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A C O N C I S E H I S T O RY O F B E LG I U M
The small and densely populated nation of Belgium has played an important
role in the history of Europe and other continents, especially Africa. It was a
pioneering force in industry, trade, and finance during the Middle Ages,
through early modern times and into the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
It introduced innovative political regimes and played a leading role in the
creative arts. Yet this rich past is not widely known. This introductory
history offers an accessible and rigorous overview of this small but important
West-European country, synthesizing Belgium’s main economic, social, pol-
itical, and cultural developments from pre-Roman times until today. Today,
this nation-state, born in , is well known for the rivalries between its two
main language communities, and as a result is often considered a fragile or
even an artificial political construct. This systematic chronological analysis of
both present-day Belgium and the polities that preceded it throws fresh light
on this controversial issue and demonstrates Belgium’s enduring importance
and influence.
Guy Vanthemsche is Professor Emeritus at the Free University Brussels,
where he taught contemporary history for over three decades. He is the
secretary of the Belgian Royal Historical Commission and a member of the
Belgian Royal Academy of Overseas Sciences. He is the author of several
books on nineteenth- and twentieth-century social, economic, and political
Belgian history, including Belgium and the Congo, – (Cambridge
University Press, ).
Roger De Peuter was a lecturer in economic and social history at Utrecht
University and taught late medieval and early modern history of the Low
Countries at the Free University Brussels until his retirement in . His
publications include articles and a book on early modern Belgian history.
Published online by Cambridge University Press
CAMBRIDGE CONCISE HISTORIES
This is a series of illustrated ‘concise histories’ of selected individual
countries, intended both as university and college textbooks and as general
historical introductions for general readers, travellers, and members of the
business community.
A full list of titles in the series can be found at:
www.cambridge.org/concisehistories
Published online by Cambridge University Press
A Concise History
of Belgium
GUY VANTHEMSCHE
Free University Brussels
ROGER DE PEUTER
Free University Brussels and Utrecht University
Published online by Cambridge University Press
Shaftesbury Road, Cambridge , United Kingdom
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Cambridge University Press is part of Cambridge University Press & Assessment,
a department of the University of Cambridge.
We share the University’s mission to contribute to society through the pursuit of
education, learning and research at the highest international levels of excellence.
www.cambridge.org
Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/
: ./
© Guy Vanthemsche and Roger De Peuter
This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provisions
of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take
place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press & Assessment.
First published
A catalogue record for this publication is available from the British Library.
A Cataloging-in-Publication data record for this book is available from the Library of Congress.
---- Hardback
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Cambridge University Press & Assessment has no responsibility for the persistence
or accuracy of URLs for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this
publication and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will
remain, accurate or appropriate.
Published online by Cambridge University Press
To my mother, Mariette Medo, born in and still going
strong – a witness to almost half of modern Belgium’s
history – GV
In memory of my parents, Antoine De Peuter and Marie De
Peuter-Luyts. The stories they told me as a youngster about
their experiences in the s and s taught me a lot
about history – RDP
Published online by Cambridge University Press
Published online by Cambridge University Press
Contents
List of Figures page xii
List of Maps xv
Acknowledgments xvii
Note on the Text xviii
Introduction
Earliest Times: From Prehistory to the End of the
Roman Period
Introduction
Before the Celts
The Celtic Era
The Establishment of Roman Rule
Gallo-Roman Society during the Pax Romana
The Gradual Transformation and Demise of Roman Rule
(Third–Fifth Centuries )
Conclusion
The Era of the Frankish Kingdoms (Fifth–Tenth Centuries)
Introduction
Polities between Unity and Fragmentation
The Dawn of Christianity
Origins and Significance of the Linguistic Frontier
The Dynamics of Rural Society
Conclusion
vii
Published online by Cambridge University Press
Contents
The Origins of the Medieval Principalities
(Tenth–Fourteenth Centuries)
Introduction
The Carolingian Inheritance Shapes the International and
Domestic Setting
The Emergence and Expansion of Flanders
(Ninth–Twelfth Centuries)
The Disintegration of Lorraine (Tenth–Twelfth
Centuries)
Formation and Territorial Expansion of the Lotharingian
Principalities (Tenth–Thirteenth Centuries)
Demographic Growth and Economic Development
Urban Society and Politics
Submission, Revolt and Defeat: Flanders and France
(–)
Toward a New Balance of Power in an Age of Crisis and
Pandemic (Fourteenth Century)
Conclusion
Unifying the Netherlands: The Burgundy–Habsburg Period
(–)
Introduction
The Burgundian Marriage: Alliances, Dynastic Politics
and Territorial Expansion
Institutions and State Building
Ruler and Subjects: A Tense Relationship
Economics and Demography in the Fifteenth Century
Expansion, Crisis and Survival of the Burgundian State:
From Charles the Bold to Maximilian of Austria
Habsburg: A New Dynasty and Its Huge
Composite Empire
Territorial Expansion and Constitutional Consolidation in
the Low Countries
Antwerp and the European Economy
Arts and Sciences
Christian Humanism and Early Reformation
Conclusion
viii
Published online by Cambridge University Press
Contents
The Spanish Netherlands (–/)
Introduction
A Problematic Peace ()
Ecclesiastical Reform and the New Dioceses
High Nobility in the Opposition ()
Iconoclasm
Repression and Revolt
Insurgence in Holland ()
Pacification? ()
Radicalization ()
Spain on the Offensive (–)
Deadlock between Rebels and Royalists, Catholics
and Protestants
Sovereignty for the Habsburg Low Countries
(–)?
Counter-Reformation
War and Crisis (–)
More War (–)
The Prince-Bishopric of Liège
“A Century of Adversity”?
Artistic Flowering and Cultural Activity
Conclusion
The Austrian Netherlands (c.–)
Introduction
The War of the Spanish Succession (–/):
The Southern Netherlands Occupied and Divided
The Difficult Beginning of the Austrian Regime
Government: Renewal and Restoration
Marquis de Prié, a Highly Unpopular Minister
(–)
The Ostend Company (–)
The War of the Austrian Succession (–) and
Its Aftermath
Enlightenment in a Backwater?
Reform of Government Policy
Demography and Agriculture
Manufacturing Industry, Trade, and Social Conditions
Conclusion
ix
Published online by Cambridge University Press
Contents
The Formation of a New Nation-State (s–)
Introduction
Economy and Society in Transition: Toward the
Industrial Revolution
Revolutions in –: The End of the “Old
Regime”?
The Annexation by France Triggers Crucial Ruptures
The United Kingdom of the Netherlands (–)
The Birth of Belgium (–)
Conclusion
The Consolidation of a Bourgeois Regime (–s)
Introduction
Social and Economic Transformations in the World’s
Second Industrial Nation
Consolidating a Fragile Nation-State on the
International Scene
Domestic Political Life: Consolidation Despite the Rise of
Political Divisions
Belgian Identity and Culture in the Making
Seeds of Change: Challenges to the Social and
Political Order
Conclusion
The Belgian Nation-State at Its Height (s–)
Introduction
Belgian Economy and Society in Transition
Belgium’s First Steps toward Mass Democracy
(s–)
Belgium’s Position on the International Scene from the
s to
Dragged into the First World War (–)
The Interwar Period Profoundly Modifies Belgium’s
Domestic and International Politics (–)
The Growing Rift within Belgium
The Explosion of Cultural Creativity in Fin de Siècle and
Interwar Belgium
Belgium and the Second World War (–)
Conclusion
Published online by Cambridge University Press
Contents
The Metamorphoses of a Nation-State (from to the
Present Day)
Introduction
Economic and Social Challenges and Changes
The Metamorphoses of the Social Fabric
Cultural Highlights in Post-War Belgium
Domestic Politics from to the s
Domestic Politics from the s: Increasing
Fragmentation and Complexity
Belgium in the Post-War World: Between Presence
and Dilution
(Language) Community Tensions and the Gradual
Construction of the Federal State
Conclusion
General Conclusion
Appendix: List of Rulers, Sovereigns and Heads of State
(–Present) and of Governors General (–) of the
Southern Low Countries and Belgium
Further Reading
Index
xi
Published online by Cambridge University Press
Figures
. Bas-relief representing a vallus, or Gallo-Roman
harvesting machine, used by Treveri peasants,
second century (Virton, Musée gaumais) page
. The Frankish aristocracy played a key role in the
beginnings of Christianization: view of the Saint
Chrodoara sacrophagus (Amay – prov. Liège, Saint-
Georges church, drawing by Laure-Anne Finoulst, )
. The Cathedral Notre Dame of Tournai, twelfth–
thirteenth century, is one of Belgium’s biggest churches,
with five Romanesque towers ( m) and a Gothic choir
(Unesco World Heritage, )
. The Bruges belfry. In some parts of the former
Low Countries, especially in present-day Belgium
and Northern France, belfries represented municipal
power and prosperity (Unesco World Heritage,
and )
. Jean Wauquelin presenting the History of Hainaut
to duke Philip the Good. Miniature by Rogier
Van der Weyden, / (Brussels, Royal Library)
. Jan Van Eyck’s portrait of Giovanni Arnolfini and
his wife () demonstrates both the painter’s
mastery and the wealth of the Bruges merchant
elite (London, National Gallery)
. The Coudenberg Palace (Brussels, c./)
. Iconoclasm in the Antwerp Our Lady Cathedral ().
Anonymous engraving
xii
Published online by Cambridge University Press
List of Figures
. Archduchess Isabella of Austria (–), sovereign
of the Catholic Low Countries (–) and regent
(–), with her husband, archduke Albert. The
inscription below the portrait presents them as domina
and dominus Belgy provinciarum. Workshop of Frans
Pourbus the Younger, before (Versailles, châteaux
de Versailles et du Trianon)
. The bombardment of Brussels by the French army ().
Anonymous painting (Brussels, Museum Broodhuis)
. In the eighteenth century, Flanders was densely
populated, and farmland was intensively exploited,
as shown on this topographical map of Sint-Niklaas
(East-Flanders) and the surrounding countryside.
Count Ferraris, Carte de cabinet des Pays-Bas autrichiens
et de la principauté de Liège, (Brussels,
Royal Library)
. Iron production thrived in the eighteenth-century
prince-bishopric of Liège. Oil painting by Léonard
Defrance, Interior of a foundry, (Brussels,
Fine Arts Museum)
. Belgium’s first king, Leopold I of Saxe-Coburg, takes
an oath on the Belgian constitution, July , ,
on the Place Royale in Brussels. Oil painting by
Gustave Wappers, La prestation de serment du roi
Léopold Ier, (Brussels, Fine Arts Museum)
. A massive architectural symbol of Belgium’s
recent independence: the Brussels Palais de Justice
(Law Courts) conceived by Joseph Poelaert
(–)
. The army violently represses the strike
in Wallonia. “Les Chasseurs du e régiment (. . .)
dispersent par la force les émeutiers qui viennent
d’incendier la Verrerie du Hainaut à Roux.” (Le Monde
illustré, April , )
. The city of Ypres was completely destroyed by the
fierce combats opposing British and German troops
(–)
. King Baudouin reviews Congolese troops on his
arrival in Léopoldville (June , ) for the
xiii
Published online by Cambridge University Press
List of Figures
independence ceremonies taking place the next day.
The king, in white uniform, is accompanied
by President Kasa Vubu and Prime Minister
Patrice Lumumba, on the far right. Unknown
photographer, Congopresse agency
. A Flemish demonstration in Brussels
(October , ) demands the definitive
delimitation of the “linguistic border”
xiv
Published online by Cambridge University Press
Maps
. Belgium in (© Laure De Cock, Ghent
University) page
. The medieval principalities, c.
(Redrawn based on a map sourced from
www.wikiwand.com/nl/Geschiedenis van de opkomst
van vorstendommen en steden in de Lage Landen)
. The Burgundian unification process, –.
Redrawn based on a map originally published in Atlas
de la Wallonie, de la préhistoire à nos jours, courtesy
of Institut Jules Destrée, Charleroi (© Sofam)
. The Low Countries under Charles V and the
prince-bishopric of Liège, . Redrawn based on a
map originally published in Atlas de la Wallonie, de la
préhistoire à nos jours, courtesy of Institut Jules Destrée,
Charleroi (© Sofam)
. The Spanish Netherlands and the prince-bishopric of
Liège, . Redrawn based on a map originally published
in Atlas de la Wallonie, de la préhistoire à nos jours,
courtesy of Institut Jules Destrée, Charleroi (© Sofam)
. The Austrian Netherlands and the prince-bishopric
of Liège, . Redrawn based on a map originally
published in Atlas de la Wallonie, de la préhistoire à nos
jours, courtesy of Institut Jules Destrée, Charleroi
(© Sofam)
. Independent Belgium, . Redrawn based on a map
originally published in Atlas de la Wallonie, de la
xv
Published online by Cambridge University Press
List of Maps
préhistoire à nos jours, courtesy of Institut Jules
Destrée, Charleroi (© Sofam)
. The communities and the regions in the
contemporary Belgian federal State (source: official
website of the Belgian federal government)
xvi
Published online by Cambridge University Press
Acknowledgments
Guy Vanthemsche wrote the Introduction, Chapters and , to , and
the final Conclusion, while Roger De Peuter authored Chapters to .
We would like to thank the following colleagues for reading and com-
menting on parts of this book: Marc Boone, Jean Bourgeois, Martin
Conway, Alain Dierkens, Janet Polasky, Dries Tys, and Els Witte. We are
also grateful to Laure De Cock and Philippe De Maeyer who drew the
map reproduced at the end of the Introduction. Many thanks finally also
to William Chew III, who made linguistic corrections to the
Introduction, Chapters and , to and the Conclusion.
xvii
Published online by Cambridge University Press
Note on the Text
Names of places and persons will be written in the original French or
Dutch, unless an English equivalent is currently used (for instance
Ghent and Brussels, and not Gent or Bruxelles; or Charles the Bold
and not Charles le Téméraire or Karel de Stoute). We will also use the
continental metric system (for instance kilometers and not miles).
xviii
Published online by Cambridge University Press
Introduction
Until well into the twentieth century, writing “national history” hardly
required any justification. On the contrary: for more than a century and a
half, it was generally considered a supreme achievement in a successful
historian’s career. However, the last few decades have profoundly
changed the game, with the breakthrough of new and thrilling
approaches to the human past, for instance global, connected, or trans-
national history. Today, this “old” branch of historiography hardly yields
academic glory; it has even fallen into deep disrepute. According to the
French historian Nicolas Offenstadt national history is “an ideological
instrument, similar to the discourse on national identity. This type of
synthesis seems problematic to me, it always sounds false” (cited by the
newspaper Le Monde [des Livres], November ). This is just one
(harsh) expression of the critical stance of many contemporary scholars
toward this genre. Obviously, the present Concise History of Belgium
needs some clarification – if not an apology.
Size is not what matters here. To be sure, Belgium is one of the
smallest nations of the planet: in the relevant world ranking, it occupies
the th place. With its , km – a surface area more or less
that of Maryland (, km), or one and a half times that of Wales
(, km) – the country is hardly noticeable on a European, let alone
a world map. In , about . million people were estimated to live in
this modest nation-state. Belgium therefore belongs to the group of small
countries with a high population density: it occupies the twenty-second
position in the relevant global ranking.
But is quantity the right criterion with which to evaluate a nation’s
importance? In the case of Belgium, it is not difficult to prove that this
https://doi.org/10.1017/9781139018005.001 Published online by Cambridge University Press
Introduction
country, however small, undoubtedly left important marks on European
and even on world history. Let us quickly mention just a few examples,
which we will of course elaborate in due time.
The “Belgian” principalities and cities played an important role in the
European Middle Ages and pioneered – together with the English
Magna Carta – the mechanisms of political representation and
“liberties.”
From the fourteenth to the sixteenth centuries, cities like Bruges,
Ghent and Antwerp were among the main economic centers of
their time.
In the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the Southern
Netherlands (the predecessor of contemporary Belgium) were often
the battleground of rivaling powers.
When it was created in , Belgium introduced one of the most
liberal constitutions of its time, a model – or a spectre – for many
citizens and politicians abroad.
In the nineteenth century, it was labelled the “second industrial nation
of the world,” being in the vanguard of capitalist development. Belgian
entrepreneurs were active all over the planet.
Between and , King Leopold II ruled over the Independent
Congo State, a colony that was heavily criticized in Europe and the
US, and Congolese decolonization in was an important factor in
the Cold War.
Belgium’s involvement in the First and Second World War was far
from unimportant – in the resistance of Belgian troops even
played a decisive role in the outcome of the struggle between the allied
armies and the German invader.
“Belgians” feature among the most prominent painters in Western art
history, from Jan Van Eyck, to Brueghel and Rubens, and to Magritte.
Clearly, all these – and other – facts and developments deserve a mention
in world history textbooks. From this point of view, a synthesis of Belgian
history is therefore far from irrelevant. But the crucial issue here is not so
much justifying a national history of Belgium, but rather arguing the
validity of a national history of Belgium and clarifying the perspective
from which the present book was written.
The attentive reader will have noticed that in some instances the word
“Belgian” has been put between inverted commas. In the forthcoming
chapters these punctuation marks will often reappear, surrounding the
https://doi.org/10.1017/9781139018005.001 Published online by Cambridge University Press
Introduction
same word. Far from being fortuitous, they refer to several fundamental
questions confronting any author of a “national history of Belgium.” Is it
legitimate to use the words Belgium and Belgian before , the year
when the present nation-state was born? How far in the past can we
identify its roots? Did some embryonic form of modern Belgium exist
(long) before the nineteenth century? And cautiously adopting the
nationalistic vocabulary still in use today, to the great displeasure of
Nicolas Offenstadt and so many historians, when did the “Belgian
identity” come into existence? Or, more correctly, does (or did) a
“Belgian identity” (ever) exist in the first place?
These questions have haunted Belgian historiography and politics
since the early nineteenth century. They are intimately linked with a
key feature of modern Belgian history, the coexistence, within the same
nation, of two language communities, French and Dutch, the first
somewhat smaller than the second. Of course, this is far from being a
unique feature; many modern countries also host different linguistic
groups and some even have two or more official languages (for instance
Switzerland). However, Belgium differs from other multilingual coun-
tries in that its linguistic duality has exerted, and still exerts, a heavy
strain on the national state – even to the point of calling into question the
latter’s very existence. This singularity alone makes a book on Belgian
history worthwhile. The growing confrontation between the two lan-
guage communities dominates the country’s history in the second half of
the twentieth century and will therefore be a key element in our final
chapter, but it also determines the way Belgium’s past is interpreted.
Consequently, it must be mentioned in these introductory pages as well.
Indeed, Belgium’s “historical depth” was, and still is, the object of
diverging readings. Many proponents of Flemish nationalism – a polit-
ical and cultural current born in the early twentieth century, as we shall
see – largely deny any historicity (and “legitimacy”) to the Belgian
nation-state. They present it as an artificial creation of the Great
Powers in , bringing together two different “peoples,” the Dutch-
speaking Flemings and the French-speaking Walloons, in an institutional
framework dominated by the latter, and oppressing the former. Romantic
nineteenth-century Belgian nationalists held a totally opposite view. For
them, the roots of “Belgian identity” lay in a remote past. According to
them, the heroic (but ultimately defeated) Belgae mentioned by the
Roman conqueror Julius Caesar in his De Bello Gallico, already displayed
some essential characteristics of the glorious Belgian “race” that finally
https://doi.org/10.1017/9781139018005.001 Published online by Cambridge University Press
Introduction
gained independence in after centuries of “foreign oppression.” In
between these radically contrasting visions, many other interpretations of
Belgium’s genesis have been formulated. It is therefore one of the tasks
of this book to clarify this issue on the basis of recent scholarly insights.
Of course, nobody in earnest still defends the nineteenth-century
patriotic image claiming high antiquity for the Belgian “nation” or
“identity.” Our first chapter will nevertheless start with these oldest
times, not only to examine the origins and significance of this now
completely discredited view, but also to explain what these Belgae and
the Romans exactly represented in the flow of time, beyond the mythic
discourse produced by erstwhile Belgian patriots. This early starting
point also helps to clarify the origins and significance of the medieval
principalities, an important issue in the debate concerning Belgium’s
historical depth. Resulting from the dissolution of the Carolingian
Empire (Chapter ), a series of quasi-autonomous polities emerged in
the area that, many centuries later, would become Belgium. Some were
within the sphere of influence of the nascent French kingdom, others
within that of the Holy Roman (Germanic) Empire (Chapter ). Did
they already herald some “Belgian” specificity? The great historian
Henri Pirenne (–) thought so. According to his views, mainly
elaborated in his multi-volume Histoire de Belgique (-) the
medieval principalities in this part of Western Europe already displayed
some specific traits leading to later Belgium – in particular the unique
mix of so-called Romanic and Germanic elements. Pirenne’s long
shadow is still perceptible in historiography today, but contemporary
scholars no longer accept his vision of Belgium’s medieval origins – we
will of course explain why.
In the course of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, all these
principalities – with the notable exception of the prince-bishopric of
Liège – came to be ruled by the same sovereigns, first the Burgundians,
then the Habsburgs, and these rulers initiated a process of submission
and centralization of the territories they governed, limiting their auton-
omy and imposing upon them some sort of common political destiny
(Chapter ). However, this process did not yet lead to modern Belgium
in a straightforward manner. The “Netherlands” or “Low Countries” (or
“Seventeen Provinces”), as they were called (Pays-Bas in French;
Nederlanden or Lage Landen in Dutch), still included the polities that,
from the late sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries onward, would
ultimately form today’s nation-state “The Netherlands,” modern
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Introduction
Belgium’s northern neighbor. The protracted and bloody wars resulting
from the religious divide between Catholics and Protestants would
indeed mark the fate of both countries, since they led to the independ-
ence of the (Protestant) Dutch Republic, the ancestor of the contempor-
ary kingdom of The Netherlands. Some of the former Seventeen
Provinces, ruled by the emperor Charles V in the early sixteenth century,
remained under the sovereignty of the (Catholic) Habsburg dynasty, first
the Spanish and then the Austrian branch, respectively, in the seven-
teenth and eighteenth century (Chapters and ).
Henceforth called the “Spanish,” then the “Austrian Netherlands,” or
also the “Southern Netherlands,” the principalities remaining under
Habsburg authority were, however, not yet automatically “destined” to
become modern Belgium. Moreover, the principality of Liège still
existed independently from the Southern Netherlands. In a short period,
a mere forty years (–), the fate of the latter seemed to be sealed
in very different ways. After a brief experiment of “independence”
(–), they were first absorbed by France (–), together
with Liège – the realization of a dream already pursued by the French
Bourbon kings since the seventeenth century – then amalgamated with
the former Dutch Republic into the United Kingdom of the Netherlands
(–). The vagaries of history (to be explained in Chapter )
finally led to the failure of both solutions, and to the emergence of
Belgium as an independent country in .
Underneath these (apparently chaotic) chronological sequences lies a
pattern that gives some coherence to the developments analyzed in this
book. Different layers of power can be observed from the Middle Ages
until the present. First the local communities, especially the cities; then
the regions (from the medieval principalities, over the modern provinces,
to the contemporary institutions of federalized Belgium); above these
regions then comes a “national” level, budding since the rule of the
Burgundians and fully blooming with the creation of Belgium proper in
; and finally some “supranational” levels, represented by such
diverse phenomena as the medieval Holy Roman Empire or the suzer-
ainty of the French kingdom in medieval times, the Habsburg Empires in
the early modern era, and finally the European Economic Community
and Union in the second half of the twentieth century. Despite their
enormous contrasts, these entities all encompassed, at some time and in
very different ways, the previous power levels. We therefore invite the
reader to carefully watch the changing relationships between these four
https://doi.org/10.1017/9781139018005.001 Published online by Cambridge University Press
Introduction
levels – they are a kind of red thread that binds together many elements
that would otherwise seem unconnected.
*
**
A flag; an anthem; a well-defined and internationally recognized terri-
tory; a set of stable political institutions governed by local politicians; a
single legal system – Belgium seemingly possessed all the ingredients of a
genuine nation-state. However, this young and thriving bourgeois
regime, analyzed in Chapter , was inevitably confronted with a nagging
problem, that of its so-called national identity. What did it mean, exactly,
to be “a Belgian”? What differentiated this European citizen from other
inhabitants of the Old Continent? Was it religion? From the seventeenth
century, the authorities, intellectuals, and the Church itself, all presented
Catholicism as a defining element of the Southern Netherlands, trans-
formed into a bastion of the Counter-Reformation. Indeed, after the
eradication, forced conversion or emigration of the many Protestants
present there in the sixteenth century, the population of “Belgium”
remained devoutly and almost exclusively Catholic – a striking contrast
with the Protestant faith of most citizens of the newly created Dutch
Republic. But this adherence to Rome did not differentiate the residents
of the Southern Netherlands from other Europeans who also remained
faithful to Catholicism (France, Spain, the Italian principalities, etc.). In
the nineteenth century, Catholic politicians also presented their faith as
the constituent feature of the new Belgian nation. But this “identity” was
contested from the start by a large number of politicians and intellec-
tuals – and also public opinion – and the public role of the Roman
Catholic Church remained a bone of contention until far into the
twentieth century. Moreover, although the vast majority of the Belgians
indeed adhered to its faith and practices, part of the population gradually
lost contact with religion or even abruptly broke with it. In other words,
while the Catholic religion undoubtedly played a key role in both public
and private life in the Southern Netherlands, it could not (and cannot) be
considered a defining element of “Belgianness.” Throughout the
following chapters, we will address the successive phases of Catholic
presence in the history of these regions.
Perhaps language was, or could become, the key defining element of “all
things Belgian”? This was not the case either, since the population consisted of
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Introduction
Francophones and Flemish speakers (i.e. people using one of the many Dutch
dialects spoken in this area). Both languages, as it were, already “had their own
nation-state” – respectively France and The Netherlands. Although language
could not become a defining character of “Belgian identity,” the patriotic
leaders and intellectuals of young Belgium nevertheless produced, as we just
saw, different discourses “proving” the reality and even the antiquity of this
“identity.” The creation of “Belgianness” was however accompanied by a
specific cultural and institutional policy, namely a thorough Gallicization of
public life. Only French was used in Belgian public administrative life. This
was also the case in the northern part of the country, where it was imposed
upon a population that predominantly spoke Flemish. Moreover, language
acted as a marker of social hierarchy. Elite figures (landlords, industrialists,
rich traders, etc.), and even the petty bourgeoisie spoke French to differentiate
themselves from common people using a Flemish dialect, an idiom they
considered obscure and unfit for civilized persons.
In the course of the late nineteenth and the first half of the twentieth
century (Chapter ), social, political, and cultural discrimination against
the Flemish population generated the “Flemish movement,” which
gradually developed a sense of “Flemish identity.” Its followers also
forged the notion of “Flanders,” a region that encompassed all Flemish
speakers in Belgium. Defined this way, Flanders was previously non-
existent, both in politics and in people’s minds, since it differed notably
from the medieval principality of the same name. The Flemish move-
ment gradually obtained equality, before the law and in public life, of the
Flemish language (meanwhile standardized into “correct” Dutch). As a
reaction against these advances, some French speakers launched the
Walloon movement. They created their own “identity” discourse, crys-
tallized around the notion of “Wallonia” – a region encompassing the
French-speaking inhabitants of Belgium (or, at least, the vast majority of
them, i.e. those living outside the bilingual capital, Brussels). This
movement, born at the end of the nineteenth century, was far less
powerful than its Flemish counterpart, but it nevertheless produced its
own interpretation of the past, now from the Francophone viewpoint.
During the twentieth century (Chapters and ), Belgium became even
more complex. After the First World War, the Treaty of Versailles transferred
some km from Germany to Belgium, the so-called East cantons (cantons
de l’Est), introducing a new, German-speaking community into an already
linguistically divided country. Since the s, although quantitatively
modest (, persons in , , in ), this population has enjoyed
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Introduction
a specific set of institutions in Belgium’s new federal state structure.
Moreover, after the Second World War, successive waves of immigrant
workers came from Italy, then from Morocco and Turkey. They were soon
followed by growing numbers of refugees and immigrants from African,
Latin-American or Asian countries – not to mention the many “Eurocrats”
and expats working for international institutions or companies. Of course,
their languages have not been accorded official status, but this multitude of
people of different origins has turned Belgium, and especially its capital city
Brussels, into a linguistic and cultural kaleidoscope, a multicultural environ-
ment that has not only profoundly reshaped the social fabric, but also
generated new kinds of tensions, including various forms of “identity polit-
ics,” as we shall see in Chapter .
Producing a homogenous narrative of the past in such a complex
country is far from evident. A century or more after Belgium’s birth,
three conflicting interpretations of this particular area’s past had
developed: a Belgian, a Flemish, and a Walloon version. One could also
add a fourth version, a “Great-Netherlandic” view, which stressed the
common political and cultural destiny of all Dutch speakers; that is,
of both The Netherlands and Flanders, whose natural fate it seemingly
was to live together in one polity, without the Francophones dominating
the “artificial” state of Belgium. During the twentieth century, some
ambitious historiographical syntheses were published, inspired by these
conflicting views. But whether they were entitled Histoire de Belgique,
Geschiedenis van Vlaanderen, Histoire de la Wallonie, or even Geschiedenis
van de Nederlandse stam (inspired by the Great-Netherlandic view), the
authors of all these works had something in common. They generally
interpreted the past from a teleological point of view – they considered
their preferred political construct as the inexorable product of historical
evolution. In the case of Belgium, the “legitimate” outcome existed and
had to be promoted, both abroad and within the country itself. In the
other instances, the desired nation-state had not yet taken form – an
injustice that needed reparation in the eyes of respective proponents. All
these historiographical endeavors tried to demonstrate that the defining
features, or “identity,” of Belgium – or Flanders, or Wallonia, or the
Great-Netherlands – were already present in the past. This almost
“natural” identity, the product of a linear past to be proud of, had to
express itself in a nation-state, existing or yet to come.
For sure, not all these views are equally vibrant today. In twenty-first-
century Belgium, undermined by a long struggle between its two main
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Introduction
language communities (Chapter ), hardly anyone interprets the past
from a nationalistic “Belgicist” point of view. The defenders of Walloon
identity, for their part, very rarely strive for Wallonia’s full-fledged
independence – in a less finalistic approach, they rather promote the
existence of a purely regional identity, within the framework of a larger
nation-state (whether Belgium or, far less often, France). Proponents of
the Great-Netherlands, encompassing both the inhabitants of The
Netherlands and modern Flanders, are also very few nowadays –
although this political project enjoyed some resonance in the interwar
period. It is essentially within Flemish nationalism that the idea of an
independent Flanders lives on; since the start of the twenty-first century,
it is being vocally supported by a large fraction of Flemish public
opinion. This position is underpinned by a finalistic view, projecting
the modern region of Flanders into the past as an ever-existing entity
with a well-defined and immutable “identity.”
Our approach to the “Belgian” past is entirely different. This synthe-
sis does not want to “justify” one or the other polity or project. It not
only eschews teleological biases; it also tries, on the contrary, to decon-
struct some myths concerning Belgian, Flemish, or Walloon history. It
tries to do so by highlighting the main historical developments that took
place within the geographical scope of contemporary Belgium – while
being well aware that this spatial framework, based on the borders
defined in –, is often deficient if one wants to capture the
processes at work in bygone times. The regions constituting today’s
nation-state were previously embedded in specific, original configur-
ations that differed from the present ones. For instance, until the seven-
teenth century parts of northern France fully belonged to the Southern
Netherlands, and the country’s historical trajectory can only be under-
stood if these regions are integrated into our narrative.
Therefore, we must always bear in mind that the fate of the “Belgian”
territories was not determined by the later outcome – Belgium – but by
other political, economic, and cultural relationships, in particular those
resulting from the emergence of the Low Countries as a more or less
coherent political reality from the late fourteenth century. The position
adopted here, namely to explore the past starting from the modern Belgian
space, is indeed arbitrary and artificial (in the sense that it imposes a
framework that was not necessarily relevant before). But it is not more so
than if one chooses Flanders or Wallonia as a starting point. Writing the
“history of Flanders” or the “history of Wallonia” raises the same kinds of
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Introduction
problems of retro-analysis. Taking the Low Countries as a framework to
describe past developments in this part of Western Europe also has its
shortcomings. The so-called Seventeen Provinces did not exist at all in the
Early Middle Ages; between approximately the fourteenth to the sixteenth
century they indeed constituted a more or less coherent spatial and
political framework; but they largely lose their relevance for developments
in the “Belgian” territories from the seventeenth century onward.
Any Concise History of Belgium must also avoid another pitfall.
However important during the most recent decades, the struggles
between both language communities should not become its sole point
of reference. It would indeed be wrong to assume that this specific
dimension of modern Belgian history was automatically relevant in all
times past. Clearly, it was not. Before the end of the eighteenth century,
the fact that some principalities consisted of French speakers and others
of Dutch speakers, or even that both languages were used simultaneously
within some principalities, was not a real problem. Indeed, the use of
languages was determined by other mechanisms than those dominant in
modern Belgium. Prior to Belgium’s birth in , and even thereafter,
politics of course meant far more than language issues. Moreover, eco-
nomic, social, and cultural developments, both in the “Belgian” territor-
ies and in Belgium proper, are important in their own right. We shall
therefore pay due attention to these as well.
This panoramic view obviously requires some knowledge of the geo-
graphical setting: after having travelled quickly through time, we will also
do so through space (see map ., p. ). We therefore invite the foreign
reader to imagine him- or herself as a fellow traveller of the German
aristocrat Leopold of Saxe-Coburg, the widower of the heiress to the
British throne, the late Princess Charlotte. In , he had accepted the
invitation of the young Belgian authorities to become their king. To reach
Brussels, where he was to swear a solemn oath on the brand-new Belgian
constitution on July , – Belgium’s national holiday since – the
future Leopold I crossed the North Sea from Dover to Calais. At the
French town of Dunkirk, he continued, via the beach, to Belgium’s north-
westernmost commune of De Panne (La Panne in French), where he first
set foot on Belgian soil. On the king’s trail, we will travel from north to
south to introduce Belgium’s main physical and topographical traits.
Belgium’s short coast, stretching a mere km in a north-easternly
direction, presents itself as a long sandy beach bordered by dunes, only
interrupted first by the mouth of the (modest) river Yser (that was to
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Introduction
play an important role in the First World War), then by the ports of
Ostend and Zeebrugge (the latter created as late as the beginning of the
twentieth century). Today’s seashore is largely covered with concrete,
strewn with large apartment buildings and villas, and therefore looks
immutable. This is of course a false impression, not only with regard to
the perilous future of global warming, but also when looking back in
time. Indeed, in antiquity and during the Middle Ages the limits between
sea and land often fluctuated, marked by a changing landscape of small
islands, marshes, and salty meadows. By the nineteenth century, however,
the inhabitants had long since won their age-old struggle with the sea:
behind the tiny area occupied by the dunes, tireless efforts of land
reclamation had created a landscape of polders.
Here begins Low Belgium, the first of the country’s three components
traditionally distinguished by geographical textbooks. Its main feature is
aptly described by its adjective. It presents an open and flat landscape,
with no relief. Leopold, passing through this region, still saw some
sparse forests on his way to the city of Bruges, in the east, some km
from the Dutch border. Nowadays, these wooded zones have almost
completely disappeared. Deforestation was practiced from the Middle
Ages, not only in this part of the country, but also elsewhere. Land was
increasingly cleared for agriculture or husbandry, although the sub-soil,
consisting of sandy soils and sandy loam, is not ideally fertile for farming.
Some km south from the coast, one crosses the first of the two big
rivers flowing through Belgium, the Scheldt (Schelde, in Dutch, Escaut in
French). Leaving Bruges on his way to Brussels, Leopold and his
entourage reached Ghent, one of Flanders’ main cities. It is located on
the exact point where the Scheldt is met by its main tributary, the Lys (in
Dutch Leie). The Scheldt runs northeast but does not reach the sea on
Belgian soil: its delta is located in The Netherlands. Before leaving
Belgian territory this river borders the other important Flemish city,
Antwerp, whose port has played a key role since the fifteenth century.
A few kilometres south of the Scheldt begins Middle Belgium, the
second of Belgium’s three geographical regions. The rolling landscape
now consists of gentle hills, molded by a series of modest waterways that
ultimately flow into the Scheldt. Among them are the Senne and the
Dyle, on whose banks are located, respectively, the Brabant cities of
Brussels and Leuven (Louvain). The soil here consists of loam, making
this part of the country more fertile and fit for agriculture. Forests are
somewhat more present here – even if deforestation has also taken a
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Introduction
heavy toll. The Forêt de Soignes, for instance, the green lung on the
southern side of Brussels, the capital located right in the centre of
Belgium, was once part of the much larger Coal Forest, which we will
mention in Chapter .
In July , Leopold of course halted in Brussels for his inauguration
ceremony, but we will continue our journey to discover the southern part
of the country. About km southeast of Brussels, one reaches the
second of Belgium’s main rivers, the Meuse. The city of Namur – today
the capital of Wallonia – is located on the confluence of this waterway
and its tributary, the Sambre. The important city of Liège is also located
on the banks of the Meuse, some km downstream, near the Dutch
border. Indeed, the Meuse, like the Scheldt, continues its course through
the territory of The Netherlands before flowing into the North Sea. The
Meuse more or less marks the beginning of Belgium’s third physical
part, High Belgium. This is a somewhat misleading name. This southern
region is certainly known for its more accentuated relief, but Belgium’s
highest point, the Signal de Botrange in the east, culminates at a modest
m. Its soils are less conducive to agriculture, and dense forests and
large pastures dominate the area. Here is located the vast wooded and
thinly populated area of the Belgian Ardennes that imperceptibly con-
tinues into the neighboring countries of France (the French Ardennes)
and the Grand-Duchy of Luxemburg. Belgium’s south-easternmost city,
Arlon, is only km from the city of Luxemburg, the Grand-Duchy’s
capital. The distance between De Panne to Arlon is about the longest one
can travel on Belgian territory, about km as the crow flies. By car, the
journey takes about five hours. This gives one an idea of the exiguity of
Belgium’s territory, a small part of Western Europe that nevertheless
carries a rich history spanning two millennia.
Before embarking on this narrative, it is however important to clarify some
terminological issues. Certain words may indeed seem confusing to non-
specialist readers, since they refer to different realities according to context or
period. Some of these shifting notions have already been mentioned before,
but a summary appears useful to avoid fatal anachronisms.
The term “Belgium” itself requires some clarification. As mentioned
before, it dates from Roman times, but it then referred to realities that
were very different from the present. The word disappears at the
beginning of the Middle Ages, before being picked up again by the
Humanists in the sixteenth century. However, Belgica then referred to
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Introduction
the Seventeen Provinces; that is the territories of both future Belgium
and The Netherlands. The famous maps showing the Leo Belgicus
graphically demonstrate this. When the northern provinces seceded
from Habsburg rule, the remaining provinces, or Southern (or
Spanish, later Austrian) Netherlands were increasingly designated,
especially in the eighteenth century, with the adjective belgique (les
territoires belgiques, or l’Église belgique, etc.) or even (but rarely) with
the noun Belgique, the name finally given to the country that became
independent in (in Dutch België, in French la Belgique).
The term “Low Countries” (Nederlanden in Dutch; Pays-Bas in
French) can be used in two different ways. It not only designates the
two modern nation-states Belgium and The Netherlands, but also the
collection of principalities that were ruled first by the Burgundian and
then the Habsburg sovereigns (the Seventeen Provinces).
Consequently, the reader must not confuse “the Netherlands”
(another wording in English for “Low Countries” in the old accepta-
tion) and “The Netherlands” (the modern kingdom, smaller than the
first). The Dutch language introduces a nuance to distinguish both
realities: the word Nederlanden refers to the former principalities,
while Nederland (without the final “en” indicating the plural) desig-
nates the modern kingdom. The French language, alas, uses les Pays-
Bas to express both significations.
The word “Dutch” also might produce confusion. Both as an adjec-
tive and a noun, it refers to things relating to the modern kingdom of
The Netherlands (for instance the Dutch territory, the Dutch econ-
omy, or “the Dutch,” i.e. the citizens of this country). In theory, these
meanings are irrelevant for Belgium. But “Dutch” also designates a
language of Germanic origin that is spoken not only by the Dutch
themselves, but also by the Flemings, the people living in the northern
part of modern Belgium. They represent about percent of the
total Belgian population and live in the modern region of Flanders
(see below). However, they are sometimes also referred to as speaking
“Flemish” (Vlaams, in the Dutch language; le flamand in French).
This is not a language of its own; it generally indicates one of the many
different local dialectical variants of Dutch. In the following pages we
will, however, use the word “Flemish” to designate the idiom spoken
by the inhabitants of the northern part of Belgium and its predeces-
sors until the second half of the nineteenth century; for subsequent
periods, we will switch to the word “Dutch” (Nederlands, in Dutch; le
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Introduction
néerlandais in French), because the leaders of the Flemish movement
then chose to standardize their language according to the norms used
in The Netherlands (see Chapter ).
This brings us to the term “Flanders,” whose meaning drastically changed
over time. Originally, it refers to a small Carolingian pagus located near the
North Sea coast that evolved into a medieval county with a much larger
surface area. But this county did not encompass all speakers of Flemish
languages. When Belgium was created in , two of its original nine
provinces were given that name: West and East Flanders. But taken
together, these provinces still did not encompass all Flemish (or Dutch)
speakers living in Belgium. Gradually, due to the growing sense of identity
created by the Flemish movement, all people speaking Flemish/Dutch
were called “Flemings” (Vlamingen, in Dutch; Flamands in French), and
they were seen as members of one and the same community and region:
Flanders (Vlaanderen in Dutch; la Flandre in French). In the late twentieth
century, Belgium’s state reforms officially created the region (and commu-
nity) “Flanders,” a public body endowed with ever-increasing compe-
tences managing the lives of all Dutch-speaking Belgians.
One of the medieval principalities where Flemish was spoken, outside
the county of Flanders, was the duchy of Brabant. This ancient polity,
however, was much larger than nineteenth-century Brabant, one of
constitutive provinces of modern Belgium. The former included the
modern province of Antwerp and even some parts of The Netherlands
(one of the modern Dutch provinces is indeed still named “Noord-
Brabant”). The Belgian province (as the ancient principality), how-
ever, consisted of both Dutch and French speakers. Consequently, in
, one of the Belgian state reforms split this entity into two new
provinces, Vlaams-Brabant and Brabant wallon.
The word “Liège” refers to three different geographical and political
entities: first, it is an important city on the Meuse. Second, it was a
medieval principality governed by a bishop (the so-called prince-bishopric
of Liège). Finally, it is one of the modern Belgian provinces in the east of
Belgium. The spatial definition of the ancient principality was very differ-
ent from that of the modern province. Moreover, the prince-bishopric was
not part of the Seventeen Provinces (or the ancient Netherlands); only
from the late eighteenth century did this polity merge with the destiny of
the Southern Netherlands to lead to modern Belgium.
Etymologically, the words “Wallonia” and “Walloon” derive from the
old Germanic “walha” or “welsch,” designating in (post-) Roman
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Introduction
times the Celtic- and Romance-speaking populations and neighboring
Germanic ones (this also explains the origin of the words “Wales,”
“Welsh,” and “Cornwall” in the United Kingdom, and of the term
Welsch used in Switzerland by German-speaking Swiss to designate
their Romance-speaking fellow compatriots). More generally, the word
also meant “foreigners,” or “strangers.” Despite some sporadic refer-
ences dating from the fifteenth century, the word “Wallonia” takes on its
modern definition – that is, the region encompassing all Francophones
living in Belgium (except those living in Brussels) – only in the final
decades of the nineteenth century. Wallonia became a political reality –
an official region – from , after the first Belgian state reform. The
word “Walloon” also refers to a series of Romance dialects spoken in the
southern parts of Belgium, characterized by a degree of Germanic
influence. These dialects gradually waned as standard French took over
(a process somewhat similar to that of Flemish and Dutch).
Map . Belgium in (© Laure De Cock, Ghent University)
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Earliest Times
From Prehistory to the End of the Roman Period
Introduction
Dating back to Celtic times, the words “Belgium” and “Belgians” are
indeed very ancient, but this antiquity is wholly fallacious if one wants to
understand the genesis of the contemporary nation-state that carries this
name. These terms do not, in any way, reflect some remote historical
antecedents of the country founded in . In the nineteenth and
early twentieth centuries, however, many Belgian patriots – historians,
politicians, artists, teachers, and other opinion makers – were enthralled
by the abundant mentions of these “Belgians” in Julius Caesar’s De Bello
Gallico, the well-known report of his bloody conquest of Gaul. In their
eyes, these references clearly proved the age-old existence of a “Belgian
identity,” or at least of some of its constitutive elements. Of course,
nowadays no one seriously refers to “Ancient Belgians” as the “ances-
tors” of the contemporary people of this nation. But that does not mean
that these early times are irrelevant. On the contrary: the prehistoric,
Celtic, and Roman legacies played a role in shaping the territories that
were to form today’s Belgium.
Before the Celts
The people known as “Belgians” were not the first inhabitants of these
territories, and human presence in the region was of course much older.
At first sight, however, Belgium’s prehistory does not seem particularly
engaging. A contemporary tourist eager to admire spectacular relics of
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Before the Celts
early mankind is not likely to choose Belgium as a priority destination.
Here, she or he will find no equivalents of the caves of Lascaux or
Altamira, nor monumental sites such as Carnac, Stonehenge, or the
Maltese temples of Gozo and Tarxien. But prehistoric remains are not
(necessarily) relevant because of their aesthetic qualities or impressive
dimensions, for even tiny bone fragments or crude stone objects
can reveal crucial information concerning mankind’s early develop-
ment. An example taken from Belgian soil illustrates this in a striking
way. In the s, a young physician, Philippe-Charles Schmerling
(–), was interested in “old stones” and fossils. His explor-
ations in several caves in the province of Liège led to the discovery
of bone fragments that obviously did not belong to modern human
beings. Moreover, these fragments were linked to remains of extinct,
“antediluvian” animals and to primitive stone tools. Unfortunately,
Schmerling’s work, published in –, went largely unnoticed,
and so its author became a forgotten pioneer of the study of Prehistory,
predating by a decade and more the work of the Frenchman Jacques
Boucher de Perthes and other founding fathers of this scientific
discipline.
Among Schmerling’s discoveries, made in the cave of Engis number ,
was part of a child’s skull, subsequently identified as belonging to
Homo neanderthalensis. More than half a century later, in , two
incomplete skeletons came to light in another cave, located in Spy, also
in the southern part of Belgium. They belonged to the same species that
was discovered in Neanderthal in – but the discoveries in Spy
(near Namur) indisputably proved the existence of a different kind of
Homo long before the arrival of modern Homo sapiens sapiens in Europe.
According to recent C` analysis, these remains dated from , to
, years Before Present ().
But even Neanderthal man was not the first hominid to set foot in this
part of north-western Europe. The earliest traces of human presence in
“Belgium,” as evident in finds of rudimentary stone tools made by Homo
erectus, go back to c., or , . This is much later than in
other parts of Europe. In Spain and France, hominid activity is demon-
strable . million years ago; and recent finds in Happisburgh, Great
Britain (a place much closer to Belgium), go back in time from to
, years. In general, evidence from the Early Palaeolithic is rare in
Belgium. The Middle Palaeolithic is better documented, especially in its
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Earliest Times
later phases, through the presence of Neanderthals, from c.,
(the dating of a child’s mandible found in Sclayn, yet another cave in
southern Belgium) to c., . Homo sapiens sapiens appeared in
Belgium around , . These anatomically modern humans pro-
duced the first, albeit very modest, figurative objects found in the
country (an engraved reindeer antler, a small anthropomorphic ivory
sculpture, etc.) – but the relics of the cultural activity of early societies
found in Belgium are rather modest compared to the artifacts discovered
in other parts of Europe.
After a long period almost devoid of human presence (from , to
, ), due to the extreme cold of the last glaciation, Belgium was
peopled by new groups of hunter-gatherers. They were bearers of the
Magdalenian industry that also produced the admirable paintings of the
Lascaux cave. The most notable, aesthetically significant artifact they left
in Belgium – a stone plaque of about by cm now on display in the
Brussels Museum of Natural Sciences, dating to about , Before the
Common Era () and vividly representing a walking auroch – in fact
reveals a striking resemblance to the animals painted on the walls of the
so-called Sistine chapel of Prehistory. It would, however, be wrong to
infer from all these examples that the significant prehistoric sites in
Belgium are exclusively located in the southern part of the country
(where caves are indeed numerous); the less hilly regions constituting
today’s Flanders also yielded significant finds. In Kanne (in the province
of Limburg), for example, archaeologists unearthed a Magdalenian
hunters’ camp (dated , ), identified as the most northern site
belonging to this culture ever found in Europe (together with a site in
the nearby Netherlands). During the subsequent Mesolithic period
(– ) the density of sites in Flanders even ranked among
the highest in north-western Europe.
The next crucial step in human evolution was the emergence of
agriculture. The first farmers – not only cultivating grains and vege-
tables, but also raising domesticated animals such as cattle, pigs, sheep,
and goats – arrived in Belgium c. years , coming from the
northeast and following the Meuse valley upstream. These people,
named after the typical form of their pottery (Rubané or Linear
Pottery), mostly established themselves on the loess soils of the centrally
located Hesbaye region and in northern Hainaut. Around the same time,
another type of Neolithic culture, the so-called Blicquy culture, also
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Before the Celts
settled there. This culture was a hybrid between the Linear Pottery
culture that originated east of the Rhine, and a Neolithic culture that
came from southern Europe (the so-called Impresso-Cardial culture).
For unidentified reasons, these first agriculturalists left almost no
traces from c. . This most probably points to an important
population decline. New types of settlement and, with them, indications
of a growing population, emerged only half a millennium later, at c.
. These farmers now covered a much larger area of Belgium and
significantly changed the landscape, in particular through forest clear-
ances. Henceforth, agriculture also rapidly progressed in the northern
part of the country. A specific feature of this so-called Michelsberg
culture (named after the German site where these cultural traits were
prominently identified) was the existence of fortified structures, consist-
ing of earth walls, sometimes surrounded by ditches and topped with
wooden palisades. These structures (already present during the final
phase of the Linear Pottery culture) need not necessarily be interpreted
as defensive settlements, protecting farmers from hostile attack. Modern
archaeologists tend to identify them as ceremonial spaces with little or no
permanent habitation, or as symbolic markers of territory. In the Late
Neolithic period (– ), the erection of dolmens and menhirs
also reveal the emergence of new (but alas largely unknown) funeral
practices and symbolic beliefs. These megaliths, located in the southern
part of the country (for example in Wéris, near the commune of Durbuy),
are quite modest when compared with the spectacular megalithic sites
found in other European countries. But the “Belgian” megaliths prove
that this region was part of a wider cultural and social space ranging from
Brittany to Germany, and from Great Britain to Malta.
The Neolithic period also shows the first signs of specialized economic
activity. Flint, a key production tool (next to wood), was dug in many
places, but some spots developed into outright specialized mining
centers. The most notable, located at Spiennes (Hainaut province) –
now ranked a UNESCO World Heritage Site – was exploited for more
than two thousand years (– ). This intricate set of galleries,
some reaching m deep, may have produced a total of to ,
tons of flint. The extracted stones underwent a first, rudimentary,
processing before being “exported” to distant places where they were
given their final form. Spiennes tools were found within a range of
km from their original locus.
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Earliest Times
Taken together, all the features of the Neolithic period we have just
mentioned reveal a society marked by a growing complexity: agricultural
surplus fed specialized workers; trade networks linked distant places;
collective and exhausting labor schemes created the first monuments
ever; a hierarchy of places (scattered dwellings existing next to perman-
ent farming settlements, specialized camps and ceremonial spaces)
reflected a multifaceted social structure – of which, alas, little is known.
Moreover, Neolithic settlements most probably coexisted with surviving
groups of hunter-gatherers – since this way of living did not suddenly
disappear, and (hostile or peaceful?) relations with sedentary farmers
were perhaps maintained for an undetermined time span.
Far from being abrupt and clear-cut, the transition to the Metal Ages
was also slow and gradual. The first copper objects marginally penetrated
late Neolithic societies – known as the Bell-beaker culture, named after
the specific form of their pottery (– ). Due to the absence of
essential ores, the rise of Early and Middle Bronze Age societies in
Belgium was rather protracted (– ). Tin and copper, the
basic ores for bronze production, were absent in this part of Europe:
bronze artefacts were imported either from the Atlantic regions or from
Central Europe. These changes went hand-in-hand with the spread of
new funeral rites. Cremated bodies were henceforth buried in urns
deposited in funeral fields, the so-called urnfields. Simultaneously, social
differentiation increased: elites were interred in burial mounds, of which
some examples are still visible in the landscape. However, the material
relics of the Late Bronze Age no longer express this social differenti-
ation. Bronze Age cultural traits were not necessarily caused by the
arrival of new population groups from the east but could also be
explained by the slow adoption of new technologies and ways of living
by people already present and open to different influences. Gradually,
bronze objects were also produced locally, with specific, “regional” traits.
A striking characteristic of this period is the (possibly religiously
inspired) tradition of depositing precious bronze objects in rivers.
The Celtic Era
The Iron Age (from ) not only represented a change in technol-
ogy (the mastering of a new type of metallurgy) but also, and foremost,
the rise of new political structures and increased social differentiation
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The Celtic Era
(or, at least, different and more explicit expressions of contrasts in wealth
and power between social groups). Within this period, archaeologists
traditionally distinguish two phases: Hallstatt (– ) and La
Tène (– ). These names refer to the eponymous (respectively
Austrian and Swiss) places where the specific traits of these cultures were
originally identified. Yet unlike the people of the Linear Pottery, or
Michelsberg, or Urnfield, etc., “cultures,” only defined by a place name
or a cultural trait, the men and women living then and there can now, for
the first time, be designated with a specific name: the Celts.
This name, first given to them by Greek sources of the late sixth
century relating to specific populations living in a wide area north of the
Alps, which they called Κελτοι, could induce some false inferences. It
would indeed be wrong to see the Celtic world as a homogenous and
static bloc. A “Celtic realm,” let alone a “Celtic nation,” of course never
existed. Although they spoke related languages and shared certain cul-
tural, artistic, and religious features, the Celts primarily consisted of
autonomous, often rival, political entities characterized by moving
boundaries and contrasting levels of power, influence, and wealth.
This is clear, for instance, if one looks at the regions that would later
form Belgium. Archaeologists have noted that the break between the
Late Bronze and the Early Iron Age is not clear-cut in this part of north-
western Europe. Here, Bronze Age traditions persisted throughout the
first phases of the Hallstatt culture. Moreover, it is far from certain that
the populations living here were all of a sudden “new” ones, originating
from the primordial Celtic core and “invading” this new periphery. The
local inhabitants might well have gradually adopted some Celtic traits
(such as language, habits, material culture, etc.). Local funeral gifts do
point to increasing social differentiation, or, at least, they reflect more
spectacular ways of expressing them. However, splendid “princely”
tombs are less numerous in Belgium than, for example, in Baden-
Württemberg or Burgundy, with such famous sites as, respectively,
Hochdorf and Vix. Such elite grave finds in Belgium also date from a
later period.
As discovered elsewhere in the Celtic world, fortified places, generally
located on hilltops, have also been identified in Belgium. These places
were the seats of aristocrats, who possibly controlled local trade net-
works. These elites both consolidated and expressed their power through
the acquisition and display of foreign (i.e. Italic or Greek) prestige goods.
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Earliest Times
The fortification on the Kemmelberg (province of West Flanders),
dating from the early La Tène period (fifth–fourth century ), for
instance, was probably linked to the salt trade, since the nearby North
Sea shores produced and exported large quantities of this precious
commodity. But the “Belgian” fortified places were clearly located at
the periphery of the Hallstatt and La Tène heartland. One striking
example is that the Kemmelberg excavations yielded, among many other
objects, a small fragment of Attic pottery – the most northern example of
this prestigious Greek ware ever found in Europe. Some rare, typically
Etruscan objects were also found in Belgium. In the eyes of
Mediterranean traders who maintained commercial contacts with north-
ern Europe, the land bordering the North Sea probably was a sort of finis
terrae, even if precious products such as amber came from further north
still. The wealthiest and most powerful parts of the early Celtic world
clearly lay south of contemporary Belgium.
During the La Tène phase of the Iron Age (– ), important
waves of migration directly affected later Belgium. While population
movements had already occurred before, now, for the first time, they left
a trace in a written source: the account written by the Roman general
Julius Caesar. We have of course to stress the biased, probably distorted
or even erroneous nature of Caesar’s view of a local situation wholly
unfamiliar to him. Given its unique nature, we will however briefly
summarize his description of the “ethnic” and linguistic landscape in
this part of Western Europe. At the beginning of his conquest of Gaul
(– ), Caesar had heard that the north-eastern part of this
region was inhabited by Belgae. His Gallic informers told him “most
Belgae originated in Germany and had crossed the Rhine long ago”
(De Bello Gallico [BG], II, ). Defeating, driving away, and/or absorbing
the pre-existing populations, they had settled in the territories delimited
by the Seine and Marne rivers, the North Sea and the Rhine–Meuse
delta. Some even crossed the Channel to Britain. Nowadays, we believe
that these migrations took place during the third or second century .
Consequently, Caesar clearly distinguished these Belgae from the other
inhabitants of Gaul; that is, the Aquitani and the Celts (or Gauls):
according to him, they all “differ from each other in language, customs
and law” (BG, I, ). But Caesar never used the word Belgica as a proper
noun to designate this part of Gaul. Nor did he use it as an adjective
(the term Gallia belgica, for instance, dates from later Roman times).
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The Celtic Era
To complicate things further, Caesar also sporadically mentioned a
specific region that he called Belgium (in Latin), which he situated in
the regions now known as Picardie and Haute-Normandie (in France);
that is, the western part of the (much larger) region inhabited by the
Belgae. Needless to say, Caesar’s Belgium has nothing to do with present-
day “Belgium” (in English). Etymologically, the word Belgae appears to
be linked to the old Indo-European root belg-, which means “to swell”
(cf. the English verb “to bulge”) as well as “being angry” (the meaning of
the present Dutch word “verbolgen”). Thus, the name of the Belgae
presents them as “those who are swelled [by anger],” “the angry people,”
or perhaps, figuratively, “the proud ones.”
But who exactly were these Belgae? More precisely, did they speak a
Celtic or a Germanic language? This question triggered a long-lasting
debate. For nineteenth- and twentieth-century Belgians, it was a highly
sensitive issue, both politically and psychologically. By stressing the
“Celtic” nature of the Belgae, contemporary Belgians wanted to under-
line their “kinship” with the contemporary French, “heirs of the Gauls”;
by saying that the Belgae were “Germans,” they distanced themselves
from their southern neighbor and emphasized their connection with
contemporary Germany. In his widely read Histoire de la Belgique
(, th ed., ), for instance, the romantic nineteenth-century
Belgian historian Henri-Guillaume Moke firmly stated that the Belgae
“were of German blood,” belonging “to a race as blond as the Gaëls
[Celts], but stronger than them.” In the mid-nineteenth century, this
“racial” definition of the Belgae made clear that young Belgium was
independent from expansionist France, and that Brussels was not a
subsidiary of Paris.
Based on archaeological, toponymic, and linguistic evidence, modern
scholars generally conclude that most Belgae actually belonged to the
Celtic sphere. When Caesar mentioned their “German” origin, he most
probably referred to the region where they came from, namely the
territories east of the Rhine, but not to an “ethnic” or linguistic group.
The differences in language between the Belgae and the other inhabitants
of Gaul, mentioned by Caesar in the cited passage (BG, I, ), probably
referred to regional variants of Celtic. But this does not imply that all
inhabitants of the territories occupied by the Belgae belonged to the
Celtic cultural and linguistic sphere. People speaking a Germanic lan-
guage most probably also lived there. Caesar himself – somewhat
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Earliest Times
contradictorily – even made a distinction between the different tribes
inhabiting the territory of the Belgae. Only some of them, most notably
the Condrusi and the Eburones, were explicitly identified as Germani (BG,
II, ), while yet another tribe, the Aduatuci, was presented as the
offspring of the Germanic tribes Cimbri and Teutoni, that had passed
through these territories earlier, on their way to Italy (BG, II, ).
Contrary to the worldview of nineteenth- and early twentieth-century
scientists and politicians – obsessed by sharp borders, static “races” and
homogenous “identities” – these early times were characterized by
moving and mingling populations, and complex shifting zones of inter-
action between groups of different linguistic and “ethnic” origin. Tribes
were far from fixed, so that different groups could easily mix and
coalesce to form new entities. Local populations could moreover adopt
cultural elements (such as language or artistic traditions) introduced or
simply used by “foreign” (“invading” or adjacent) groups. It is therefore,
in brief, impossible to reconstruct the exact linguistic map of the terri-
tories inhabited by the ancient Belgae. Both Celtic- and German-
speaking people were probably present in different mixtures, and a
kaleidoscopic and moving picture, with mutual cultural and linguistic
exchanges, is far more plausible than a homogenous and static one.
Belgae society was characterized by the existence of aristocrats who
ruled the mass of free people, consisting of farmers; in contrast to other
parts of the Celtic world, where their presence is clearly attested, there is
no evidence of the religious specialists known as druids. As in other parts
of Gaul, their polity was fragmented, consisting of different autonomous
tribes. Some of these, smaller or less mighty, were subordinated as
“clients” to another, more powerful tribe. Once again, Caesar’s
Commentaries mentions some essential details of the tribal landscape.
The most important tribes present on the territory of later Belgium
were the Menapii (living near the North Sea coast and in Flanders, next
to the Morini, essentially dwelling in what today is northern France), the
Nervii (in the central part of contemporary Belgium, mostly in the
provinces of Hainaut and Brabant), the Eburones (mostly in today’s
province of Limburg), the Aduatuci and the Condrusi (along the Meuse
river) and the Treveri (in the south of the Ardennes).
While both archaeology and Caesar’s text prove the existence
of fortified places, or strongholds of tribes, in Belgium there are no
traces of oppida in the strict sense of the term. These pre-urban
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The Establishment of Roman Rule
agglomerations – with residential, political, economic, and religious
functions – had developed in other parts of the Celtic world, but not
in the regions inhabited by the above-mentioned tribes (with the excep-
tion of the Titelberg, an oppidum of the Treveri, but this site is located in
the contemporary Grand-Duchy of Luxemburg). Money was also intro-
duced late in comparison to other parts of Gaul, that is, not until the
second half of the second century . Since the nineteenth century,
many Celtic hoards have come to light in Belgium but ordinary people
did not use these gold coins for daily economic transactions. Celtic
money most likely had a political and diplomatic function and only
circulated among tribal aristocrats. This corroborates Caesar’s famous
description of the Belgae as the “bravest” (fortissimi) of all the popula-
tions of Gaul, because they were “farthest from the civilisation and
refinement of [our] Province, and merchants less frequently resort to
them and import things which tend to effeminate the mind” (BG, I, ).
The social and political effects of commercial and cultural contact with
the Mediterranean world were far less pronounced in the territories of
the Belgae, and especially in its most northern margins. Political power
was less crystalized, social differentiation less pronounced, and com-
merce less active.
The Establishment of Roman Rule
The history of the Roman conquest of Gaul has been told many times
over; moreover, Caesar’s own narration of his feats of arms – essentially a
book expressing his political and military propaganda – is both widely
read and easily accessible. Hence, our description of Roman military
operations in the lands of the Belgae will be very brief. After Caesar’s first
incursion in southern Gaul, the Belgian tribes feared that their lands
would be among the next targets of the Roman legions. At a general
assembly they decided combine forces in order to resist the invader. Not
all Belgian tribes joined the coalition – some even helped Caesar with
troops and logistics – but Caesar considered this (shaky) alliance to be a
threat. Acting swiftly, he decided to invade the territory of the Belgae. In
the Nervii were decimated at the Sabis river (whose precise
location is still unclear and heavily debated) because, among other
reasons, their allies the Aduatuci arrived too late to help. The latter then
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Earliest Times
took refuge in their fortress. Caesar’s troops besieged and took the place,
massacring the fighters and abducting the women and children as slaves.
The following year the Romans waged destructive campaigns against the
Morini and Menapii but failed to completely defeat them. The indefatig-
able Caesar then also briefly invaded Britain and Germania, but this did
not mean that the lands of the Belgae were entirely “pacified.” On the
contrary, a major uprising nearly jeopardized all the previous conquests.
Roman legions, spending the winter of amidst the territories of
the Belgae, suffered a surprise attack, mainly by the Eburones and the
Treveri (who had been Caesar’s allies during the battle at the Sabis, but
had now changed sides). Many Romans lost their lives and Caesar found
it difficult to restore his military supremacy (– ). Caesar expli-
citly mentions the leader of the Eburones, Ambiorix. Except for these few
references in De Bello Gallico, nothing is known about him; but
nineteenth-century Belgian patriots did not hesitate to turn him into a
“national hero”: the symbol of Belgian resistance to foreign domination –
in fact, a striking example of nationalistic myth construction. However,
one thing is certain: in the next years, Belgian tribes continued to resist
the Roman conquerors. Some of them, for example the Atrebates and the
Menapii, even participated in the great Gallic uprising led by
Vercingetorix, who was finally defeated in at Alesia, south of
the territory of the Belgae.
That year marked the official end of the Roman conquest of Gaul.
Caesar could now pursue his higher ambitions in Roman politics. But at
that moment, the Roman presence in the lands of the Belgae was still
very superficial. The main and immediate effect of Caesar’s campaigns
was most likely demographic. The Eburones seems to have been almost
wiped out; other tribes also suffered heavy losses. Should we take
Caesar’s propagandistic writings at face value? This of course remains
unclear, since we have no other source to corroborate his claims.
Archaeological sources also remain silent on the matter, since Caesar’s
legions left not a single material trace of their presence in today’s
Belgium, with one possible exception. In , a large quantity of leaden
Roman sling stones was found near the city of Thuin (in the province of
Hainaut), possibly the location of the fortified place of the Aduatuci.
Even today, virtually all geographical place names mentioned by Caesar
remain unidentified in Belgium. Many researchers, both scholars and
amateurs, still tenaciously try to locate his whereabouts in the country,
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The Establishment of Roman Rule
fiercely rejecting identifications proposed by others and advocating their
own findings.
Notwithstanding Caesar’s extensive massacres and his destruction of
farmsteads, fields, and fortified places, the lands inhabited by the Belgae
were not yet completely brought to submission. While the Roman
legions pursued successive military operations in Germany, east of the
Rhine, uprisings continued for decades on the west bank of the river –
also, but not exclusively, on the territory of later Belgium. The Romans
put down revolts of the Treveri in – and the Morini in –
. Belgae also participated in a broader rebellion of Gallic tribes in
, and one of their leaders, the Treveri chief Julius Florus, was defeated
by Roman legions in the Ardennes, where he committed suicide. A few
decades later, yet another uprising shook Roman Gaul. In – , the
Batavi (a tribe established in what is now The Netherlands) took the lead,
under their chief Caius Julius Civilis. These developments also involved
the people and territories of later Belgium. Gaul was on the brink of
breaking away from the Empire, but Roman rule was finally restored.
These events show that Caesar’s conquest was not a clear-cut break in
the history of these northern regions. While it certainly marked the
beginning of Roman rule, for many years the bulk of the “conquered”
people continued their lives largely unchanged. Part of the Celtic
aristocracy had allied itself with the new masters, and some members
of this local elite were even Romanized to a certain extent, as indicated by
the names of the insurgent leaders just mentioned. But it was also clear
that large segments of society, from top to bottom, were disgruntled by
foreign rule. Heavy taxation and other abuses, for instance, had triggered
the revolt of . During the four decades or so following Caesar’s
victory in , the Roman imprint on the newly conquered north-
eastern regions of Gaul was rather modest – apart from destruction and
plunder. It is quite significant that the first material evidence of Roman
presence in later Belgium, except the above-mentioned finds near Thuin,
dates from about . This is no coincidence, since real organizational
and structural change only started under the first Roman emperor,
Augustus (r. – ). The founder of the Principate had close
links with the regions conquered by his adoptive father, Julius Caesar,
residing there on several occasions. This interest was largely due to his
military ambitions beyond the Rhine, and his legions waged several
bloody campaigns in Germania. When Augustus finally abandoned his
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Earliest Times
dream of conquering and annexing these lands, the frontier or limes was
definitively established on the Rhine.
The military campaigns east of that river, and the subsequent stabiliza-
tion of this border of the Roman world, profoundly influenced the fate of
north-eastern Gaul by fundamentally changing its political, social, and
cultural status. This part of Western Europe, formerly an outskirt of the
world known to Greco-Roman civilization, now became the hinterland of
one its most strategic frontiers. Several crucial actions undertaken by
Emperor Augustus and his immediate successors profoundly trans-
formed these regions, and the results of these decisions and enterprises –
sometimes conscious, sometimes unplanned – were to last for centuries;
in some respects, they even survived the Roman Empire itself.
Administrative and legal changes went hand-in-hand with visible modi-
fications of the landscape. We will start by examining the political
framework imposed on conquered Gaul.
The Romans first exercised power through purely military means, and
army camps were obviously its quintessential and tangible expression.
One of the earliest examples of these sites on Belgian territory, dating
back to Augustan times, was excavated in the village of Velzeke (in the
province of East Flanders). However, given the permanent state of
confrontation, and later face-off, with the Germanic tribes, the main
Roman forces were naturally stationed further east near the Rhine. In
this way, most legions were established permanently on the territories of
contemporary Germany, while later Belgium evolved into a zone focused
on logistics and supply for the military guarding the limes. However, at
about the same time – the transitional decades from to – the
exercise of Roman power also gradually took on political, legal, and
administrative forms. This was reflected in the creation of a hierarchical
network of territorial entities or districts named provinciae and civitates.
Between c. and , Augustus divided recently conquered Gaul
into three large provinces: Aquitania, Gallia Lugdunensis, and Gallia
Belgica. Needless to say, Belgium belonged to the latter but it is worth-
while stressing that this Roman province also stretched far beyond the
boundaries of the modern nation; it covered vast regions of modern
northern France, as well as the whole of today’s Grand-Duchy of
Luxemburg. The territories west of the Rhine also belonged to Gallia
Belgica until – , from which date they were integrated into the
newly created provinces of Germania Superior and Germania Inferior.
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The Establishment of Roman Rule
During the reign of Emperor Diocletian and his co-rulers, c. ,
Gallia Belgica was split into two new provinces – Belgica Prima and
Belgica Secunda – while at the same time, the two Germanic provinces
were respectively renamed Germania Prima and Germania Secunda. This
means that at the end of the third century , contemporary Belgium did
not belong to one single province, but to three, namely Belgica Secunda
(in the west), Germania Secunda (in the east) and finally, for a very
limited part, to Belgica Prima (in the south of the Ardennes).
Each province was further subdivided in a varying number of civitates,
themselves consisting of districts called pagi (singular pagus), a territorial
entity that had a fiscal and religious role, but of which very little is
known. The pagi would, however, play an important role in post-Roman
times (see Chapter ). The civitates were more or less based on the areas
occupied by the pre-existing Gallic tribes. Consequently, the following
civitates were established in the territory of later Belgium. The civitas
Menapiorum and civitas Nerviorum belonged to Belgica Secunda, while
the civitas Tungrorum probably belonged to Germania Inferior from the
start. The civitas Treverorum was part of Belgica Prima, and its territory
mainly stretched outside the borders of contemporary Belgium.
Contrary to the Menapii, Nervii, and Treveri, Caesar never mentioned
the Tungri in De Bello Gallico. They were probably a small tribe already
present that now resettled into the territories left “vacant” after Caesar’s
massacres, together with survivors of the slaughtered Eburones, Condrusi,
and Aduatuci, and with Germanic peoples coming from over the Rhine.
This administrative organization materialized through the foundation
of cities, a major innovation in this specific part of the former Celtic
world. As we have seen, these north-eastern regions of Gaul had not yet
produced permanent (pre-) urban settlements, and tribesmen and -
women gathered temporarily in existing fortified places, mainly for
ceremonial or military reasons. A few decades after Caesar’s conquest,
the power of Rome expressed itself not only through military camps, but
also through newly founded towns that acted as “capitals” (singular
caput, plural capita) of the provinciae and civitates. However, due to the
vagaries of history, Reims, Trier, and Cologne (the capitals of respectively
Gallia Belgica/Belgica Secunda, Belgica Prima, and Germania Inferior/
Secunda) are not located on the territory of contemporary Belgium. The
same largely goes for the central places of the underlying administrative
level of the civitates, since Bavay and Cassel, the capitals of the civitas
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Earliest Times
Nerviorum and the civitas Menapiorum, are now located in France. The
sole exception is Atuatuca Tungrorum, the central place of the civitas
Tungrorum, founded around and now the city of Tongeren in the
province of Limburg. “Roman Belgium” was moreover strewn with
urban settlements, though these were mostly small. This was largely
due to yet another fundamental vector of Roman rule; that is, the road
system, a remarkable achievement that reshaped space in recently
conquered Gaul.
In all likelihood, the Belgae had already developed pathways across
their territories, but these trails left almost no traces. However, Roman
domination required a more elaborate and sophisticated communication
and transport system – the logical extension of that already developed in
Italy and in other Mediterranean regions under Roman occupation. The
first road in Gallia Belgica was built under Augustus, and by the reign of
Emperor Claudius (middle of the first century ) this network,
equipped with way stations, was largely operational. The main axis on
contemporary Belgian territory ran from west to east, linking the port of
Boulogne (on the Channel) to Cologne (on the Rhine) via the civitates
capitals Bavay and Tongeren. The latter city was linked to Arlon by a
road running from north to south. Many subsidiary and secondary roads
stretched in other directions and completed this spider’s web of Roman
power. The resultant crossroads, together with the spots bridging rivers
and smaller waterways, quickly generated new permanent settlements.
Some developed into communities of some importance called vici (sin-
gular vicus). These places did not enjoy the legal status of municipium,
that not only bestowed Roman law but other advantages as well on the
respective urban area. In the territory of later Belgium, only Tongeren
obtained this position, probably in the second century . Nevertheless,
the vici unquestionably exercised a local or even regional influence.
Indeed, as nodal points in the road system they rapidly fulfilled a crucial
economic and social role, as we shall see when examining the new society
that resulted from Roman domination.
Gallo-Roman Society during the Pax Romana
The instruments of Roman power – army, administration, cities, and
roads – jointly triggered an all-round and profound transformation of
society. This process was complex, since foreign and local elements
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Gallo-Roman Society During the Pax Romana
combined in a subtle way. As elsewhere in the Empire, the introduction
of seemingly “flawless” Roman features was accompanied by the more or
less incomplete adoption (or adaptation) of these foreign ingredients by
the local population, or even by the persistence of pre-Roman traditions
and structures. In Gaul this process gave rise to the so-called Gallo-
Roman society. Gallia Belgica, including later Belgium, was of course no
exception to this rule. Recent scholarship has emphasized the spatial and
social variations of this process, so that in marginal rural territories and
lower social groups the impact of Rome was less pronounced, and Celtic
traditions persisted.
This Roman imprint was most clearly visible in the municipia and in
the most important vici. We have already mentioned Atuatuca
Tungrorum (Tongeren), the only municipium and undoubtedly the
leading city in the territory of future Belgium. Its first stone edifices,
replacing the previous wooden and clay constructions, were built in the
second half of the first century . The city displayed the essential
features of Roman urbanism: a grid pattern; a forum or central
marketplace (not yet excavated); religious edifices; thermae, that is,
public or private bathing facilities; more or less luxurious houses for
the well-to-do; funeral monuments on the outskirts of the town; and of
course the more modest dwellings of ordinary townspeople (for instance
the houses and workshops of artisans). A vast horreum (warehouse) shows
that the city played a significant role in the supply of the troops stationed
near the limes. The city’s population is estimated at about , around
. In the south of the Belgian Ardennes, Orolaunum (now
Arlon, capital of the Belgian province of Luxemburg), due to its
strategic location at the intersection of two important roads, developed
into one of the most important vici. This place possibly had some
,–, inhabitants.
Unfortunately, few remnants of Roman architecture are extant in
Belgium today. This country cannot boast spectacular monuments such
as the Porta Nigra and the Basilica of Constantine in Trier, or the well-
preserved theaters of Nîmes or Arles in France. Apart from some unim-
pressive building foundations here and there, aficionados of Roman ruins
visiting Belgium will have to settle for parts of the old city walls of
Tongeren and Arlon. Nevertheless, a series of fine funerary monuments
from the latter town partially compensate for this meagre offering. The
bas-reliefs of these stelae provide a lively glimpse of daily life in the first
https://doi.org/10.1017/9781139018005.002 Published online by Cambridge University Press
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being baited; a thousand voices shouted to each other from boat to
boat; oars and rudders rattled, and the wind sang in the mast-tops.
It was a scene which once seen could never be forgotten.
II.
Long before the Hasselrud men had their lines set the whole fleet
had rowed back toward land. But Grim’s boat-guild, which had just
arrived, and had as yet no nets to draw, lingered for a while eating
their dinner, which they had brought with them in the boats. They
chatted and told stories about Draugen, the sea-bogey, who rows in
a half boat, and whose scream sounds terribly through the tempest.
Any man who sees him knows that he will never see land again.
Draugen is only out in the worst weather; he has a sou’wester on his
head, his face is white and ghastly as death itself, and his empty
eye-sockets have no eyes in them. The boys shuddered at the
horrible picture which was conjured up before them, and it was a
relief to them when the time came for pulling up the lines, and the
great codfishes were hauled sprawling into the boat; each one had
plenty to do now in cutting out the hooks and in winding the lines
upon their frames. A smart gale had sprung up while they were thus
engaged, and Grim began to look wistfully at the lurid sunset.
“The sun draws water,” he said; “that means lively weather. Hoist
the sails, lads, and let us turn our noses shoreward.”
He had hardly uttered his command when a thick curtain seemed
to be drawn across the face of the sun, and the sea became black as
ink.
“Clew up the sail!” he shouted, in a voice of thunder; “we are in
for it.”
With a roar as of a chorus of cataracts the storm advanced,
lashing the water into smoke which whirled heavenward, making the
sky dense as night. The masts creaked, the boats tore away with a
frantic speed, and the waves rose mountain-high, with steep, black
gulfs between them.
“Cap’n,” one of the men ventured to remonstrate, “are we not
carryin’ too much sail?”
Grim deigned him no reply, but, with a sharp turn of the tiller, ran
The Cormorant closer to the wind. Forward bounded the boat,
cleaving the coming wave with a blow of her bows which made her
timbers groan. The spray was dashed fathoms high, and would have
drenched every man on board if his oil-skins had not been water-
tight. Of the other boats only two were visible, and it was splendid
to see how they rose out of one sea, until half the length of their
keels were visible, then buried their noses in the next, while great
sheets of foam splashed on either side, and were torn into shreds by
the gale.
“This is rather lively work, I should say,” remarked the
midshipman. “I think I should prefer a man-of-war to The Cormorant
in this sort of weather.”
“I confess to a weakness for Cunarders,” said Harry; “yet I dare
say I shall enjoy this affair well enough when we get safely ashore.”
“You mean if we get safely ashore,” said Magnus, quietly. “This
has rather an ugly look to me. Though I dare say Grim knows what
he is about.”
He had scarcely spoken when a harsh voice bellowed, “Lay hold of
the mast, lads!” and in the same moment they seemed to be flung
to a dizzying height; a huge wave towered in front, showing a white
whirling top which seemed on the point of breaking right over them.
They had just time to clasp the mast when the boat, lying flat on her
side, pressed down by her weight of canvas, plunged her nose into
this mountain of water, but by some astonishing manœuvre righted
herself, slid down within another black hollow, and again rose high
on the crest of another wave.
“All hands bail!” roared the captain.
The command came not a moment too soon; the water was
rushing in from the leeward, and the flying wreaths of foam struck
the boy’s faces with a terrible force and made them smart furiously.
“Grim! Grim!” shouted Olaf, making himself heard with a difficulty
above the storm, “you are carrying too much sail.”
“Hold your tongue, gosling,” Grim thundered back; “we have got
nothin’ but the sail fer to save us.”
“What point are you making for?”
“The Bird Islands.”
“I thought there was no harbor there.”
“Reckon ye be right.”
“Gracious heavens!” cried Olaf, turning a terrified countenance
toward his comrades; “he means to wreck the boat; but he knows
what he is about. There is no other chance.”
He sat for a moment silent, gazing up into the cloud rack which
scudded along at a furious rate before the wind. Strips of storm-
riven sky, with momentary vistas of blue, were now and then visible,
but vanished again, making the dusk more dismal by their memory.
“Breakers ahead!” shouted Olaf, “look out!”
“I see a black ridge against the sky,” cried Harry; “now it is gone
again!”
He was going to say more, but the wind came with a howling
screech and forced his breath down his throat. He gasped, and as
the boat gave a tremendous lurch, diving down into a black hollow,
he could only cling to the base of the mast, lest the next tumble
might toss him overboard. The sound of a steady rhythmic roar rose
and fell upon the air, and made them strain their eyes in the
direction from which it was coming.
“Why, Grim, you are steering away from the island,” Magnus
screamed, pointing to the black ridge which was, once more, for a
moment revealed.
“He means to land us on the leeward side,” Olaf bawled in his
brother’s ear; “the chances are that the water is there a bit
smoother.”
To reach the leeward side was, however, a task which required no
mean order of seamanship. The distance was too short for tacking,
and moreover the water was filled with blind rocks and skerries
which made the approach tenfold dangerous. It seemed to the
unskilled eyes of the boys that for nearly half an hour The
Cormorant was tumbling aimlessly upon the waves, shipping seas
which it was a wonder did not swamp her, and righting herself, as by
a miracle, when again and again she seemed on the point of
capsizing. And yet all these wonderful feats were only the result of
the coolest calculation and the most consummate skill.
Just as they were clearing the hidden skerries at the western point
of the island the wind veered a point to the north, but did not fall off
perceptibly. The spray rose from the shore like a dense and blinding
smoke, and in the depths of every black abyss which opened before
them death’s jaws seemed to be yawning. Harry closed his eyes; and
though he was no coward, his heart failed him.
“What is the use of fighting any longer?” he said to Magnus, who
was lying at his side, clinging like him to the mast; “we are going to
the bottom, any way. The archangel Gabriel himself couldn’t land us
on this shore, with all the heavenly hosts to assist him.”
“But Grim is a better sailor than Gabriel,” Magnus replied, quite
unconscious of his joke. “He knows every inch of the bottom here
from the time he was a boy and used to row out here and gather
eider-down. He has told me about it often. If I were you I wouldn’t
give up yet.”
“All right, old fellow,” Harry answered, taking heart once more. “I
am ready for anything. But I am an unlucky chap—a sort of a Jonah,
who has a talent for getting into scrapes. I shouldn’t wonder if, in
case you threw me overboard, the storm would fall off and you
might sail home in comfortable fashion.”
“We mean to go overboard, all of us, in a few minutes,” Magnus
retorted, hugging Harry tightly with his left arm, which he had freed
for that purpose. “Now I am going to propose something to you. Let
us tie ourselves together with a rope so that each may help the
other; and we may either live or perish together.”
“I am afraid you would be the loser by that arrangement,” his
friend exclaimed. “You are a good deal stronger than I am, and you
will need every bit of your strength if you are to plow your way
through those awful breakers.”
Magnus, instead of answering, slipped the end of a rope about
Harry’s waist and secured it tightly; the other end he tied about his
own waist, although he came near losing his balance, and going
headlong over the gunwale. The Cormorant had now slipped around
to the leeward side of the island, where, under the shelter of the
steep rock, the water was a trifle less tumultuous. And yet a gigantic
surf was running and the undertow on the steeply sloping bottom
seemed strong enough to take an elephant off his feet. The wind
yelled and screeched from the top of the towering rock, and rushed
down in thundering eddies on the leeward side. If it had not been
for a momentary clearing of the sky, which showed the position of
the breakers and the outline of the shore, it would have been
madness to risk landing; and even as it was, the chance of being
dashed to pieces against the rocks seemed altogether to
preponderate. But Grim apparently took a different view of the
situation; as long as the sail was whole and the boat true to her
rudder he saw no cause for despair.
“Now, lads,” he roared, hoarsely, “steady on yer shanks. No
chicken-hearted chap among ye! Uncoil the rope! Thar’s a bit of
sandy beach thar—sixty or a hundred feet wide. If we be in luck
we’ll be thar in a minute.”
The ridge of the island was now half visible against the dark
horizon, but the beach below was wrapped in a dense smoke,
through which came glimpses of the black jagged rock.
“Almighty Lord! thar’s a skerry ahead,” screamed one of the
boatmen, as the retreating surf broke with a wild uproar over the
hidden rock and rose like a mighty water-spout against the sky.
There was a moment of breathless suspense. Each man seemed to
hear the beating of the other’s heart. As the boat was flung upward
again on the next wave, the wind gave a frantic shriek; the mast
bent forward under the terrible strain. The incoming surf buried the
skerry under a mountain of towering water, and high upon its crest
The Cormorant rode triumphant, only to be hurled from its crest,
fairly shooting through the air, upon the beach.
“Jump overboard!” bellowed Grim, and seizing Magnus in his arms
he leaped from the stern just as the boat struck the sand and broke
into fragments. Every man followed his example; but the undertow
swept them off their feet. Still Grim stood like a rock, holding with
his gigantic strength the rope to the other end of which Harry was
attached. Once he tottered, and if he had had sand under his feet he
would have been dragged down by his double burden. But by a
lucky chance he had planted his heels upon a bowlder which rose
slightly out of the surf. When the wildest force of the wave had been
exhausted he sprang up on the beach, depositing Magnus and the
half-unconscious Harry beyond the reach of the waves. Back he
rushed again to his former station, just as one of the boatmen, who
had momentarily regained his footing, was scrambling up toward
him.
“I am tied to the rope,” shouted the man; “someone is tugging at
it.”
“Hand it to me,” commanded Grim.
The man struggled to his feet and planted himself resolutely at his
captain’s side. All this was the work of a moment. With the next
incoming wave, which was happily much smaller than the preceding
one, four men were flung up on the sand; but they seemed half
dead, and made no effort to save themselves. Grim, who thought he
saw a glimmer of brass buttons in the water, dashed forward and
seized Olaf by the collar, just as he would have been sucked back by
the undertow. He bore him up on the shore, while the boatman
came dragging two of his unconscious comrades out of the roaring
surf. One was still missing; but as the next wave that broke in tumult
at their feet showed no trace of him, they knew that he was beyond
the reach of human help.
The work of resuscitating the men was a long and tedious one;
but Grim and Magnus both worked with their hearts in their throats,
yet with a resolution which scorned fatigue. Harry revived the
moment they had poured a glass of brandy down his throat, and he
soon recovered his spirits and volunteered his help. But the
midshipman was both badly battered and had swallowed a quantity
of water; and it was only after long and persistent efforts on Grim’s
part that his breath came back to him. Their next thought was of
fire; for the wind was raw and chill, and the last glimmer of daylight
was vanishing. The problem, however, was a serious one, for there
was not a tree growing on the island, except perhaps a few stunted
juniper shrubs up in the crevices of the rocks. And to get at these in
the dark was no easy undertaking. Nor was their situation in other
respects an enviable one. Above them loomed the black cliff, and the
surf was thundering at their feet. And there they were sitting,
huddled together in a heap to keep each other warm, and yet
shivering in their wet clothes, and thinking with horror of the long
hours of the night which must pass before they could be rescued.
“Lads,” cried Magnus, suddenly extricating himself from Harry and
Olaf’s embrace, “I am the only one of you who is not wet to the
skin, and I am going to explore this island and see if we can’t scare
up some fuel. To sit here hugging each other in the dark is a dismal
sort of business, and I am not so affectionately disposed as the rest
of you.”
“A mighty peart chap ye be, lad,” Grim said, raising his tall figure
out of the group; “but ye had better let me crawl ahead, and ye
keep astern o’ me. I know summat o’ the island and ye don’t know
nothin’.”
“I’ll keep abreast of you, Grim,” Magnus replied, “but your stern
would obscure my view; so take your bearings and let’s be off.”
“Ye be a mighty lively customer,” Grim grumbled, admiringly,
giving the boy a caressing pat in the dark.
They had scarcely crawled fifty yards up the beach when their
fumbling hands touched something cold and clammy, which felt like
the nose of some aquatic animal. There came immediately a little
chorus of whining barks, which was followed by a great flapping, as
if something broad and wet struck against the stones.
“Thunder and lightning, Grim,” cried Magnus, “what sort of beasts
are these?”
“A herd of seals,” answered Grim, quietly; “it was funny I didn’t
think o’ them. Here we have got our fuel.”
In the same moment a cold nose was stuck right into Magnus’
face and he tumbled backward, scarcely knowing how to return the
unexpected caress.
“Draw yer knives, lads,” shouted Grim to the men, “a herd of seals
is a comin’ right upon ye.”
The seals were now in full flight, rolling, tumbling, and pushing
themselves on over the smooth sand. They instinctively knew, even
in the dark, the way to the water, and they thus came plump down
upon the shipwrecked men, who had arisen in response to Grim’s
call and were ready to give them a warm reception. In the storm
and the fright of the sudden attack the keen scent of the animals
scarcely served them at all. They rushed right down upon their
enemies, and within a few minutes fully a dozen of them lay gasping
and bleeding upon the beach. The rest plunged into the surf, where
their plaintive bark was heard as they battled with the raging sea.
Grim and Magnus in the meanwhile pushed on, groping their way
over the slippery bowlders, and keeping close together so as to help
each other in case of accident. But the farther they climbed the
steeper grew the rock, and as far as they could ascertain by their
sense of touch there was no sign of vegetation.
“Now look sharp, lad,” cried Grim, warningly.
“Look sharp!” repeated Magnus, “how am I to look sharp when it
is as dark as pitch about me?”
“Right ye be, lad, right ye be,” the other retorted; “ye be a smart
chap and a peart one. But don’t ye lay hold o’ nothin’ here before ye
know it is rock. Thar be thousands o’ birds here on the lee’ard side
when thar be a storm from the north; and ef ye mistook a gull or a
cormorant fer somethin’ solid ye might tumble down and break yer
precious neck. Mark ye my word, chap, thar will be a mighty lively
hubbub here in a couple o’ minutes.”
Grim had hardly uttered this prophecy when Magnus felt
something feathery under his touch, and in the same instant there
came a piercing scream and a powerful wing dealt him a blow across
the bridge of his nose. Immediately there commenced a wild chorus
of screams and chattering protest, as if the more sober-minded birds
were deprecating this senseless uproar. Magnus thought, too, that
he heard his name called from below, but the deafening thunder of
the surf and the noise of the birds drowned all other sounds, and he
concluded that he had been deceived. It was a terrible sensation, all
these invisible wings flapping about him in the dark; unseen bodies
precipitated against him and tumbling blindly about him with a
murderous tumult from a thousand discordant voices. He raised his
elbows above his head to protect himself from the blind assaults and
the perpetual beating of wings. It hardly occurred to him to assume
the offensive until he heard Grim’s voice shouting to him:
“Draw yer knife, lad, and make it lively fer them screamin’ rascals.
Their down is worth money and they’ve got blubber as thick as a
seal’s. Give ’em no odds, I tell ye, my laddie.”
Magnus followed this advice promptly. He drew his knife, and
fought with a will, thrusting and striking right and left, and hearing
the great birds tumbling about him down the steep sides of the rock.
He had been thus occupied for a few minutes when suddenly, to his
unutterable amazement, a great blaze rose from the strand below,
lighting up the barren wall of the cliff, and showing him how narrow
the ledge was upon which he was sitting. It was a superb spectacle,
too, to see the whirling host of gulls, auks, and cormorants eddying
wildly about his head, the great black cliff looming up above him,
and the spray of the surf spouting, with angry brawl, high up into
the nocturnal air.
“Hurrah! lad,” yelled Grim, through the ear-splitting noise and
confusion, “I war a blasted fool not to think on it. They be a-burnin’
the wreck.”
The descent was a much easier affair than the ascent; for the light
of the fire below blazed up every now and then and enabled them to
see where they were treading. They picked up between them several
dozen birds, of nearly half as many varieties, and flung them down
before the fire, where the company were now seated in comparative
comfort, warming their stiffened limbs. Two of the boatmen were
engaged in skinning the seals and cutting off the blubber, which,
after squeezing out the blood, they flung into the fire. Soon the oil
began to ooze out, and, flowing over the wood, burned with a clear
and strong flame.
“I am going to make myself comfortable, fellows,” said Harry, who
was looking very pale and chilly after his involuntary bath; “and if
you don’t mind it, I’ll make a scarf of this big duck. She fits very
nicely about my throat, though she won’t accommodate herself to
the bow-knot. This little one I am going to stuff down my bosom.
She feels so deliciously warm and downy! I tell you,” he went on,
with emphasis, suiting his actions to his words, “I mean to patent
this invention, when I get back home, as an infallible cure for
rheumatism, toothache, consumption, chillblains, corns, and kidney
disease. I am going to call it Winchester’s In-wincible Wivifier. That
will sound well and catch the public eye. I was about ready to give
up the ghost awhile ago, and now I feel quite jolly.”
He stretched himself luxuriously on the windward side of the fire,
arranged half a dozen ducks and auks under his head as a pillow,
and closed his eyes. Magnus and Olaf soon followed his example,
each tying a big gull about his throat, and feeling a grateful warmth
creeping through their half-frozen bodies. The men had the good
luck to find a bunch of drift-wood large enough to keep the fire
going until morning, and to satisfy their hunger they roasted a piece
of seal-flesh, which, in spite of its oily flavor, tasted better than they
had expected. When Grim saw that the boys were asleep he covered
them carefully with his own oil-skin clothes, while he himself kept
marching up and down on the beach to keep his blood in motion.
After midnight the wind shifted suddenly to the west and fell off
gradually, the clouds were scattered, and the moon sailed calmly
through the dark-blue sky.
The three boys slept soundly after their terrible hardships, and the
eastern sky was already bright with the dawn when they opened
their eyes. The whole screaming colony of birds were again on the
wing, and whirled about the projecting crags of the cliff with wild
clamor. Several sails were already visible on the horizon and, as soon
as signals of distress were hoisted, steered toward the island. Harry,
who was ravenously hungry, made a courageous assault upon the
roasted seal-flesh, but after two futile attempts declared that he was
not sufficiently acclimated to relish such diet. If necessity compelled
him, he preferred to roast his boots, and to use the seal-oil as gravy.
“What do you say you call this island?” he asked Grim, who was
trotting at his side up and down on the sand.
“The Bird Island,” answered Grim.
“I should rather call it the ‘Skerry of Shrieks,’” said Harry; “for in
all my living days I have never heard a finer assortment of varied
yells than I heard here last night. It must be a jolly place in summer,
when the nights are light and the weather comfortable.”
“It ain’t bad fer such as like it,” was Grim’s non-committal reply.
“And do you know,” Magnus put in eagerly, “during the early fall
the island is quite covered with eider-ducks’ nests, so that you can
hardly move your feet without stepping into them. All those little
round depressions up on the slope there are such nests; and
thousands of dollars have been made here in times past by
gathering the down with which the eider-duck lines her nest; and it
is even possible during the brooding season to catch the bird alive
and pull the down from her breast; though I think that would be
cruel, as she probably needs all she has left after having picked
herself for the benefit of her young.”
“The eider-duck must be very tame,” Harry observed.
“Yes, it is very tame, indeed, because people rarely molest it,” said
Magnus; “the peasants have a kind of superstitious respect for it,
and they won’t allow anyone to kill it. It is very much the same kind
of feeling as they have for the swallow. They think a misfortune will
befall him who robs or pulls down a swallow’s nest.”
Several boats were by this time within hailing distance, and they
were easily persuaded to run up and take the shipwrecked company
on board. They insisted, however, upon drawing their nets before
returning, and thus it happened that it was nearly noon before the
party set foot on shore. They now learned that a great many boats
besides their own had been wrecked during yesterday’s storm, and
that some fifty or sixty men had been drowned. Many dead bodies
were washed ashore during the day, and some were even drawn up
in the nets and sent home to their sorrowing widows. Sad, indeed,
was the sight of the little fleet of boats which sailed southward that
afternoon, each with a tarred pine box showing above its gunwales.
The three boys, although they would scarcely have admitted that the
disaster had discouraged them, concluded, after a short
consultation, that the experience they had already had of the
fisheries was an instructive one and would probably last them for the
remainder of their lives. They therefore, without much regret,
induced Grim to hoist the sails and pilot them safely home.
FIDDLE-JOHN’S FAMILY.
I.
“Queer sort of chap that Fiddle-John is,” said the men, when
Fiddle-John went by.
“Quaint sort o’ cr’atur’ is Fiddle-John,” echoed the women; “not
much in the providin’ line.”
“A singular individual is that Violin-John,” said the parson; “I can
never make up my mind whether he is a worthless scamp or a man
of genius.” “Possibly both,” suggested the parson’s wife. “Apartments
to let,” remarked the daughter, tapping her forehead significantly.
“Hurrah! There is Fiddle-John,” cried the children, flocking
delightedly about him, clinging to his arms, his legs, and his coat-
tails. “Sing us a song, Fiddle-John! Tell us a story!”
Then Fiddle-John would seat himself on a stone at the road-side,
while the children nestled about him; and he would tell them stories
about knights and ladies, and ogres, and princesses, and all sorts of
marvellous things.
“Worthless fellow, that Fiddle-John,” said the passers-by; “there he
sits in the middle of the day talking nonsense to the children, when
he ought to be working for the support of his family.”
It was perfectly true; Fiddle-John ought to have been working. He
would readily have admitted that himself. He was well aware that his
wife, Ingeborg, was at home, working like a trooper to keep the
family from starving. But then, somehow, Fiddle-John had no taste
for work, while Ingeborg had. He much preferred singing songs and
telling stories. And a very pretty picture he made, as he sat there at
the roadside, with his handsome, gentle face, his large blue eyes,
and his wavy blond hair, and the children nestling about him,
listening in wide-eyed wonder. There was something very attractive
about his face, with its mild, melancholy smile, and a sort of
diffident, questioning look in the eyes. He had an odd habit of
opening his mouth several times before he spoke, and then,
possibly, if his questioner’s face did not please him, he would go
away, having said nothing. And, after all, it was diffidence and not
insolence which prompted this action. It would never have occurred
to Fiddle-John to take a critical view of anybody; he approved of all
humanity in general, only he had an intuitive suspicion when anyone
was making fun of him, and in such cases he found safety only in
flight and silence.
By profession Fiddle-John was a ballad-singer; a queer profession,
you will say, but nevertheless one which in Norway enjoys a certain
recognition. He had a voice which the angels might have envied him
—a clear and sweet tenor which rang through the depths of the
listener’s soul. Hearing that voice, it was impossible not to stay and
listen. The deputy sheriff, who once came to arrest Fiddle-John for
vagrancy, when Fiddle-John began to sing, sat and cried. It came
over him so “sorter queer,” he said. The parson, who had made up
his mind to give Fiddle-John a thundering reproof for neglect of his
family, the first time he should catch him, quite forgot his sinister
purpose when, one day, he saw the ballad-singer seated under a
large tree, with a dozen children climbing over him, and, with
rollicking laughter, tumbling and rolling about him. And when Fiddle-
John, having quieted his audience, took two little girls on his lap,
while the boys scrambled and fought for the places nearest to him,
the parson could not for the life of him recall the harsh things he
had meant to say to Fiddle-John. The fact was—though, of course, it
is scarcely fair to tell—the ballad which Fiddle-John sang to the
children reminded the parson of the time (now long ago) when he
was paying court to Mrs. Parson, and sometimes, on slight
provocation, dropped into poetry.
“Thy cheeks are like the red, red rose,
Thy hands are like the lily.”
These were the very extraordinary sentiments which the parson
had, at that remote period, professed toward Mrs. Parson, and these
were the very words which Fiddle-John was now singing. No wonder
the parson forgot that he had come to scold Fiddle-John. “I suppose
that such good-for-nothings may be good for something, after all,”
he said to his wife as he related the incident at the dinner-table.
Fiddle-John and his family lived in a little cottage close up under
the mountain-side, where the sun did not reach until late in the
afternoon. In the winter they were sometimes snowed down so
completely that they had to work until noon before they could get a
glimpse of the sky. The two boys, Alf and Truls, would go early in
the morning with their snow-shovels and dig a tunnel to the cow-
stable, where a lonely cow, a pig, and three sheep were penned up.
Their father would then sit at the window, holding a lantern, the
light of which vaguely penetrated the darkness and showed them in
what direction they were digging; but, after awhile, this monotonous
occupation wearied him, and he would take his fiddle and play the
most mournful tunes he could think of. It never occurred to him to
lend a helping hand; and it never occurred to the boys to ask him.
They accepted their fate without much reasoning; it seemed part
of the right order of things that they and their mother should work,
while their father played and sang. Ingeborg, their mother, had
nursed a kind of tender reverence for him in their hearts, since they
were babes. He seemed scarcely part of the coarse and common
work-a-day world to which they belonged; with his gentle,
handsome face, and his clear blue eyes, he seemed like some
superior being who conferred a favor upon them by merely
consenting to grant them his company. His songs travelled from one
end of the valley to the other, and everybody learned them by heart
and sang them at weddings, dances, and funerals. Even though the
parishioners might themselves find fault with Fiddle-John, and call
him quaint and queer, they stood up for him bravely if a stranger
ventured to attack him.
They knew there was not another such singer in the whole land,
and it was even said that people had come from foreign lands and
had made him enormous offers if he would go with them and sing at
concerts in the great foreign cities. Thousands of dollars he might
have earned if he had gone, but Fiddle-John knew better than to
abandon the valley of his birth, where he had been known since his
babyhood, and trust himself to the faithless foreign world.
Thousands of dollars! Only think of it! The very thought made
Fiddle-John dizzy; ten or twenty dollars would have presented
something definite to his imagination, which he would have
comprehended, but thousands of dollars was a blank enormity which
diffused itself like mist through his dazed brain. And yet Fiddle-John
could never stop thinking of the thousands of dollars which he might
have earned, if he had gone with the foreigner. If the truth must be
told, he himself would have liked well enough to go; and it was only
the persuasions of Ingeborg, his wife, which had restrained him.
“What could you do in the great foreign world, John,” she had said
to him; “you, with your want of book-learning and your simple
peasant ways? They would laugh at you, John, dear, and that would
make me cry, and we should both be miserable. And all the little
children here in the valley, what would they do without you, and
who would sing to them and tell them stories when you were gone?”
The last argument was what decided Fiddle-John, He did not
believe that people would laugh at him in the great foreign world,
but he did believe that the children would miss him when he was
gone, and he could not bear to think of someone else sitting under
the great maple-tree at the roadside and telling them stories. For all
that, he regretted many a time that he had been soft-hearted, and
had allowed the gate of glory to be slammed in his face, as he
expressed it. He had never suspected it before; but now the thought
began to grow upon him, that he was a great man, who might have
gained honor and renown if his wife had not deprived him of the
opportunity.
Every day the valley seemed to be growing darker and narrower;
the sight of the mountains became oppressive; it was as if they
weighed upon Fiddle-John’s breast and impeded his breath. With
feverish restlessness he roamed about from farm to farm and
played, until every string on his fiddle seemed on the point of
snapping.
“I am a great man,” he reflected indignantly, “and might have
earned thousands of dollars. And yet here I go and fiddle for half-
drunken boors at twenty-five cents a night.”
And to drown the voices that rose clamorously out of the depths
of his soul, he strummed the strings wildly; and the peasants whirled
madly around him, shouted, and kicked the rafters in the ceiling.
The gentleness and the mild radiance which had made the children
love him passed out of his countenance; his eyes grew restless, his
motions aimless and unsteady. Sometimes he flung back his head
defiantly and mumbled threats between his teeth; at other times he
shuffled along dejectedly, or lay under a tree, dreaming of the great
world which had forever been closed to him.
“If I had only dared!” he whispered to himself; “oh, if I had only
dared!”
At that moment someone stepped up to him and shook him by the
shoulder. “Hallo, old chap,” said the man, “you are just the fellow I
want! You are the party they call Fiddle-John?”
There was something brisk and aggressive about the stranger
which almost frightened Fiddle-John. It was easy to see that he
came from afar; for he had smartly-cut city-clothes, a tall shiny hat,
and a huge watch-chain from which half a dozen seals and trinkets
depended. Fiddle-John had never seen anything so magnificent; he
was completely dazzled. He sat half-raised upon his elbow and
stared at the stranger in mute wonder. “Well, Fiddle-John,” the latter
went on glibly; “you don’t seem very cordial to an old friend. Or
perhaps you don’t know me. Reckon I’ve changed some since you
used to tell me stories about the Ashiepattle and the ogre who
stowed his heart away for safe keeping inside of a duck in a goose-
pond, some thousands of miles off. I have often thought of that
story since. Fact is, that is just the kind of arrangement I am after.
I’ve too much heart, Fiddle-John, too much heart. My heart is always
getting me into trouble, and if I could make an arrangement to leave
it behind here in Norway, while I myself return to America, I should
like it first rate. You don’t happen to know of any party who would
be willing to keep it for me during my absence, hey, Fiddle-John?”
The man here laughed uproariously and slapped Fiddle-John on
the shoulder.
“You are the same rum old customer you used to be, Fiddle-John,”
he said in a tone of cordial good-fellowship; “but you don’t seem as
talkative as you used to be—don’t even tell me you are glad to see
me. Now, that’s what I call hard, Fiddle-John. Don’t even know the
name of your little friend James Forrest—or—beg your pardon—Jens
Skoug, I mean to say, who used to climb on your back and listened
in rapture to your wonderful voice and your marvellous fairy tales.”
A gleam of intelligence flitted across Fiddle-John’s features, as he
heard the name Jens Skoug, and he arose with bashful hesitancy
and extended his hand to the talkative stranger. He remembered
well that Jens’ family had emigrated, some ten years ago, to the
United States, and he remembered also vividly the uncouth little
creature in skin-patched trousers and ragged jacket who had
embarked, at that time, in the great steamer that came to take the
emigrants off to Bergen. And now this little creature was a tall,
dazzling man with a silk hat and showy jewellery, and an address
which a prince might have envied. Thus reasoned Fiddle-John in his
simplicity. Such a marvellous transformation he had never in all his
life witnessed. The name James Forrest which Jens had dropped by
a deliberate accident also impressed him strangely. It seemed to add
greatly to Jens’ magnificence. A man who could afford to have such
a foreign-sounding name must indeed be a person of enterprise and
prominence. It surrounded Jens with a delightful foreign flavor which
captivated his friend even more than his brilliant talk. “Jens,” he said,
making an effort to conquer his diffidence, “you have grown to be a
great man, indeed. How could you expect me to recognize you?”
“A great man!” exclaimed Jens, expanding agreeably under his
friend’s sincere flattery; “no, Fiddle-John, I am not a great man—that
is, not yet, Fiddle-John. But I mean to become a great man before I
die. In America, where I live, every man can become great if he only
chooses to. But I thought, being young yet, that I could afford to
spend a couple of months in opening to my countrymen the same
road to fortune which is open to myself, before I settled down to
tackle life in earnest. Fact is, Fiddle-John, as I said before, I have too
much heart. My conscience would leave me no peace, whenever I
thought of my poor countrymen who were toiling here at home for
twenty-five or forty cents a day, and scarcely could keep body and
soul together, while I could earn five and ten dollars a day as readily
as I could blow my nose. I positively cried, Fiddle-John, cried like a
girl, when I thought of you and your small chaps and of all the other
poor fellows here in the valley who had such a hard time of it,
tearing off their caps and bowing and scraping before the parson
and the judge and all the big guns, while in America we step up to
the President himself, wring his hand and say, ‘How are you, old
chap? I’ll drop in and take pot-luck with you to-morrow, if you don’t
happen to have company.’ And he, likely as not, will say to me,
‘Right welcome shall you be, Jim; bring a couple of good fellows
along with you. We don’t stand on ceremony around the White
House. Perhaps I may be able to hunt up a consulship or a foreign
mission for you, if you should happen to be out of office and pressed
for cash.’ Now, that’s what I call good manners, Fiddle-John, and the
chances are ten to one that, if you call upon him with a note from
me, he may set you up in a right fat office, where you may cock
your head at parsons and judges and feel yourself as big as the very
biggest.”
Fiddle-John listened with eager ears and open mouth to this
alluring narrative. It did not occur to him to question the truth of
what Jens said, for did not his appearance and his independent and
dazzling demeanor plainly show that he was a great and prosperous
man? And, moreover, how could he have undergone such a startling
transformation in a few years, if it had not been true, as he said,
that the President of the United States or some other mighty
personage took an interest in him. Fiddle-John had often heard it
said that in America all things were possible; and he had himself
read letters from persons who here at home had been poor tenants
or even day laborers, and who over there had become colonels, and
merchants, and legislators. Therefore, he was not in the least
surprised at the good luck which had overtaken his former friend. He
was only surprised that the thought of going to America had never
occurred to him before, and he made up his mind on the spot to sell
his cow, his pig, and his three sheep, and take the first ship for New
York. He could scarcely stop to bid Jens Skoug good-by, so eager
was he to rush home and communicate his resolution to his wife and
children. He foresaw that he would meet with opposition from
Ingeborg; but he steeled his heart against all her entreaties and
vowed to himself that this time he would have his own way. Was it
not enough that she had once nearly ruined his life? Should he
permit her again to snatch the chance of greatness away from him?
He was flushed and breathless when he reached his little cottage
up under the mountain-wall. It had never looked so mean and
miserable to him as it did at this moment. The walls were propped
up on the north and west sides with long beams, and dry, brownish
grass from last year grew in tufts along the roof-tree and drooped
down over the eaves. His two sons, Alf and Truls, were playing bear
with their little sister Karen, who was seven years old. But they rose
hurriedly when they saw their father, and brushed the sand from the
knees of their trousers. There was something in his bearing and in
the expression of his face which vaguely alarmed them. He stooped
no more in walking, but strode along proudly with uplifted head.
“Boys,” he cried, joyously, “run in and tell your mother, to-morrow
we are going to America!” Ingeborg, who was just coming across the
yard with a new-born lamb in her arms, paused in consternation,
and gazed with a frightened expression at her husband.
“What has happened to you, John?” she asked, gently. “I thought
that matter about the foreigner was settled long ago.”
“I tell you, no!” he shouted, wildly; “it is not settled. It never will
be settled as long as there is breath left in my body. This time I
mean to have my own way. Jens Skoug has come back from
America, and he says that America is the place for me. I knew it all
along, and whether you will follow me or not, I am going.”
“Follow you, John? Yes, if go you must, then I will follow you. But
to America I will not go willingly, unless I know what we are to do
there, and how we are to make our living. It is a long, long distance,
John, across the great ocean; they speak a language there which
neither you nor I understand.”
Fiddle-John turned impatiently on his heel, as if to say that he
knew all that twaddle from of old; but Ingeborg, giving the lamb to
Alf, went up to him, laid her hand on his arm, and said:
“You and I have lived together for so many years, John, and we
love each other too well ever to be happy away from each other.
Don’t let us speak harsh words. They rankle in the bosom and cause
pain, long after they are spoken. If you must go to America, I will go
with you. But I have a feeling that I shall never get there alive. I beg
of you, don’t decide rashly and don’t believe all that Jens Skoug tells
you. He was not a truthful child, and I doubt if he has grown up to
be a good man. Let us say no more about it to-night. We will sleep
on it, and see how it will look to us to-morrow.”
Fiddle-John was not a bad fellow; on the contrary, he was quite
soft-hearted and easily moved. This wife of his had toiled in poverty
and ill-health all her life long, and he had never offered to lift a
finger to help her. Yet she loved him, accepting her lot meekly, and
never uttering a word of reproach against him. He had never
observed before how thin and worn she looked, how hollow her
cheeks were, and how large her eyes. He felt for the first time in his
life a pang of remorse. He had not been a good husband, he
thought; not as good as he might have been. But then he was a
great man, and great men were never the best of husbands. And
when he reached America, and his greatness became generally
recognized, and fortune began to smile upon him, then he would
shower kindness upon her, and she would be rewarded a thousand-
fold for all she had suffered. Surely, he would turn over a new leaf—
in America.
Thus Fiddle-John consoled himself, when his conscience grew
uneasy. When only they got to America, he reasoned, then
everything would be right. He would have started without delay if
Ingeborg’s health had not failed so rapidly that the doctor positively
forbade her to think of travelling. The look of suffering and sweet
forbearance upon her face seemed a perpetual reproach to Fiddle-
John, and he roamed restlessly from one end of the valley to the
other, playing, singing, and telling his stories, in order to earn money
for the voyage, he said to his sons; but, in reality, to escape from the
unspoken reproach of his wife’s countenance. But the day soon
came when he needed no longer to flee from her presence. One
bright spring day, just as the snow was melting, and the bare spots
on the meadows steamed in the sun, Ingeborg closed her weary
eyes forever; and a few days later she was laid to rest in the shadow
of the old church down on the headland, where the song-thrush
warbles through the brief Arctic summer night.
II.
Down in the valley the Easter bells were chiming; the bell-strokes
trembled through the clear, sun-steeped air. There was commotion in
the valley, too, in spite of the fact that it was Easter Sunday. Out in
the middle of the fiord lay a huge black steamer, which panted and
shrieked, as if it were in distress, and sent volumes of gray smoke
out of its chimneys. Around about little black fragments of coal-dust
were drizzling through the air and swimming on the water; and the
gulls which kept whirling about the smoke-stacks were quite shocked
when they caught the reflections of themselves in the tide; with wild
screams they plunged into the fiord. They probably mistook
themselves for crows.
The pier, which broke the line of the beach at the point of the
headland, was thronged with men, women, and children. The men
were talking earnestly together; most of the women were weeping,
and the children were gazing impatiently toward the steamboat and
tugging at their mother’s skirts. Some twenty or thirty boats, heavily
laden with chests and boxes, lay at the end of the pier; and one
after another, as it was filled with people, put off and was rowed out
to the steamer. Only the old folk remained behind; with heavy hearts
and tottering steps they walked up the sloping beach and stood at
the roadside, straining their eyes to catch a last glimpse of the son
or daughter, whom they were never to see again. Some flung
themselves down in the sand and sobbed aloud; others stooped over
the weeping ones and tried to console them.
At last there was but one little group left on the pier; and that was
composed of Fiddle-John and his three children. Jens Skoug, the
emigration agent, was standing in a boat, shouting to them to hurry,
and the boys were scrambling down the slippery stairs leading to the
water, while the father followed more deliberately, carrying the little
girl in his arms.
There was a Babel of voices on board; and poor Fiddle-John and
his sons, who had never heard such noise in their lives before, stood
dazed and bewildered, and had scarcely presence of mind to get out
of the way of the iron chains and pulleys which were hoisting on
board enormous boxes of merchandise, horses, cattle, pigs, and a
variety of other commodities. It was not until they found themselves
stowed away in a dark corner of the steerage, upon a couple of
shelves, by courtesy styled berths, which had been assigned to
them, that they were able to realize where they were, and that they
were about to leave the land of their fathers and plunge blindly into
a wild and foreign world which they had scarcely in fancy explored.
The first day on board passed without any incident. The next day,
they reached Hamburg, and were transferred to a much larger and
more comfortable steamer, named the Ruckert, and before evening
the low land of North Germany traced itself only as a misty line on
the distant horizon. Night and day followed in their monotony;
Russian Mennonites, Altenburg peasants, and all sorts of queer and
outlandish-looking people passed in kaleidoscopic review before the
eyes of the astonished Norsemen. It was the third day at sea, I
think, when they had got somewhat accustomed to their novel
surroundings, that a little incident occurred which was fraught with
serious consequences to Fiddle-John’s family.
The gong had just sounded for dinner, and the emigrants were
hurrying down-stairs with tin cups and bowls in their hands. The
children were themselves hungry, and needed no persuasion to
follow the general example. They unpacked their big tin cups, which
looked like wash-basins, and took their seats at an interminably long
table, while the stewards went around with buckets full of steaming
soup, which they poured into each emigrant’s basin, as it was
extended to them, by means of great iron dippers. Many of the
Russians were either so hungry or so ill-mannered that they could
not wait until their turn came, but rushed forward, clamoring for
soup in hoarse, guttural tones; and one of the stewards, after having
shouted to them in German to take their places at the tables, finally,
by way of argument, gave one of them a blow on the head with his
iron dipper. Then there arose a great commotion, and everybody
supposed that the angry Mennonites would have attacked the
offending steward. But instead of that, the crowd scattered and
quietly took their places, as they had been commanded. They were
an odd lot, those Mennonites, thought the Norse boys, who did not
know that their religion forbade them to fight, and compelled them
to pocket injuries without resentment.
Next to Alf, on the same bench, sat a swarthy boy, fourteen or
fifteen years old, with yellow cheeks and large black eyes. He had a
thin iron chain about his wrist and seemed every now and then to
direct his attention to something under the table. Alf concluded that,
in all probability, he had his bundle of clothes or his trunk hidden
under his feet. But he was not long permitted to remain in this error.
Just as the steward approached them and extended the long-
handled dipper, filled with soup, a fierce growl was heard under the
bench, and a half-grown black bear-cub rushed out and made a
plunge for his legs. The frightened steward made a leap, which had
the effect of upsetting the soup-pail over his assailant’s head.
A wild roar of pain followed, and everybody jumped on tables and
benches to see the sport; while the Savoyard boy who owned the
bear darted forward, his eyes flashing with anger, and hurled a flood
of unintelligible imprecations at the knight of the soup-pail. There
was a sudden change of tone, as he stooped down over his scalded
and dripping pet, and, showering endearing names upon it, hugged
it to his bosom.
The emigrants jeered and shouted, the waiters swore, and the
purser, who had been summoned to restore order, elbowed his way
ruthlessly through the crowd until he reached the author of the
tumult.
“How do you dare, you insolent beggar, to bring a bear into the
steerage?” he cried, seizing the boy by the collar, and shaking him.
“Who permitted you to bring such a dangerous beast——”
His harangue was here suddenly interrupted by the bear, which
calmly rose on its hind legs and, showing its teeth in an unpleasant
manner, prepared to resent such disrespectful language. The purser
took to his heels, while the steerage rang with jeers and laughter,
and the Savoyard had all he could do to prevent his friend from
pursuing him. The Norse boys, whose sympathy was entirely with
the bear and his master, quite forgot their hunger in their excitement
over the stirring incident; and when the Savoyard, feeling that the
steerage was scarcely a safe place for him after what had occurred,
mounted the stairs, dragging his bear after him, they could not resist
the temptation to follow him at a respectful distance. But when they
saw him crouching down behind the big smokestack and gazing
timidly about him while he wiped the bear’s head and face with his
sleeve, they could not conquer the impulse to make the
acquaintance of so distinguished and interesting a personage. They
accordingly sidled up slowly, holding their sister between them, and
were soon face to face with the Savoyard.
“What is your name?” asked Truls with a boldness which raised
him immensely in his brother’s esteem.
The Savoyard shook his head.
“What do people call you when they speak to you?” Truls
repeated, raising his voice and drawing a step nearer.
“Non capisco. Je ne sais pas,” answered the boy in Italian and
French, giving them the choice of the only two languages he knew.
“Capisco,” Truls went on confidently in his Norse dialect; “that is a
very funny name. I am afraid you don’t understand me. It wasn’t the
bear’s name I asked for; it was your own.”
The Savoyard shrugged his shoulders expressively, then poured
out a torrent of speech which bewildered his Norse friends
exceedingly. If the bear had opened its mouth and addressed them
in the ursine language, it would not have succeeded in being more
unintelligible.
“You are a very funny chap,” Truls remarked with a discouraged
air. “Why don’t you talk like a Christian?”
He was determined to make no more advances to so irrational a
creature, and was about to lead the way back to the dinner-table,
when the arrival of the purser and the third officer of the ship again
arrested his attention. The purser had evidently been hunting for the
Savoyard; for, as he caught sight of him, he made an exclamation in
German and called out to the third officer:
“There is the vagabond! Make him understand, please, that his
bear must be shot and that he must get out of the way. He has
taken out no ticket for his beast and we don’t take that kind of
freight gratis!”
The third officer, who spoke French fluently, explained the purport
of the purser’s remarks to the Savoyard, but in a gentle and kindly
manner which almost deprived them of their cruel meaning. The
boy, however, made no motion to stir, but remained calmly sitting,
with his arm thrown over the bear’s neck and one hand playing with
his paws.
The officer, seeing that his words had no effect, repeated his
remark with greater emphasis. A startled look in the boy’s eyes gave
evidence that he was beginning to comprehend. But yet he
remained immovable.
“Get out of the way, I tell you!” cried the purser, drawing a
revolver from his hip-pocket and pointing it at the bear’s head. “I
have orders to kill this beast, and I mean to do it now. Quick, now, I
don’t want to hurt you!”
The boy gazed for a moment with a fascinated stare at the muzzle
of the terrible weapon, then sprang up and flung himself over the
bear, covering it with his own body. The animal, not understanding
what all this ado was about, took it to mean a romp, and began to
lick his master’s face and to claw him with his limp paws.
“Well, I have given you fair warning!” the purser went on,
excitedly, as he vainly tried to find an exposed vital spot on the bear
at which he could fire. “If you don’t look out, you will have to take
the consequences.” A large crowd had now gathered about them,
and a loud grumble of displeasure made itself heard round about.
The purser began to perceive that the sentiment was against him,
and that it would scarcely be safe for him to execute his threat. Yet
he found it inconsistent with his dignity to retire from the contest,
and he was just pausing to deliberate when, all of a sudden, a small
fist struck his wrist and the pistol flew out of his hand and dropped
over the gunwale into the sea. A loud cheer broke from the crowd.
The purser stood utterly discomfited, scarcely knowing whether he
should be angry with his small assailant or laugh at him. He would,
perhaps, have done the latter if the cheering of the people and their
hostile attitude toward him had not roused his temper.
“Bravo, Tom Thumb!” they cried. “At him again! don’t be afraid of
the brute because he has got brass buttons on his coat.”
“Good for you, Ashiepattle!” the Norwegians shouted; “go it again!
We’ll stand by you!”
It was Truls, Fiddle-John’s son, who had thus suddenly become
the hero of the hour; he had acted in the hot indignation of the
moment and was now abashed and bewildered at the sensation he
was making. He looked anxiously about for his brother and sister,
and as soon as he caught sight of them, was about to make his
escape when the purser seized him by the collar and bade him
remain.
“You are a nice one, to be attacking your betters, who have never
given you any provocation,” he said in German, which Truls,
fortunately, did not understand. “I am going to take you to the
captain, and he will have you punished for assault.”
He made a motion to drag the struggling boy away, but the crowd
closed about him on all sides, and pressed in upon him with angry
shouts and gestures. The third officer, who had so far taken no part
in the proceedings, now stepped up to the purser and begged him to
release the boy.
“Of course,” he said, “you are in the right; but if I were you, I
would waive my right this time. It’s hardly worth while making a row
about so small a matter; and it is always bad policy to go to the
captain with squabbles and grievances, especially when they might
so easily have been avoided. I assure you, you will only injure
yourself by doing it.”
They talked for a minute together, while the ever-increasing
throng surged hither and thither about them. Whether purposely or
not, the irate purser, in the zeal of his argument, released his hold
on Truls’ collar, and the liberated boy dodged away, as quickly as
possible, and was soon lost in the crowd. The Savoyard and his bear
had long before seized the opportunity to withdraw from the public
gaze.
III.
The life on shipboard did not agree with Fiddle-John. Like a
spoiled child, he was restless and unhappy when he was unnoticed.
All day long he sat on the top of a coil of rope in the forecastle of
the ship and sang. The forecastle was often deserted, and there
were probably not many among the emigrants who would have been
capable of judging whether his voice was in any way extraordinary.
And yet, one there was who found an untold amount of comfort in
listening to that clear, sweet tenor of Fiddle-John’s, and that one was
the Savoyard boy. It had been his constant effort, since his
encounter with the purser, to make himself as inconspicuous as
possible, and it would have gratified him much if he had possessed
some means of making the bear invisible. As the forecastle was the
least visited portion of the ship, he had chosen to hide himself there
behind the anchor-cable.
He trembled whenever anyone approached, and threw the end of
the tarpaulin which covered the deck-freight over his friend, the
bear. The only people whose company did not incommode him were
Fiddle-John and his children, for whom he testified his devotion by
smiles and gestures and all sorts of endearing Italian diminutives,
which, on account of his caressing tones, even a dumb brute could
not have failed to appreciate. After a long and exciting pantomime,
Truls ascertained that his name was Annibale Petrucchio and that his
bear gloried in the name of Garibaldi.
Both boys felt that they had made great progress in each other’s
friendship when these facts had been established, and another hour
of dumb show, intersprinkled with exclamations, resulted in a still
more astonishing revelation, which was that Annibale and his friend
slept every night on deck, because they feared to arouse once more
the purser’s displeasure by invading the steerage. Sometimes
Annibale curled himself up with Garibaldi within the coil of the
anchor-cable—he jumped up, dragging the bear after him, to show
the attitude in which they slept—but when it rained, or when the sea
was high enough to sprinkle the deck, they both crept under the
deck-freight tarpaulin, where they had made themselves a little
house between two trunks which they had pushed apart. The only
trouble was that the April nights were very cold—Annibale shivered
all over to show how cold he was—and anchor-cables and deck-
freight were not particularly soft to sleep upon.
As Alf and Truls became duly impressed with the unpleasantness
of the Savoyard’s situation, they took counsel in order to ascertain
how they might relieve his distress. But all the plans that were
suggested were found to be risky, and night came before they
arrived at a decision. The weather had been raw and blustery all the
afternoon, and the officer on the bridge had been looking every
minute uneasily at the falling barometer. After sunset the gale
increased in violence and the ship pitched and rolled in the heavy
sea. In the steerage there was a terrible commotion; women prayed
and screamed and moaned, children of all ages joined in the chorus,
the lamps swung forward and backward in their brass frames, and
bottles, glasses, and loose crockery made a terrible racket, sliding to
starboard and back again to port with every motion of the ship. The
wind howled in the rigging, and every now and then a big wave
swept across the deck and poured out through the scupper-holes.
Alf and Truls, who had been lying awake for hours listening to the
hollow boom of the waves and the shrieking of the wind, conversed
in a whisper about the poor Savoyard, who had to be on deck in that
terrible weather, and they finally summoned courage to creep toward
the ladder and slowly to mount it, tightly clutching each other’s
hands. It was a risky undertaking, and their hearts stuck in their
throats as they clung to the door-knob, hesitating whether they
should open the door. Without knowing, however, they must have
given the knob a twist; for suddenly the door swung open with a
tremendous bang, and Truls was flung across the deck against the
bulwarks with such force that for an instant he scarcely knew
whether he had lighted on his head or his feet.
He picked himself up, however, without any serious damage, and
as there was a momentary lull in the storm, he half rolled, half crept
up toward the prow, where a couple of lanterns were swinging in the
fore-royal stays. Nevertheless it was so dark that he could not
discern an object ahead of him, and only groped his way along the
bulwarks, until he stumbled upon a demoralized mass of rope which
he knew to be the anchor-cable.
“Annibale!” he shouted at the top of his voice, “are you here?” But
before he had time to receive a reply the ship plunged into a
monstrous wave, which rose in a storm of spray and drenched the
whole forecastle up to the mainmast. Truls, in his effort to keep his
footing, tumbled forward and grabbed hold of something wet and
hairy, which slid along with him for a couple of yards, and then was
hauled back by some unseen force. The boy crawled along in the
same direction and shouted once more, “Annibale! where are you?”
And a voice close to his ear answered:
“Ah, Monsieur Truls, Garibaldi et moi, nous sommes à demi
morts.”[11]
“Now, don’t jabber at me, Annibale,” Truls observed, making his
voice heard above the wind; “but if you will come along with me, Alf
and I will give you half of our berth; and Garibaldi can sleep at our
feet.”
Whether Annibale understood the words or not, he could not fail
to comprehend the friendly gestures which accompanied them. He
eagerly seized Truls’ hand and they plunged bravely forward, but
slipped on the wet deck, and the bear and the boys slid with great
speed in the direction of the descent to the steerage. They were
drenched to the skin and considerably bruised when, after several
unsuccessful efforts, they seized the door-knob. Alf, as it turned out,
feeling too ill to keep watch, had already preceded them to bed.
Garibaldi, who seemed keenly conscious of his disgrace since the
day he molested the purser, slunk along as meekly as possible, and
only now and then shook his wet skin and coughed in a dispirited
fashion. He was not as grateful, moreover, as might have been
expected, when he was assigned his place on the straw at the foot
of the berth, but gradually pushed himself upward until his nose
nearly touched that of his master; whereupon he curled himself up
comfortably and went to sleep. It was a very pretty sight to see the
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