Coudenberg
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Coudenberg (or Dutch for cold hill) is a small hill in Brussels where the Palace of Coudenberg was built.
For nearly 700 years, the Castle and then the Palace of Coudenberg were the seat of government of the counts, dukes, archdukes, kings, emperors and governors who from the 11th century until its destruction in 1731, exerted their sovereignty over the area of the Duchy of Brabant, (southern Netherlands and northern Belgium).
Today, after several years of excavations, the archaeological vestiges of the palace, its foundations, can be visited.
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[edit] History
About 1100, the counts of Louvain and Brussels left the bottom of the valley of the Senne (Dutch : Zenne) and built their castle on the heights of Coudenberg from where they could dominate the small city. With the creation of the Duchy of Brabant in 1183 by the German Emperor Frederik Barbarossa, Coudenberg gained in importance and was included within the first great wall built around Brussels. The hunting park of the dukes led down the hill to the north, a remnant of which is Brussels Park (Parc de Bruxelles).
With the second enclosure of the city, following the 1356 occupation by Louis II of Flanders, the castle no longer is necessary as a primary defense, and it gradually is converted from a military strong point into a residential palace. After 1430 when Brabant was annexed by inheritance to Burgundy, Philip the Good build new wings for the palace, embellish the park, and built the Aula Magna, the gigantic room for royal receptions and other pageantry. The first regular meetings of the States-General (Etats Généraux), composed of delegates from the middle-class, clergy and of the nobility of the Burgundian Netherlands, were held there in 1465 .
It was in this room that in 1515, Margaret of Austria formally relinquished her regency over the Low Countries to Charles von Habsburg, and the future emperor Charles V became the Duke of Burgundy . It is in this same room that forty years later Charles V abdicated in favor of his son, King Philip II of Spain. During his reign, Charles V created Bailles Square (Place des Bailles) in front of the palace, build galleries and rooms in Renaissance style and set up the Grand Chapel in late Gothic style in memory of his parents, Philip the Handsome and Joanna of Castile.
In the 17th Century, under their reign as the sovereigns of the Spanish Netherlands, Archdukes Albert and Isabelle establish their court in Coudenberg. The archdukes restore the façade of the palace, they transform the buildings and refit the apartments and the gardens. The street which skirts the Aula Magna and the chapel is elongated up to the church of Saint-Michael-and-Gudula, the future cathedral, and is renamed Isabelle Street. As art lovers, the archdukes bring to their court the best artists of the time, among which are Jan Brueghel and Rubens, to decorate the palace with their works.
On the night of February 3, 1731, fire broke out in the kitchens and quickly engulfed the entire palace. The freezing conditions made it difficult to deliver any supply of water and the means of firefighting were very insufficient. In the morning, the palace is in ruins with many of the works of art destroyed along with the governmental archives. Only the chapel was saved. The court moved elsewhere. Unfortunately money was not available for rebuilding, so for more than forty years, the ruins of the palace remained. It was only in 1774, that Charles Alexander of Lorraine proposed replacing the ruins with a Royal Square. Because of the architectural clash between the Gothic chapel and the surrounding buildings, the chapel was torn down.
[edit] Modern
Just off the southwest corner of Brussels Park, lies the Royal Square (Place Royale) which was built atop the ruins of the old Palace. Originally a statue of Prince Charles Alexander of Lorraine, the then (1780) governor of Austrian Netherlands, by Peter Anton von Verschaffelt was placed in the square. The statute was not equestrian, but showed Charles-Alexander standing, attending to the affairs of government. Unfortunately, following the French Revolution and during the occupation of Brussels by the French, it was melted down for the value of the metal. The current equestrian statue is of a young Godfrey of Bouillon. A new statue of Charles-Alexander of Lorraine was eventually placed nearby in the Museum Square.
The Royal Square on the Coudenberg is faced by the beautiful (reformed) church of St. Jacob-on-the-Coudenberg. It was built by two French architects, Montoyer and Guimard, in classic style from 1776 to 1780. In the 19th century the dome and two side wings were added.
There are a number of other building on Coudenberg including the Cour des Comptes (Dutch : Rekenhof) (Belgium’s General Accounting/Auditing Office); the Royal Chapel, built in 1761 with a Louis XVI - style interior; the Palace of Lorraine; and the Royal Museum of Fine Arts of Belgium.
[edit] References
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- This article is based in part on material from the French Wikipedia.
