FLANDERS was formerly the name of an extensive and almost independent territory ruled by "counts," and embracing, besides the present Belgian provinces of the same name, the southern portion of the province of Zealand in Holland, and some of the departments in the me. of France. Cmsar found this district inhabited by the Morini, the Menapii, and the Nervii, and having conquered these tribes, lie annexed the coun try. Under the rule of the Franks, the river Scheldt, which flowed through the dis trict, formed the boundary line between Neustria and Austrastia, in consequence of which the northern and south-western parts of the territory comprised under the term F., although its population was decidedly Germanic, came to belong to France, while the s.e., although to a large extent non-Germanic, was after 1007 included in the Ger man empire. F. obtained its name from the Vldndergau (pagus Flandrensis, the district around Bruges and Sluis), whose counts had been made wardens of the north-eastern coasts of France at the period of the incursions of the Normans, in the latter half of the 9th c., and who extended the name of their hereditary possessions to the whole district which they governed. The first count or markgraf of the country is said to have been Baldwin, surnamed Bras de Fer (iron-arm), who married Judith, the daughter of king Charles the bald of France, and widow of Ethelwulf, king of England, and afterwards received the newly created "mark" or county, in 864, as a hereditary fief from his father-in-law. He extended hie, territories by the addition of Artois, which was held by his successors until Philippe Auguste reunited it to France. He died in 879, but not until he had inaugurated the industrial greatness of F. by introducing into it a great number of workmen skilled in the manufacture of woolen and other goods. Baldwin IV., or the bearded; one of-the successors of Baldwin Bras de Fer, received in fief from the emperor Henry II. the burgraviate of Ghent, Walcheren, and the islands of Zealand, and thus became a prince of the German empire. He was succeeded by his son Baldwin V., or the pious (1036-67), who increased his possessions by the addition of the German territory between the Scheldt and the Dender, belonging to the duchy of Lower Lorraine. To this he added Tournay, the supremacy over the bishopric of Cambrav (to which, till the erection of the new bishopric of Arras, the county of Flan ders hack been ecclesiastically subordinate), and the county of Hainault. During the middle ages, F. figured prominently in the political affairs of Europe—the counts of F. being more powerful and wealthy than many. European kings. Baldwin IX., the founder of the Latin kingdom at Constantinople, died in 1206, leaving two daughters, one of whom died without children; the other bequeathed Hainault to John of Avenues, her son by her first marriage; and F. to Guy Dampierre, her son by a second 'mar.
riage. Meanwhile, the industrial prosperity of the cities of F. had becomq so great, that the citizens began to feel their own power, and to claim independence. They formed republican communities like the free cities of Germany, with this difference, that they admitted the nominal suzerainty of the counts. But they were not afraid to take up arms in defense of their liberties against their nominal masters. Witness the insurrection headed by Jakob van Artevelde (q.v.) against the cruel government of count Louis I. On the marriage of Marguerite, the daughter and heiress of Louis II., count of F., to Philip the bold of Burgundy, the country was united to the Bur gundian territories in 1384, and afterwards shared the fortunes of that duchy. The dukes of Burgundy brought great part of the former duchy of Lower Lorraine under their dominion, and thus laid the foundation for the subsequent union of the states of the Netherlands, in which F. continued -to form one main component part. On the death of Charles the bold, these territories passed, in 1477, to the house of Hapsburg, by the marriage of his daughter Mary to the archduke Maximilian. After Burgundy had passed with king Philip II. to the Spanish line of the house of Hapsburg, the territory of F. was considerably diminished, as not only was the portion called Dutch F. trans ferred to the estates-general by the peace of 'Westphalia, but, in the time of Louis XIV., France seized upon another portion of F., as also a part of Hainault, Cambray, and Artois, and was confirmed in her possession by the peace of Aix-la-Chapelle, of Nimeguen, and of Utrecht. By the last, and by the treaty of peace concluded at Bastadt, the remains of the Spanish 'Netherlands again fell into the hands of the house of Austria. In 1794, F., like the other provinces of Belgium, was incorporated with the French republic, and afterwards with the empire, and formed the departments of Lys and Escaut; the congress of Vienna, hOwevei; conferred tliebe portions on the rieW kingdom of the Netherlands, with which they remained united till the formation of the kingdom Belgium (q.v.). The Belgian portion of F. is now divided into the provinces of East and West F. Praet, Histoire des Comtes de Flandres, et de l'Origine des Communes Flamandes (Brussels, 1828); Le Giay, Histoire des Comtes de Flandres jusqu'a Arenement des Dues de Bourgogne (2 vols., Paris, 1843); Kervyn van Lettenhoven, liktoire de Flandres (6 vols., Brussels, 1847-51), etc.