History of North

The department French of the Northern can enorgueillir itself of an extremely rich history and diverse.
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Prehistory and Antiquity

Prehistory

Indices allowing to attest the presence of the man as of the year 500 000 before our era were detected in the surroundings of Quiévy, in the Cambrésis.

The less moved back periods of prehistory are also represented, in particular on the territory of the communes of Busigny or Marcoing where the remainders seem to go back to 60 000 before J. - C.

Antiquity

The appearance of agriculture and especially of the breeding mark the entry of the area in Antiquity, towards 5 000 before J. - C. the inhabitants of this time were remarkably advanced, as erection testifies some to monumental menhirs with Cambrai (the “Stones twin”) or in the valley of Sensée.

The arrival of the Belgian , a Celtic tribe , between 3rd and 2nd century before J. - C., will durably mark the area and its major identity. The Belgian are not homogeneous people and are divided into several tribes which will divide the ground available: the Ménapiens settle in north, in the current area of Dunkirk and Hazebrouck. The Atrébates, as for them, colonize the center (Lille, Douai). Nerviens, finally, is allured by the rich and green grounds of the Avesnois, with the sud.

The province of Belgium and the Gallo-Roman golden age

Year 57 before J. - C. mark the beginning of the Roman invasion, carried out by Jules César. The decisive battle is played on banks of the Sabis , a river whose identification poses problem today since the historians hesitate between the Selle, the the Scheldt and the Sambre.

After a victory acquired rather hard, the Romans start pacification and romanisation of the area. They equip it with a revolutionary administrative organization: rich person Roman province of Belgium does not count less than seventeen cities, which associate with their prosperity old Celtic tribes. The city of Bagacum (Bavay) sets up thus in capital of the Nerviens. The same applies to the Ménapiens with Castellum Menapiorum (Cassel) and for the Atrébates with Nemetacum (Arras, in Pas-de-Calais).

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---- The Roman period thus marks the first golden age of the area, thanks to the breeding of the sheep and with the culture of corn. In the Douaisis and the Valenciennes-native, more of the third of current communes draw their name from a city gallo-romaine.

Decline, invasions cruel and christianization

The decline starts as of the end of the 3rd century, and this because of the franques invasions who bring their batch of plunderings and destruction. During briefs interludes of peace that these specific raids allow, new capitals affirm their authority temporarily: Cassel and Bavay yields the place to Cambrai or Tournai.

This tormented time is also marked by the beginnings of christianization. Some large missionaries remained in the imaginary room: it is the case of Supérior, the bishop of Nerviens, or of Piat, which must undergo martyrdom with Tournai for its foi.

The Middle Ages: between France and Holy roman Empire

The germanisation partial of the area

From 406, the last vestiges of the Roman authority in the area are definitively cut down because of the surge of the cruel people, Francs or Germains. No authority power station does not manage to be affirmed before the advent of Clovis Ier and the Mérovingiens, at the end of the 5th century.

The degree of colonization by these people of Germanic expression is variable according to the places, and is done more important in north than in the south. It follows the appearance of a linguistic Frontière rather clear around Lille: to north, the more intense germanisation will give rise to the Flemish language. At the south, the Gallo-Romans manage to preserve more influence and will adopt the language more Latinized than is French.

The return to a certain political stability facilitates the revival of the urbanization and the establishment of the ecclesiastical authorities. Vaast restores évêchés of Cambrai and Arras at the beginning of the 6th century, and Audomar (holy Omer) made in the same way with Thérouanne. Many monasteries are born, as with Marchiennes, Condé or Maroilles. They will play a crucial role by clearing wooded grounds and by draining marshes.

The Scheldt like new border

The treaty of Verdun

The Treated of Verdun, into 843, dividing the heritage of Charlemagne in three kingdoms, reinforces division between French mobility and Germanic mobility by a new border. It is indeed the the Scheldt, because of its character of natural border, which is selected to delimit the two kingdoms of Francie Western, in the west, and of Lotharingie, in the east. What constitutes the today department of North thus finds itself consequently divided into two parts, with side what will become the kingdom of France, and other what will become the Saint Germanic Roman Empire.

Counties of Flanders, Cambrésis, Hainaut and battles of Bouvines

The history of the area at the beginning of the Middle Ages is very complex. In the west, the too remote and too weak French capacity royal lets be created, as of the end of the 9th century, the Comté of Flanders. This vassal theoretical of king de France, who will be able to fight effectively against the Normands, will be characterized in fact by its regular insubordination. The first Flemish counts extend their jurisdiction of the Canche to the mouth of the the Scheldt.

Germanic side, one observes the same tendency with the appearance of political entities owe only one very theoretical obedience with the emperor. The bishop of Cambric, for example, increases largely its capacities and becomes count of the Cambrésis in 1007. As for the County of Hainaut, it emerges definitively only in the middle of the 11th century, after many adventures. Much more in north, the duchy of the Brabant is of typically Flemish tradition.

In the east as in the west, the deplorable quality of the ways makes that the inland waterways take importance more and more. Many boroughs appear thus along the rivers: Lille, Valencian, Landrecies… As in Italy of North at the same time, but on a less scale, the greatest urban centres uses their importance to obtain privileges on behalf of their lords, generally in the shape of charters. Certain boroughs manage themselves by building houses of city, supplemented sometimes by one Belfry symbolizing the existence of the communal capacity.

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At the time of a delicate succession concerning the County of Flanders (and implying the County of Hainaut), the king of France must deal with coalition joining together the emperor, the king of England and the count de Flandre Ferrand of Portugal. The confrontation shows a decisive battle with Bouvines in 1214, which sees the victory of Philippe Auguste. The king of France and his successor Saint Louis will be thus able to weigh in the businesses of Flanders and Hainaut during a few decades.

The One hundred Year old war

The Guerre One hundred Year old had innumerable consequences for the area. The count de Flandre is with the service of its suzerain the king de France, whereas the economic interests of the Flemings are turned towards the England. As for the count de Hainaut, it is quite naturally that it lines up as regards emperor, which is combined with the England. The area is devastated at the 14th century, less by the engagements themselves that by the épidémies.

“Burgundy, Burgundy! ”

Philippe the Good, duke of Burgundy of 1419 to 1467, by ceaseless matrimonial operations, puts a final term at the counties of Flanders and Hainaut and what is called joins together under its crown the totality of from now on the Netherlands (i.e. at the time the Holland, the Belgium and the north of the France).

The Burgundian domination corresponds to one stable and prosperous period for the area. Lille becomes an administrative pole of foreground by accommodating the Court of Auditors of the Burgundian State. New cultures of colza, broad beans, peas or tinctorial plants are sown. In addition to the industrial market of the drapery of quality the sayettery with light fabrics designed specifically for export in all the Europe creates for itself. On the cultural level, one also approaches with great steps of the era of Froissart, Guillaume Dufay and especially of Van Eyck.

Spanish Netherlands

Charles Quint

In 1516, Charles of Ghent, king of Spain, inherits old the country from on this side Burgundian, i.e. of the Netherlands. Three years later, this obscure king promised with great destinies is elected emperor of the Holy roman Empire under the name of Charles Quint. Charles enjoys a certain popularity in the Netherlands, and undertakes without difficulty of great administrative reforms. The area is cut out methodically between various provinces such as the Flanders gallicane , the maritime Flanders , the châtellenie of Lille or the Cambrésis, independent seigniory set up in duchy.

Inevitable territorial tensions burst regularly with the kingdom of France, whose border still stops with the Aisne. The legendary confrontation between Charles Quint and François I {{er}} is made hard feel in the area: the boroughs are taken and shaved by a camp before being begun again and rebuilt with new fortifications by the other, then again shaven, etc On several occasions, the Cambrésis, in its capacity as neutral ground, will be used to conclude from the agreements between the two belligerents: Peace of the Ladies, Treated of Cateau-Cambrésis.

These offensives of François I {{er}} do not give any tangible result, and it is necessary to await the wars carried out by Louis XIV for the next century so that the powerful Spanish Netherlands bend finally.

Philippe II and the Protestant blaze

The reign of Philippe II, the famous catholic king , will quickly appear catastrophic since he hardly knows neither the population nor the languages of the région.

The Protestantisme is spread there like a powder trail, as well for religious reasons as for political reasons, the inhabitants aspiring to release itself finally from any influence foreign. That does nothing but push Philippe II with more répression.

In the whole of the Netherlands, an insurrectionary movement reaches its paroxysm in 1566 with breakings of religious images. Valencian and Cateau-Cambrésis, in particular, choose without ambiguity for the reformed religion and set up a new municipal capacity. The Spanish troops, however, early made bring back the order by bloody représailles.

The pacificatory reign of the Austrian archdukes

The combined action of the catholic Counter-Reformation and the pacificatory reign of the archdukes of Austria succeeds in restoring peace and prosperity during the first third of the 17th century. A new architectural art using brick and the stone with a decoration original mannerist, synthesis of the Italian art and from Antwerp creations, modifies the medieval aspect of the cities. The purse and the frontages of Lille are examples caractéristiques.

The construction of a remarkable patrimonial unit, fortunately safeguarded and restored today, is suddenly stopped by the resumption of the hostilities between France and Spain with to start from 1635 (Battle of Lens in 1648).

New French domination

Conquests of the Sun king

In a series of short and decisive wars, Louis XIV will redraw the borders of the north of the France to do of them what they are always aujourd'hui.

After the annexation of the Artois in 1659 and the repurchase of Dunkirk to the English in 1662, Louis XIV seizes Douai and Lille in 1667, Valencian and Cambrai in 1677.

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France imposes a new administration: three intendances located at Dunkirk, Lille and Maubeuge. French bishops from now on are named, among whom famous the Fénelon with Cambrai. As for Vauban, it metamorphoses the medieval defensive system already modified before by the Spaniards. It comes out a remarkable whole of strengthened cities from it all along the border, like Quesnoy, Landrecies or Bergues. The dismantling operated at the end of the 19th century preserved these constructions only the citadel of Lille and some other enclosures which one sticks to restaurer.

Revolutionary disorders

Following the French revolution, the Austria invades the new whole department of North. During the occupation of the Hainaut French (1793-1794), the Ancien Mode is restored. It follows a brutal reaction of the inhabitants, worsened by the damage of the bombardments. Proud the Valencian, in particular, loses all its monuments except for the belfry. Cambrai is private of its cathedral and its churches gothiques.

Under Napoleon, the department of North engages an considerable effort to be rebuilt and unify its territory from a social point of view and administratif.

The epopee of coal: “the era Germinal”

Several factors tend to support the economic development of the area at the beginning of the 19th century and to insert it in priority in the era of the Industrial revolution.

The continental Blockade imposed by Napoleon against the the United Kingdom during its reign, first of all, leads the Northerners to produce goods which they got before abroad. Thus is born for example the sugar industry or which are introduced of the British steam engines into the spinning mills to accelerate the output. But especially, the blockade involves the fast rise of mining, since the center of the area (of Hazebrouck to Valencian while passing by Lille) appears extremely rich in coal, then one of the independent sources of energy with the bois.

The development of the mines, associated with the propagation of the railroad and the appearance of the Belgium in 1830, make that most of the cities and campaigns of the department are transformed: which gallop industrialization, demographic explosion, blooming of the working class… It is for example with Fourmies, in the Avesnois, which had place a shooting between police force and demonstrators on May 1st, 1891, being worth at the city the nickname of red Fourmies it and giving rise to the festival of May 1st.

The Northern mining was of course a dark period for the innumerable mining ones which left their health under ground for a starvation wage, as celebrates it Germinal reports it Emile Zola. But it marks at the same time the apogee of the Northern , become in a few years one of the more economic great powers of the country and called to remain it until aujourd'hui.

North at the XXe century

The First World War, or the beginning of the decline

The war of 1914-1918 wounds the heart of the area deeply, much more than that of 1939-1945 will do it. Most of the department is indeed occupied at the beginning of the war by the German and will remain it until the end, with the result that the artillery trench warfares and bombardments concentrate there more that elsewhere. In November 1917, the allied troops British launch in the Cambrésis an offensive of scale by using for the first time to large scales the Tank. It is famous the Bataille of Cambric, which made bend the enemy but did not manage to make it move back.

The losses, as well human as architectural, are innumerable, without speaking about the dramas related to the evacuation of the populations. With Landrecies in November 1918, before evacuating the city vis-a-vis advanced allied troops, the German point their guns towards the downtown area and deliberately destroy several historical buildings of the old place forte.

Rebuilding, Second world war and again rebuilding

In spite of the efforts made to rebuild the area after 1918, the result is not with the height of waitings: the economic crisis of the Thirties, on the one hand, prevents the assertion of a true rebirth, as well economic as culturelle.

The Second world war, in addition, completes to discourage the inhabitants, with his batch of new destruction in cities as symbolic systems as Valencian, Maubeuge or Dunkirk, which is entirely shaven at the time of the operation of fold of Allied the in June 1940. (Battle of Dunkirk)

Today, in spite of the wounds of the History, the Northern continues to play a determining role in the area, misant on its situation of strategic crossroads on the level European.

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