History of Thérouanne

The history of Thérouanne which this article gives relates to the old town of Terwaan, Thérouanne, Tarvenna or Terenburg and not the current village of Thérouanne, refondé later and a little at side. Old Thérouanne was with the Middle Ages a flourishing Flemish commune but was entirely destroyed by Charles Quint without there remaining stone about it on stone

At the time when César conquered the Gaulle into 56 before J. - C., the North of current France was inhabited by various tribes belonging to two people: Celtic , i.e. Gallic; and German , installed here along the the Rhine since the 3rd century before J. - C. the population was thus mixed. At that time, the territories of the current districts of Saint-Omer and Calais were inhabited by the Morins (between the Aa and Boulogne-sur-Mer), and their neighbors the Ménapiens (between Aa and the Lys) and the Atrébates (which gave its name to the Artois), by far the most important tribe of the three.

In this place with the borders of the Empire the Roman influence was especially sensitive in the urban center of Tarwenna (of tarwos , bull into Celtic) which was primarily a Roman creation and was quickly renamed thereafter in Colonia Morinorum, capital of the country of Morins. It was located at a crossroads of ways, that which while passing by Thérouanne goes from Gesoriacum (Boulogne-sur-Mer) to Nemetacum (Arras) and Colonia Claudia (Cologne), whose layout persists in D341, and that which moves towards Cassel, maintaining D190. A road probably older than the Roman way, was the Leulène, local sinuous towards Wissant on the coast; whose layout was preserved only partially, and whose beginning coincides with D192. This time finishes into 407, year when the Francs entirely burned the city.

Thérouanne could reappear after between 639 and 667 Audomar or Omer, monk of the abbey of Luxeuil, had undertaken évangéliser what is the district of Saint-Omer today and, at the end of his life, had become with the support of saint Achaire de Noyon the first bishop of Thérouanne. It accepted the assistance of Bertin de Sithiu which gave its name to the abbey of Saint-Omer (Saint-Bertin abbey). The territory of the diocese, suffragan of the archbishop's palace of Rheims, was delimited in north by the Yser and in the south by the Canche and the Lily.

When as from the 9th century the counts of Flanders by the weapons had increased their territory towards the south, Thérouanne also fell between their hands. For little time however, because the count of Flanders Philippe of Alsace gave his niece Isabelle de Hainaut to the young king de France Philippe Auguste, with in dowry the South of the Flanders. He vainly hoped to acquire a decisive influence on the king, that on the other hand in 1191 from the Flanders the gift detached which his wife had received and increases it thereafter of the county of Artois. Thérouanne also returned it to France and French became the current language there.

After in 1369 the countess Marguerite of Flanders had married Philippe Bold the, duke of Burgundy, it brought the Flanders in dowry to him. In 1384 the duke himself inherited Artois; Flanders and Artois were thus joined together again, even if they constituted two separate entities. Less than one century later the duke Charles Bold the tried to increase his field and by there in conflict with the king of France Louis XI entered. He resulted a series from it from wars which finished in 1477 with the Bataille of Nancy during which Charles found death. It was the end of the Burgundian era and the fight for the independence of the duchy.

The king tried to add Artois to the royal field by conquering it by the weapons. Thus in 1479 it besieged Arras, but it encountered such a resistance that it decided to punish the city after having taken it: all the inhabitants were driven out and replaced by French of the area of the Loire. Outraged by such a process, the States d' Artois lined up as regards Marie, girl and heiress of Charles the Bold one, and marries of Maximilien of Austria. This last wanted to defend the heritage of his wife and fought battle against the French on August 7th, 1479 to Enguinegatte (a little in the south Thérouanne). The battle was undecided and the two adversaries are transfered more or less constrained to make peace. It thus signed in 1482 the peace of Arras which granted Artois to Maximilien and in Marie, except the Calais is (with the hands of the English), the Boulonnais and évêché of Thérouanne. Thérouanne was thus a French enclave in Artois. The tensions with France remained, but at this time they seemed alleviated so that on August 3rd, 1529 Charles-Quint and François I {{er}} signed with Cambrai the Paix of the Ladies. France renonçait officially with straight on the Flanders and Artois. But the king of France started to reinforce in an intensive way Thérouanne, his enclave in Artois. Between 1521 and 1544,500 villages of the surroundings were devastated by the French garrison of the city. At the request of the States d' Artois the imperial troops seized the city, under the control of the lord of Lalaing. April 20th, 1553 Charles-Quint gave the order to shave to the ground the city (which counted a large cathedral, two parish churches and several convents and abbeys) and one made it at such a point that it is hardly if the recent excavations managed to find something; on what remained salt was spread so that never nothing any more could push. Only some vestiges remained among which part of the famous frontage of the cathedral with Large God of Thérouanne (middle of the 13th century) transferred towards the cathedral close to Saint-Omer. The diocese of Thérouanne, which was richest and widest of all Western Europe, was thus removed; at the time of the reorganization of évêchés of 1559 Philippe II of Spain the territory between Boulogne, Saint-Omer and Ypres divided some. The French-speaking parts échurent in Boulogne and Saint-Omer, and the Dutch-speaking ones in Ypres.

The most important bishop of Thérouanne was Jean de Waasten (1099-1130) who at the beginning of the 12th century introduced the Gregorian Réforme. The last bishop, Antoine II of Créquy, was officially named in February 1552, but because of destruction of its city could never be installed. December 15th, 1553 it was named bishop of Nantes.

The territory of Thérouanne arose nowadays with the diocese of Arras.

Source

Internal bonds

List of the bishops of Thérouanne

External bonds

And Thérouanne was destroyed
Thérouanne forgotten city; Marc de Moerman magistrate in Thérouanne
History of a disappeared city

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