Ypres

Ieper (Dutch)
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Location of Ieper in West Flanders
Location of Ieper in West Flanders
Ypres is located in Belgium
Ypres
Location in Belgium
Sovereign state Belgium Belgium
Region  Flemish Region
Community Flanders Flemish Community
Province  West Flanders
Arrondissement Ieper
Coordinates
Area 130.61 km²
Population
– Males
– Females
– Density		 34,897 (2006-01-01)
48.86%
51.14%
267 inhab./km²
Age distribution
0–19 years
20–64 years
65+ years		 (1 January 2006)
22.52%
58.08%
19.40%
Foreigners 1.89% (1 July 2005)
Unemployment rate 8.01% (1 January 2006)
Mean annual income €11,833/pers. (2003)
Mayor Luc Dehaene (CD&V)
Governing parties CD&V
Postal codes 8900, 8902, 8904, 8906, 8908
Area codes 057
Website www.ieper.be

Ypres (French pronunciation: [ipʁ], English: /ˈiːprə/; Dutch: Ieper, pronounced [ˈipər]) is a Belgian municipality located in the Flemish province of West Flanders. The municipality comprises the city of Ieper and the villages of Boezinge, Brielen, Dikkebus, Elverdinge, Hollebeke, Sint-Jan, Vlamertinge, Voormezele, Zillebeke, and Zuidschote. Together, they count some 34,900 inhabitants.

During World War I, Ypres was the centre of intense and sustained battles between the German and the Allied forces. During the war, Tommies nicknamed the city "Wipers."

Contents

History

Origins to World War I

Ieper on the Ferraris map (around 1775)

Ieper is an ancient town, known to have been raided by the Romans in the first century BC.[1]

During the Middle Ages, Ieper was a prosperous city with a population of 40,000, [2] renowned for its linen trade with England, which was mentioned in the Canterbury Tales. As the 3rd largest city (After Gent and Bruges) Ypres played an important role in the County of Flanders. Textiles from Ypres could be found on the markets of Novgorod in Russia in the early 12th century. In 1241 there was a major fire that ruined much of the old city. The powerful city was involved in important treaties and battles, such as:

Ieper was fortified to keep out invaders. Parts of the early ramparts, dating from 1385, still survive near the Rijselpoort (Lille Gate).

On March 25th 1678 Ypres was conquered by the forces of Louis XIV of France. In 1697 during the Vrede van Rijswijk it came into the possessions of the Spanish Crown. In 1713 it was handed over to Habsburg. In 1782 the Austrian emperor Joseph II decided to tear down parts of the walls, making it easy for the French to take over the city during the first coalition war in 1794.

It was the hometown of William of Ypres, a commander of Flemish mercenaries in England who was reckoned among the more able of the military commanders fighting for King Stephen in his 19 year civil war with the Empress Matilda.

The famous Cloth Hall was built in the thirteenth century. Also during this time cats, then the symbol of the devil and witchcraft, were thrown off Cloth Hall, possibly due to the belief that this would get rid of evil demons. Today, this act is commemorated with a triennial Cat Parade through town.

Over time, the earthworks were replaced by sturdier masonry and earthen structures and a partial moat. Ieper was further fortified in 17th and 18th centuries while under the occupation of the Habsburgs and the French. Major works were completed at the end of the 17th century by the French military engineer Sebastien Le Prestre, Seigneur de Vauban.

World War I

Ieper On Fire

Ieper occupied a strategic position during World War I because it stood in the path of Germany's planned sweep across the rest of Belgium and into France from the north (the Schlieffen Plan). The neutrality of Belgium was guaranteed by Britain; Germany's invasion of Belgium brought the British Empire into the war. The German army surrounded the city on three sides, bombarding it throughout much of the war. To counterattack, British, French, and allied forces made costly advances from the Ypres Salient into the German lines on the surrounding hills.

In the First Battle of Ypres (31 October to 22 November 1914), the Allies captured the town from the Germans. In the Second Battle of Ypres (22 April to 25 May 1915), the Germans used poison gas for the first time on the Western Front (they had used it earlier at the Battle of Bolimov on 3 January 1915) and captured high ground east of the town. The first gas attack occurred against Canadian, British, and French soldiers; including both metropolitan French soldiers as well as Senegalese and Algerian tirailleurs (light infantry) from French Africa. The gas used was chlorine gas. Mustard gas, also called Yperite from the name of this city, was also used for the first time near Ieper in the autumn of 1917.

Ruins of Ieper – 1919

Of the battles, the largest, best-known, and most costly in human suffering was the Third Battle of Ypres (21 July to 6 November 1917, also known as the Battle of Passchendaele), in which the British, Canadians, ANZAC, and French forces recaptured the Passchendaele Ridge east of the city at a terrible cost of lives. After months of fighting, this battle resulted in nearly half a million casualties to all sides, and only several miles of ground won by Allied forces. The town was all but obliterated by the artillery fire.

English-speaking soldiers in that war often referred to Ieper/Ypres by the deliberate misreading Wipers. British soldiers even self-published a wartime newspaper called the "Wipers Times".

Ypres today

After the war the town was rebuilt using money paid by Germany in reparations, with the main square, including the Cloth Hall and town hall, being rebuilt as close to the original designs as possible. (The rest of the rebuilt town is more modern in appearance.) The Cloth Hall today is home to In Flanders Fields Museum, dedicated to Ieper's role in the First World War.

Today, Ieper is a small city in the very western part of Belgium, the so-called Westhoek. Ieper these days has the title of "city of peace" and maintains a close friendship with another town on which war had a profound impact: Hiroshima. Both towns witnessed warfare at its worst: Ieper was one of the first places where chemical warfare was employed, while Hiroshima suffered the debut of nuclear warfare. The city governments of Ieper and Hiroshima advocate for cities never to be targets again and campaign for the abolition of nuclear weapons. The City of Ieper hosts the international campaign secretariat of Mayors for Peace, an international Mayoral organization mobilizing cities and citizens worldwide to abolish and eliminate nuclear weapons by the year 2020. Mayors for Peace 2020 Vision Campaign

Sights

Town centre

Cloth Hall at night
The fountain in the Grote Markt, Ieper, opposite the Cloth Hall

The imposing Cloth Hall was built in the 13th century and was one of the largest commercial buildings of the Middle Ages. The structure which stands today is the exact copy of the original medieval building, rebuilt after the war. The belfry that surmounts the hall houses a 49-bell carillon. The whole complex was designated a World Heritage Site by UNESCO in 1999.

The Gothic-style Saint Martin's church, originally built in 1221, was also completely reconstructed after the war, but now with a higher spire. It houses the tombs of Jansenius, bishop of Ypres and father of the religious movement known as Jansenism, and of Robert of Bethune, nicknamed "The Lion of Flanders", who was Count of Nevers (1273-1322) and Count of Flanders (1305–1322).

Saint Martin's Church

Menin Gate

The Menin Gate

The Menin Gate Memorial2 in Ieper commemorates those soldiers of the British Commonwealth - with the exception of Newfoundland - who fell in the Ypres Salient during the First World War before 16 August 1917, who have no known grave. Those who died from that date - and all from New Zealand and Newfoundland - are commemorated elsewhere.[3][4] The memorial's location is especially poignant as it lies on the eastward route from the town which allied soldiers would have taken towards the fighting - many never to return. Every evening since 1928, at precisely eight o'clock, traffic around the imposing arches of the Menin Gate Memorial has been stopped while the Last Post is sounded beneath the Gate by the local fire brigade. This tribute is given in honour of the memory of British Empire soldiers who fought and died there. The Menin Gate in Ypres only records the soldiers for whom there is no known grave, As graves are discovered, the names are removed from the Menin Gate.

The ceremony at the Menin Gate

The ceremony was prohibited by occupying German forces during the Second World War, but it was resumed on the very evening of liberation — 6 September 1944 — notwithstanding the heavy fighting that still went on in other parts of the town. The lions that marked the original gate were given to Australia by the people of Belgium and can be found at the Australian War Memorial in Canberra.

"Who will remember, passing through this Gate,
The unheroic Dead who fed the guns?"
-- Siegfried Sassoon, On Passing the Menin Gate
Necropole national gravestones

War graves, both of the Allied side and the Central Powers, cover the landscape around Ypres. The largest are Langemark German war cemetery and Tyne Cot Commonwealth war cemetery. The countryside around Ypres(Flanders Fields) is featured in the famous poem by John McCrae, In Flanders Fields.

Saint George's Memorial Church

Saint George's Memorial Church commemorates the British and Commonwealth soldiers, who died in the five battles fought for Ypres during World War I.

Events

Kattenstoet

Famous inhabitants

Twin cities

See also

Notes

  1. ↑ Ieper: historical background
  2. ↑ See chapter 5.6.2 (in Dutch)
  3. ↑ [1] "It commemorates those of all Commonwealth nations (except New Zealand) who died in the Salient, in the case of United Kingdom casualties before 16 August 1917. Those United Kingdom and New Zealand servicemen who died after that date are named on the memorial at Tyne Cot, a site which marks the furthest point reached by Commonwealth forces in Belgium until nearly the end of the war. Other New Zealand casualties are commemorated on memorials at Buttes New British Cemetery and Messines Ridge British Cemetery."
  4. ↑ http://www.cwgc.org/admin/files/cwgc_ypressalient.pdf

Footnote

2 The gate is called "Menin Gate" because it is situated on the road to another Flemish city, Menin in French or a (deprecated) variant name in English, Menen in Dutch or English.

External links