The three main historical cities of Dutch speaking Belgium are Bruges, Ghent and Antwerp. The latter historically belongs to the Duchy of Brabant, under the influence of the Holy Roman Empire, Germanic of nature. Bruges and Ghent, on the other hand, were connected to the County of Flanders, under the suzerainty of the King of France, until things were complicated by the integration of the Lower Countries into the orbit of the Dukes of Burgundy, who were not particularly on good terms with their Parisian nephews, but neither with the Holy Roman Emperor. In 1477 Mary of Burgundy got married with Maximilian of Austria, so her dad, Charles the Bold, was expected to give the couple a dowry. Can you give a set of cooking pots to your only child when she gets married? Besides, had Mary ever boiled an egg herself? No, Charles thought, so he gave her the Duchy of Brabant, which consequently entered into the orbit of the Habsburg Empire. Five years later, Mary fell off her horse and died childless, so her possessions came under regency of Maximilian too. The House of Habsburg now had control over all Flanders and Brabant, including the three main cities of Bruges, Ghent and Antwerp.

In 1089 Bruges had become the capital of the County of Flanders and prospered as a main trading post of the Hanseatic League. In 1309 Bruges even established what was probably the first stock exchange in the world. Trade of cloth and wool strengthened relations with England, which was of course not very much to the liking of the French kings. Having this issue in common, Bruges, Ghent, Ypres and an autonomous area near Bruges, the 'Brugse Vrije', teamed up in an alliance against France, towards the end of the 14th century.

But the partners quarrelled a lot. While Bruges was struggling with the silting up of its access to the sea, Ghent was flourishing. With 65,000 inhabitants it had already become the largest city north of the Alps by the 13th century. Still, Bruges remained politically and culturally important, as the Burgundian Dukes resided quite often in the city, bringing dynamics of art and lavish court spending. However, when Flanders and its two major cities fell into Habsburg hands in the late 1400s, their period of glory was over: the Habsburg rulers saw no interest in Bruges without sea access and the inhabitants of Ghent were just one obnoxious bunch of troublemakers, constantly rebelling about taxes and on top of that, sympathetic to the Protestant movement which ultimately pulled Habsburg into the War of Eighty Years (1568-1648) against the seceding Dutch Republic. Reasons enough for the Habsburg Empire to shift the centre of importance to Brabant, with the cities of Brussels and Antwerp. Soon English, Portuguese and other trading houses mushroomed in Antwerp, Atlantic colonial trade zoomed in on Antwerp. The city's Golden Age! But the secession of the Dutch Republic at the end of the War of Eighty Years brought it all abruptly to a standstill, as the Dutch blocked the Scheldt River mouth, strangled Antwerp's port economy and caused the cultural and economic gravity of the Lower Countries to move north, to Amsterdam. Antwerp's predicament essentially never changed until a Belgian-Dutch agreement was concluded in … 1863. Before that, only the exception of short-lived periods of reunion of North and South had justified a sparkle of hope, first under Napoleon's occupation, then during the 15 years of the United Kingdom of the Lower Countries.

So, with this complex but fascinating historical background in mind, enjoy Ghent, Bruges and Antwerp, three pearls reflecting in their own distinct way a grand past and a dynamic present in which old and new still blend into a remarkable and unique cocktail of lively city centres.

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