County of Hainaut
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- This article deals with the historical county of Hainaut, for other meanings see Hainaut.
The county of Hainaut (French: comté d'Hainaut, Dutch: graafschap Henegouwen) was a historical region in the Low Countries. It consisted of the actual Belgian province of Hainaut and the Northern part of the French département Pas-de-Calais.
In Roman times, Hainaut was situated in the Roman provinces of Belgica and Germania Inferior and inhabited by Celtic tribes, until Germanic peoples replaced them and made an end to roman imperial rule.
Its most important cities were Mons (Bergen), Cambrai (Kamerijk) and Charleroi. Today the historic county of Hainaut is territorialy divided up between Belgium and France.
[edit] History
The county of Hainaut, located in the west of the German Empire, near to the borders with the Kingdom of France, emerged from the refeudalisation of three counties in 1071:
- the county of Mons
- the southern part of the landgraviate of Brabant
- the Ottonian margraviate of Valenciennes
The unification of the county of Hainaut as imperial fief was accomplished in 1071, when countess Richilde of Hainaut tried to sell her fiefs to Henry IV, Holy Roman Emperor after she was defeated in the Battle of Kassel.
Henry IV ordered the bishop of Liège to buy the fiefs and to give them back as a unified county in feud to the countess Richilde, by feudal intermediance however of the Duke of Lower Lotharingia.
The counts of Hainaut had several historical connections with the counts of Flanders and counts of Holland, to whom they had strong family ties.
Throughout its history, the county of Hainaut formed a personal union with other states, e.g.:
- Hainaut and Flanders: 1067-1071 and 1191-1246
- Hainaut and Holland: 1299-1436
- Hainaut and Bavaria-Straubing: 1356-1429
With the early death (presumably tuberculosis) of Jacqueline, countess of Hainaut and countess of Holland in Teilingen Castle, near The Hague (where she is buried) on October 8th 1436, her estates were acquired by Philip III of Valois, Duke of Burgundy. After the marriage of Mary I of Valois, Duchess of Burgundy with Maximilian I von Habsburg, Holy Roman Emperor, the lands became a part of the Habsburg empire.
