in Wallonia. [11]
- Charleroi (204,146)
- Liège (195,790)
- Namur (110,428)
- Mons (92,529)
- La Louvière (78,414)
- Tournai (69,792)
- Seraing (63,500)
- Verviers (56,596)
- Mouscron (55,687)
- Herstal (38,969)
- Braine-l'Alleud (38,748)
- Châtelet (36,131)
Science and technology[link]
Contributions to the development of science and technology have appeared since the beginning of the country's history. Baptismal font of Renier de Huy, is not the only example of medieval Walloon working expertise. An indication of that : the words "houille" (coal)[12] or "houilleur" (coal miner) or "grisou" (damp) were coined in Wallonia and are from walloon origin.
The economically important very deep coal mining in the course of the First Industrial Revolution has required highly reputed specialized studies for mining engineers. But that was already the case before the Industrial Revolution, with an engineer as Rennequin Sualem for instance.
Engineer Zenobe Gramme invented the Gramme dynamo, the first generator to produce power on a commercial scale for industry. Chemist Ernest Solvay gave his name to the Solvay process for production of soda ash, important chemical for many industrial uses. Ernest Solvay also acted as a major philanthropist and gave its name to the Solvay Institute of Sociology, the Solvay Brussels School of Economics and Management and the International Solvay Institutes for Physics and Chemistry which are now part of the Université Libre de Bruxelles. In 1911, he started a series of conferences, the Solvay Conferences on Physics and Chemistry, which have had a deep impact on the evolution of quantum physics and chemistry.
Georges Lemaître of the Université Catholique de Louvain is credited with proposing the Big Bang theory of the origin of the universe in 1927.
Three Nobel Prizes in Physiology or Medicine were awarded to Walloons: Jules Bordet (Université Libre de Bruxelles) in 1919, Albert Claude (Université Libre de Bruxelles) together with Christian De Duve (Université Catholique de Louvain) in 1974.
In the present day, Bureau Greisch has acquired an international reputation as consulting engineer and architect in the fields of structures, civil engineering and buildings, including the Millau Viaduct in France.
Economy[link]
Wallonia is rich in iron and coal, and these resources and related industries have played an important role in its history. In ancient times, the Sambre and Meuse valley was an important industrial area in the Roman Empire. In the Middle Ages, Wallonia became a center for brass working and bronze working, with Huy, Dinant and Chimay being important regional centers. In the 12th and 13th centuries, the iron masters of Liège developed a method of refining iron ore by the use of a blast furnace, called the Walloon Method. There were also a few coal mines around Charleroi and the Borinage during this period, but their output was small, and was principally consumed as a fuel by various industries such as the important glass making industry that sprang up in the Charleroi basin during the 14th century.[13]
In the 19th century, the area began to industrialize, mainly the so-called sillon industriel. It was the first fully industrialized area in continental Europe,[9] and Wallonia was the second industrial power in the world, in proportion to its population and its territory, after the United Kingdom.[14] The sole industrial centre in Belgium outside the collieries and blast furnaces of Wallonia was the historic cloth making town of Ghent.[15]
The two World wars curbed the continuous expansion that Wallonia had enjoyed up till that time. Towards the end of the 1950s, things began to change dramatically. The factories of Wallonia were by then antiquated, the coal was running out and the cost of extracting coal was constantly rising. It was the end of an era, and Wallonia has been making efforts to redefine itself. The restoration of economical development is high on the political agenda, and the government is encouraging development of industries, notably in cutting edge technology and in business parks.[16] The economy is improving,[17] but Wallonia is not yet at the level of Flanders and is still suffering many difficulties.
The current Walloon economy is relatively diversified, although certain areas (especially around Charleroi and Liège) are still suffering from the steel industry crisis, with a high unemployment rate of up to 30% in some regions. Nonetheless, Wallonia has some companies which are world leaders in their specialized fields, including glass production,[19] lime and limestone production,[20] cyclotrons[21] and aviation parts.[22] The south of Wallonia, bordering Luxembourg, benefits from its neighbour's economic prosperity, with many Belgians working on the other side of the border; they are often called frontaliers. The Ardennes area south of the Meuse River is a popular tourist destination for its nature and outdoor sports, in addition to its cultural heritage, with places such as Bastogne, Dinant, Durbuy, and the famous hot springs of Spa.
Politics and government[link]
Main article: Politics of Wallonia
Wallonia has its own powers and doesn't share them with the other Regions or Communities (except with the Community Wallonia-Brussels but not in the framework of the Belgian constitution, only on the basis of agreements between the Walloon Region and this French Community). As the other Federating units of Belgium, it is entitled to pursue its own foreign policy including the signing of treaties. Following Philippe Suinen, it is an exception among federal States, and, as pointed out recently by Michel Quévit professor emeritus at the Université Catholique de Louvain, a quasi State:[23] "From 1831, the year of Belgium's independence, until the federalization of the country in 1970, Wallonia has increasingly asserted itself as a region in its own right."[24] There is almost no possible veto of the Belgian State (except in very rare situations), and, even, Belgium, in many domains, is not able to sign an international treaty without the agreement of the Walloon Parliament. There is no legal hierarchy in the structure of the Belgian federal syste and no hierarchy between federal and regional authorities. For this reason, Belgium has many aspects of a confederation.[25]
The directly elected Walloon Parliament was created in June 1995, replacing the Conseil régional wallon (Regional Council of Wallonia). The first Council sat on 15 October 1980 and was composed of members of the Belgian Chamber of People's Representatives and the Belgian Senate elected in Wallonia.
Since 23 April 1993, Belgium has been a federal state made up of Regions and communities.
Wallonia has a parliament (one chamber with 75 members elected for five years by direct universal suffrage) and a government responsible in front of the parliament. Its parliament exercises two functions:
- It discusses and passes decrees, and they can take initiatives to draw them up. After this, decrees are sanctioned and promulgated by the Walloon government.
- It controls the Walloon government. Control is exercised via the vote.
- It ratifies the international treaties linked to his powers.
The composition of the parliament for the 2009-2014 legislature is as follows:
- Parti Socialiste (socialist party PS): 29
- Mouvement Réformateur (liberal democrats, center right MR): 19
- Ecolo (green party): 14
- Centre Démocrate Humaniste (former Christian party: CDh): 13
There are no more representatives of the Front national in the Walloon Parliament.
The Walloon Government is elected by a political majority in Parliament. The government numbers nine members with the president. Each member is called a Walloon minister.
The head of the government, called Minister-President, is Rudy Demotte, member of the Parti Socialiste (PS).
The coalition government for the future legislature is (as of 16 July 2009) a center left coalition PS-Ecolo-CDh with the same "Minister President" but other ministers, Paul Furlan, Jean-Marc Nollet, Philippe Henry, Eliane Tillieux and former ministers Jean-Claude Marcourt, André Antoine. The chairman of the Parliament is Êmily Hoyos.
Symbols[link]
The first appearance of the French word Wallonie as a reference to the romance world as opposed to Germany is said to date from 1842.[26] Two years later, it was first used to refer to the romance part of the young country of Belgium.[27] In 1886, the writer and walloon militant Albert Mockel, first used the word with a political meaning of cultural and regional affirmation,[28] in opposition with the word Flanders used by the Flemish Movement. The word had previously appeared in German and Latin as early as the 17th century.[29]
The rising of a Walloon identity led the Walloon Movement to choose different symbols representing Wallonia. The main symbol is the "bold rooster" (French: coq hardi), also named "Walloon rooster" (French: coq wallon, Walloon: cok walon), which is widely used, particularly on arms and flags. The rooster was chosen as an emblem by the Walloon Assembly on 20 April 1913, and designed by Pierre Paulus on 3 July 1913.[30] The Flag of Wallonia features the red rooster on a yellow background.
An anthem, Le Chant des Wallons (English: The Walloons' Song), written by Theophile Bovy in 1900 and composed by Louis Hillier in 1901, was also adopted. On September 21, 1913, the "national" feast day of Wallonia took place for the first time in Verviers, commemorating the participation of Walloons during the Belgian revolution of 1830. It is held annually on the third Sunday of September. The Assembly also chose a motto for Wallonia, "Walloon Forever" (Walloon: Walon todi), and a cry, "Liberty" (French: Liberté). In 1998, the Walloon Parliament made all these symbols official except the motto and the cry.
Regional languages[link]
French is the major language spoken in Wallonia. German is spoken in the German-speaking Community of Belgium, in the east. Belgian French is rather similar to that spoken in France, with some or even many vocabulary differences, including not only the use of the words septante (70) and nonante (90) in Belgium, as opposed to soixante-dix and quatre-vingt-dix in France.
There are noticeable Walloon accents, with the accent from Liège and its surroundings being perhaps the most striking. Other regions of Wallonia also have characteristic accents, often linked to the regional language.
Walloons traditionally also speak regional romance languages, all from the Langues d'oïl group. Wallonia includes almost all of the area where Walloon is spoken, a Picard zone corresponding to the major part of the Province of Hainaut, the Gaume (district of Virton) with the Lorrain language and a Champenois zone. There are also regional Germanic languages, such as the Luxembourgish language in Arelerland (Land of Arlon). The regional languages of Wallonia are more important than in France, and they have been officially recognized by the government. With the development of education in French, however, these dialects have been in continual decline. There is currently an effort to revive Walloon dialects; some schools offer language courses in Walloon, and Walloon is also spoken in some radio programmes, but this effort remains very limited.
Culture[link]
Literature[link]
In Walloon[link]
Literature is written principally in French but also in Walloon and other regional languages, colloquially called Walloon literature. Walloon literature (regional language not French) is printed since the 16th century. But it did have its golden age, paradoxically, during the peak of the Flemish immigration to Wallonia in the 19th century: "That period saw an efflorescence of Walloon literature, plays and poems primarily, and the founding of many theaters and periodicals."[31] The New York Public Library possesses a surprisingly large collection of literary works in Walloon, quite possibly the largest outside Belgium, and its holding are representative of the output. Out of nearly a thousand, twenty-six were published before 1880. Thereafter the numbers rise gradually year by year, reaching a peak of sixty-nine in 1903, and then they fall again, down to eleven in 1913. See 'Switching Languages', p. 153. Yves Quairiaux counted 4800 plays for 1860–1914, published or not. In this period plays were almost the only popular show in Wallonia. But this theater remains popular in the present-day Wallonia: Theater is still flourishing, with over 200 non-professional companies playing in the cities and villages of Wallonia for an audience of over 200,000 each year.[32] There are links between French literature and (the very small) Walloon literature. For instance Raymond Queneau set Editions Gallimard the publication of a Walloon Poets' anthology. Ubu roi was translated in Walloon by André Blavier ( an important pataphysician of Verviers, friend of Queneau), for the new and important Puppets theater of Liège of Jacques Ancion, the Al Botroûle theater "at the umbilical cord" in Walloon indicating a desire to return to the source (according to Joan Cross). But Jacques Ancion wanted to develop a regular adult audience. From the 19th century he included the Walloon play Tati l'Pèriquî by E.Remouchamps and the avant-garde Ubu roi by A.Jarry.[33] For Jean-Marie Klinkenberg, the dialectal culture is no more a sign of attachment to the past but a way to participate to a new synthesis[34]
In French[link]
Jean-Marie Klinkenberg (member of the Groupe µ) wrote also that Wallonia (and literature in Wallonia), is also present since the beginning of the history of formation of the French language.[35] In their 'Histoire illustrée des lettres française de Belgique', Charlier and Hanse (editors), La Renaissance du livre, Bruxelles, 1958, published 247 pages (on 655 ), about the "French" literature in the Walloon provinces (or Walloon principalities of the Middle-Age, sometimes also Flemish provinces and principalities), for a period from the 11th to the 18th centuries. Among the works or the authors,the Sequence of Saint Eulalia (9th century), La Vie de Saint Léger (10th century), Jean Froissart (14th century in the County of Hainaut), Jean d'Outremeuse, Jean Lebel Jean Lemaire de Belges (16th century from Bavay), the Prince of Ligne (18th century, Beloeil). There is a Walloon Surrealism,[36] especially in the Province of Hainaut. Charles Plisnier (1896–1952), born in Mons, won the Prix Goncourt in 1936, for his novel Mariages and for Faux Passeports (short stories denouncing Stalinism, in the same spirit as Arthur Koestler). He was the first foreigner to receive this honour. The Walloon Georges Simenon is likely the most widely read French-speaking writer in the world, according to the Tribune de Genève.[37][38] More than 500 million of his books have been sold, and they have been translated into 55 languages. There is a link between the Jean Louvet's work and the social issues in Wallonia[39]
In Picard[link]
Picard is spoken in the western province of Hainaut. Notable Belgian authors who wrote in Picard include Géo Libbrecht, Paul Mahieu, Paul André, Francis Couvreur and Florian Duc.
Mosan art, painting, architecture[link]
Mosan art is a regional style of Romanesque art from the valleys of the Meuse in present-day Wallonia, and the Rhineland, with manuscript illumination, metalwork, and enamel work from the 11th, 12th and 13th centuries. Among them the masterpiece of Renier de Huy and perhaps of the whole Mosan art Baptismal font at St Bartholomew's Church, Liège. The architecture of Roman churches of the Walloon country are also named mosan, exemplified by the Collegiate Church of Saint Gertrude in Nivelles, and the churches of Waha and Hastière, Dinant. The Ornamental brassware is also a part of the Mosan art and among these dinandiers Hugo d'Oignies and Nicolas de Verdun.
Jacques du Broeucq was a sculptor of the 16th century.
Flemish art was not confined to the boundaries of modern Flanders and several leading artists came from or worked in areas in which langues d'oïl were spoken, from the region of modern Wallonia, e.g. Robert Campin, Rogier van der Weyden (Rogier de la Pasture) and Jacques Daret. Joachim Patinir Henri Blès are generally called mosan painters. Lambert Lombard (Liège, 1505 – 1566) was a Renaissance painter, architect and theorist for the Prince-Bishopric of Liège. Gérard de Lairesse, Bertholet Flemalle were also important painters in the Prince-Bishopric of Liège.
Gustave Serrurier-Bovy (Liège, 1858 - Antwerp, 1910)[40] architect and furniture designer, credited (along with Paul Hankar, Victor Horta and Henry van de Velde) with creating the Art Nouveau style, coined as a style in Paris by Bing.[41] And in Liège also, principally Jean Del Cour, the sculptor of the Virgin in Vinâve d'Isle, Léon Mignon the sculptor of Li Tore and Louis Jéhotte of the statue of Charlemagne.
George Grard (1901 — 1984) was a Walloon sculptor, known above all for his representations of the female, in the manner of Pierre Renoir and Aristide Maillol, modelled in clay or plaster, and cast in bronze.
During the 19th and 20th centuries many original romantic, expressionist and surrealist Wallon painters emerged, including Félicien Rops, Paul Delvaux, Pierre Paulus, Fernand Verhaegen, Antoine Wiertz, René Magritte... The avant-garde CoBrA movement appeared in the 1950s
Music[link]
There was an important musical life in Prince-Bishopric of Liège since the beginning. Between 1370 and 1468 flourished a school of music in Liège, with Johannes Brassart, Johannes de Sarto and firstly Johannes Ciconia, the third Master of Ars Nova.[42]
The vocal music of the so-called Franco-Flemish School developed in the southern part of the Low Countries and was an important contribution to Renaissance culture. Robert Wangermée and Philippe Mercier wrote in their encyclopedic book about the Walloon music that Liège, Cambrai and Hainaut played a leading part in the so-called Franco-Flemish School.[43]
Among them were Orlande de Lassus, Gilles Binchois, Guillaume Dufay In the 19th and 20th centuries, there was an emergence of major violinists, such as Henri Vieuxtemps, Eugène Ysaÿe (author of the unique opera in Walloon during the 20th century Piére li houyeû - Pierre the miner - based on a real incident which occurred in 1877 during a miners' strike in the Liège region), and Arthur Grumiaux, while Adolphe Sax (born in Dinant) invented the saxophone in 1846. The composer César Franck was born in Liège in 1822, Guillaume Lekeu in Verviers. More recently, André Souris (1899–1970) was associated with Surrealism. Zap Mama is a more international group.[44]
Henri Pousseur is generally regarded as a member of the Darmstadt School in the 1950s. Pousseur's music employs serialism, mobile forms, and aleatory, often mediating between or among seemingly irreconcilable styles, such as those of Schubert and Webern (Votre Faust), or Pousseur's own serial style and the protest song "We shall overcome" (Couleurs croisées). He was strongly linked to the social strikes in Liège during the 1960s.[45] He worked also with the French writer Michel Butor.
Cinema[link]
Walloon films are often characterized by social realism. It is perhaps the reason why the documentary Misère au Borinage, and especially its co-director Henri Storck, is considered by Robert Stallaerts as the father of the Walloon cinema. He wrote: "Although a Fleming, he can be called the father of the Walloon cinema.".[46] For F.André between Misère au Borinage and the films like those of the Dardenne brothers (since 1979), there is Déjà s'envole la fleur maigre (1960) (also shot in the Borinage),[47] a film regarded as a point of reference in the history of the cinema.[48] Like those of the Dardenne brothers, Thierry Michel, Jean-Jacques Andrien, Benoît Mariage, or, e.g. the social documentaries of Patric Jean, the director of Les enfants du Borinage writing his film as a letter to Henri Storck. On the other hand, films such as Thierry Zéno's Vase de noces (1974), Mireille in the life of the others by Jean-Marie Buchet (1979), C'est arrivé près de chez vous (English title: Man bites dog) by Rémy Belvaux and André Bonzel (1992) and the works of Noël Godin and Jean-Jacques Rousseau are influenced by surrealism, absurdism and black comedy. The films of the Dardenne brothers are also inspired by the Bible and Le Fils for instance is regarded as one of the most spiritually significant films.[49]
Folklore[link]
The Ducasse de Mons (Walloon French for Kermesse), is one of the Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity. It comprises two important parts: the procession, the descent and the uprising of the Waltrude's Shrine, and the combat of Saint George. The combat (after the procession), is played on the Trinity Sunday between 12.30 pm and 1.00 pm on on the Mons'scentral square. It represents the fight between Saint George (the good) and the dragon (the evil). The dragon is displaced with the help of the white men (fr:Hommes blancs). The dragon fights Saint George by giving Tail attacks. Saint George on his horse turns clockwise. And the dragon turns in the other direction. Saint George finally kills the dragon.
The Gilles of Binche (only of this town) and the giants' procession in Ath are also one of the Masterpieces of the Oral and Intangible Heritage of Humanity.
Cuisine[link]
Wallonia is famous for Cougnou (found throughout the region), the Waffles of Liège, Herve cheese, an Apple butter called Sirop de Liège (had with cheese), 3 kinds of Trappist beer (from Chimay, Orval and Rochefort), the Jenever named Peket, May wine named Maitrank, Garden strawberry of Wépion. A great speciality of Dinant is the Flamiche: These cheese tarts are not found in the window displays as they are meant to be eaten straight from the oven. As one restaurateur said so well in a book about Walloon gastronomy "it is the client who waits for the flamiche, as the flamiche does not wait for the client.[50] There are also the Ardennes Ham,[51] the "Tarte al djote" (from Nivelles), a tart made with beet leaves. And cheese for dessert.[52] The 1957 Michelin Guide noted that "regional food has put up heroïc resistance and the Walloon provinces and Flemish provinces are proud of their specialities."[53]
Transportation[link]
Airports[link]
The two largest cities in Wallonia each have an airport. The Brussels South Charleroi Airport has become an important passenger airport, especially with low fares companies such as Ryanair or Wizzair. It serves as a low-cost alternative to Brussels Airport, and it saw 3 million passengers in 2008, almost 4 million in 2009. The Liège Airport is specialized in freight, although it also operates tourist-oriented charter flights. Today, Liège is the 8th airport for European freight and aims to reach the 5th rank in the next decade.
Railways, motorways, buses[link]
TEC is the single public transit authority for all of Wallonia, operating buses and trams. Charleroi is the sole Walloon city to have a metro system, the Charleroi Pre-metro.
Wallonia has an extensive and well-developed rail network, served by the Belgian National Railway Company, SNCB.
Wallonia's numerous motorways fall within the scope of the TransEuropean Transport network programme (TEN-T). This priority programme run by the European Union provides more than 70,000 km of transport infrastructure, including motorways, express rail lines and roadways, and has been developed to carry substantial volumes of traffic.[54]
Waterways[link]
With traffic of over 20 million tonnes and 26 kilometres of quays, the autonomous port of Liège (PAL) is the third largest inland port in Europe.[55] It carries out the management of 31 ports along the Meuse and the Albert Canal. It is accessible to sea and river transporters weighing up to 2,500 tonnes, and to pushed two-barge convoys (4,500 tonnes, soon to be raised to 9,000 tonnes). Even if Wallonia does not have direct access to the sea, it is very well connected to the major ports thanks to an extensive network of navigable waterways that pervades Belgium, and it has effective river connections to Antwerp, Rotterdam and Dunkirk.[56]
On the west side of Wallonia, in the Province of Hainaut, the Strépy-Thieu boat lift, permits river traffic of up to the new 1350-tonne standard to pass between the waterways of the Meuse and Scheldt rivers. Completed in 2002 at an estimated cost of € 160 million (then 6.4 billion Belgian francs) the lift has increased river traffic from 256 kT in 2001 to 2,295 kT in 2006.
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See also[link]
- Walloon language
- Science and technology in Wallonia
- The Walloon people
- Walloon Movement
- Flanders
- Brussels
- Belgian general strikes
- History of coal mining
- Industrial Revolution
- Manifesto for Walloon culture
References[link]
- ^ Law of 1966 about language in Belgium
- ^ French : Le Gouvernement a décidé de promouvoir le terme « Wallonie » en lieu et place de « Région wallonne ».
- ^ For example, the CIA World Factbook states Wallonia is the short form and Walloon Region is the long form. The Invest in Wallonia website and the Belgian federal government use the term Wallonia when referring to the Walloon Region.
- ^ (French) Albert Henry, Histoire des mots Wallons et Wallonie, Institut Jules Destrée, Coll. «Notre histoire», Mont-sur-Marchienne, 1990, 3rd ed. (1st ed. 1965), foodnote 13 p. 86.
- ^ Footnote: In medieval French, the word Liégeois referred to all the inhabitants of the Principality vis-à-vis the other inhabitants of the Low-countries, the word Walloons being only used for the French-speaking inhabitants vis-à-vis the other inhabitants of the Principality. Stengers, Jean (1991). "Depuis quand les Liégeois sont-ils des Wallons?". In Hasquin, Hervé (in French). Hommages à la Wallonie [mélanges offerts à Maurice Arnould et Pierre Ruelle]. Brussels: éditions de l'ULB. pp. 431–447
- ^ a b (French) Maurice Delbouille Romanité d'oïl Les origines : la langue - les plus anciens textes in La Wallonie, le pays et les hommes Tome I (Lettres, arts, culture), La Renaissance du Livre, Bruxelles,1977, pp.99-107.
- ^ a b c d e f g "A young region with a long history (from 57BC to 1831)". Gateway to the Walloon Region. Walloon Region. 2007-01-22. http://www.wallonie.be/en/discover-wallonia/history/a-young-region-with-a-long-history-from-57bc-to-1831/index.html. Retrieved 2009-01-13.
- ^ Kramer, pg. 59, citing M. Gysseling (1962). "La genèse de la frontière linguistique dans le Nord de la Gaule" (in French). Revue du Nord 44: 5–38, in particular 17.
- ^ a b "(French) Wallonie : une région en Europe". Ministère de la Région wallonne. http://sder.wallonie.be/ICEDD/CAP-atlasWallonie2006/pages/atlas.asp?txt=conWalEur. Retrieved September 29, 2007.
- ^ a b "The region asserts itself (from 1840 to 1970)". Gateway to the Walloon Region. 2007-01-22. http://www.wallonie.be/en/discover-wallonia/history/the-region-asserts-itself-from-1840-to-1970/index.html. Retrieved 2009-01-14.
- ^ Belgium: largest cities and towns and statistics of their population
- ^ the word "houille" in Dictionnaire de l'Académie française
- ^ Allan H. Kittel, "The Revolutionary Period of the Industrial Revolution", Journal of Social History, Vol. I,n° 2 (Winter 1967), pp. 129-130.
- ^ Philippe Destatte, L'identité wallonne, Institut Destrée, Charleroi, 1997, pages 49-50 ISBN 2-87035-000-7
- ^ European Route of Industrial Heritage
- ^ http://www.wallonie.be/en/discover-wallonia/economy/walloon-incentives/index.html
- ^ "Wallonia battles wasteland image". BBC News. October 6, 2008. http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7647591.stm. Retrieved September 27, 2009.
- ^ Accordin La Libre Belgique on 26 August 2010: 9,8 millions visitors in 2009 (2,8 in Brussels), 6 % of the regional economy (15% in Brussels)
- ^ AFC Flat Glass
- ^ Carmeuse
- ^ IBA
- ^ SONACA
- ^ Philippe Suinen, Une première mondiale in Le Monde dioplomatique, octobre 2000 [1] Michel Quévit [2]
- ^ Official Website of the Walloon Region
- ^ Rolf Falter, Belgium's Peculiar Way to Federalism in Nationalism in Belgium pp.175-197
- ^ There is also a mention of Wallonie in 1825 : (French) « les Germains, au contraire, réservant pour eux seuls le noble nom de Franks, s'obstinaient, dès le onzième siècle, à ne plus voir de Franks dans la Gaule, qu'ils nommaient dédaigneusement Wallonie, terre des Wallons ou des Welsches » Augustin Thierry, Histoire de la conquête de l'Angleterre par les Normands, Éd. Firmin Didot, Paris, 1825, tome 1, p. 155. read online
- ^ (French) Albert Henry, Histoire des mots Wallons et Wallonie, Institut Jules Destrée, Coll. «Notre histoire», Mont-sur-Marchienne, 1990, 3rd ed. (1st ed. 1965), p. 12.
- ^ (French) «C'est cette année-là [1886] que naît le mot Wallonie, dans son sens politique d'affirmation culturelle régionale, lorsque le Liégeois Albert Mockel crée une revue littéraire sous ce nom» Philippe Destatte, L'identité wallonne p. 32.
- ^ La préhistoire latine du mot Wallonie in Luc Courtois, Jean-Pierre Delville, Françoise Rosart & Guy Zélis (editors), Images et paysages mentaux des XIXe et XXe siècles de la Wallonie à l'Outre-Mer, Hommage au professeur Jean Pirotte à l'occasion de son éméritat, Academia Bruylant, Presses Universitaires de l'UCL, Louvain-la-Neuve, 2007, pp. 35-48 ISBN 978-2-87209-857-6, p. 47
- ^ http://www.allstates-flag.com/fotw/flags/be-wal_l.html#wal98
- ^ 'Switching Languages', Translingual Writers Reflect on Their Craft, Edited by Steven G. Kellman Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2003, p. 153. ISBN 978-0-8032-2747-7
- ^ The Walloon language page
- ^ Joan Gross, Speaking in Other Voices: An Ethnography of Walloon Puppet Theaters. Amsterdam and Philadelphia: John Benjamins Press, 2001, ISBN 978158811054
- ^ Benoît Denis et Jean-Marie Klinkenberg, Littérature : entre insularité et activisme in Le Tournant des années 1970. Liège en effervescence, Les Impressions nouvelles, Bruxelles, 2010, pp. 237-253, p. 252. French : Ancion monte l'Ubu rwèen 1975 (...) la culture dialectalisante cesse d'être une marque de passéisme pour participer à une nouvelle synthèse...
- ^ ’Histoire de la Wallonie’, Privat Toulouse, 2004, ISBN 2-7089-4779-6 p. 220. French: Le latin apporté en Gaule par les légions romaines avait fini par éclater en de multiples dialectes (...) peu à peu, pour répondre aux besoins des pouvoirs publics et religieux se forme une langue standard. Dans ce processus qui aboutira à l'élaboration du français, la Wallonie est présente dès les premières heures.
- ^ An Paenhuysen Surrealism in the Provinces. Flemish and Walloon Identity in the Interwar period in Image&Narrative, n° 13, Leuven November, 2005
- ^ L'écrivain français le plus dans le monde
- ^ Maigret and his Master
- ^ The Columbia encyclopedia of modern drama, Volume 1
- ^ Artnet, Gustave Serrurier-Bovy
- ^ Your Antique Furniture Guide, Art Nouveau in Belgium
- ^ French ’’Le troisième grand Maître de l'Ars Nova in Robert Wangermée et Philippe Mercier, La musique en Wallonie et à Bruxelles, La Renaissance du livre, Bruxelles, 1980, Tome I,pp. 37-40.
- ^ Robert Wangermée et Philippe Mercier, La musique en Wallonie et à Bruxelles, La Renaissance du livre, Bruxelles, 1980, Tome I, p. 10.
- ^ Dictionnaire de la chanson en Wallonie et à Bruxelles
- ^ The "Trois Visages de Liege", (...) full of provocative sound collages [evokes..] not only moments in sonic civic history, but the sounds of its historical events as well: wildcat strikes and their ensuing violence in 1960, protests against new laws being enacted, etc. See Acousmatrix 4: Scambi/Trois Visages de Liege/Paraboles Mix
- ^ Historical dictionary of Belgium (Scarecrow press, 1999, p. 191 ISBN 0-8108-3603-3).
- ^ Cinéma wallon et réalité particulière, in TOUDI, n° 49/50, septembre-octobre 2002, p.13.
- ^ Les films repères dans l'histoire du cinéma
- ^ 100 Most spiritually significant Films
- ^ Dinant Official Web Site
- ^ Ardenne Ham
- ^ The Simon and Schuster international pocket food guide, 1981.
- ^ quoted by "Culinary cultures of Europe: identity, diversity and dialogue", by Darra Goldstein, Kathrin Merkle, Fabio Parasecoli, Stephen Mennell, Council of Europe. Directorate General IV--Education, Culture and Heritage, Youth and Sport, Council of Europe, 2005
- ^ AWEX
- ^ Liege port authority
- ^ http://www.logisticsinwallonia.be/index.php?page=94&lng=en&text=L%92excellence%20logistique Logistics in Wallonia
Further reading[link]
- Johannes Kramer (1984) (in German). Zweisprachigkeit in den Benelux-ländern. Buske Verlag. ISBN 3-87118-597-3.
External links[link]
 |
Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Wallonia |
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Walloon edition of Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia |
- Logistics in Wallonia
- Tourism in Wallonia
- Musique en Wallonie
- Culture and art
- Walloon composers (French)
- Belgium Rift: Flanders vs. Wallonia - slideshow by Life magazine
Coordinates: 50°30′N 4°45′E / 50.5°N 4.75°E / 50.5; 4.75
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| Rudy Demotte | |
|---|---|
|
|
| Minister-President of the French Community | |
| Incumbent | |
| Assumed office 20 March 2008 |
|
| Preceded by | Marie Arena |
| Minister-President of Walloonia | |
| Incumbent | |
| Assumed office 19 July 2007 |
|
| Preceded by | Elio Di Rupo |
| Personal details | |
| Born | (1963-06-03) 3 June 1963 (age 49) Ronse, Belgium |
| Political party | Socialist Party |
| Alma mater | Free University of Brussels, French |
Rudy W.G. Demotte (born 3 June 1963 in Ronse) is a Belgian socialist politician and present Minister-President of Wallonia since 19 July 2007, replacing Elio Di Rupo, one month after an historical defeat of the socialists in the federal election. On 20 March 2008, he was also appointed Minister-President of the French Community, replacing Marie Arena.
Of mixed Flemish and Walloon ascent, Rudy Demotte is one of the few Walloon politicians to be perfectly bilingual in French and Dutch.
From 1988 to 1990 he served on the cabinet of the Minister of Social Affairs. He was first elected to the Belgian House of Representatives in 1995 and was reflected in 1999 and 2003. In 1999, he became the federal Minister for Economic Affairs and Scientific Research. In 2002, he became the Minister for Budget, Culture and Sport of the French Community of Belgium. From July 2003 to 2007, he became Minister for Social Affairs and Public Health in the federal government.
Having served as a council member from 1994 on, he became mayor of Flobecq in 2000.
See also[link]
External links[link]
- Official web site (in French, Dutch and German)
| Political offices | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Elio Di Rupo |
Minister-President of Walloonia 2007–present |
Incumbent |
| Preceded by Marie Arena |
Minister-President of the French Community 2008–present |
|
| Persondata | |
|---|---|
| Name | Demotte, Rudy |
| Alternative names | |
| Short description | Belgian politician |
| Date of birth | 3 June 1963 |
| Place of birth | Ronse (East Flanders) |
| Date of death | |
| Place of death | |
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