Flanders at the End of the Thirteenth Century

From the tenth century to the beginning of the fourteenth century, Western Europe experienced steady progress in all spheres of the economy. The population grew steadily, thus increasing the number of both consumers and workers, as well as encouraging trade and industry. At the beginning of the period, almost all of the population lived from agriculture and was settled in the countryside; at the end, a considerable number lived in the towns. Trade and industry had grown markedly since the eleventh century, giving rise to increased prosperity in which the inhabitants of the small towns, villages and countryside shared. Land was continually being won from the sea, marshes drained, desolate ground and pasture cultivated. Where once there had been forests, there was now arable land; much progress had been made in agriculture. These four centuries of continual advance did have their crises: famines, epidemics, floods, and so on, but the disasters were, nevertheless, limited geographically and could not interrupt the general course of progress.

The fourteenth century contrasted sharply with this. Repeated famines and epidemics devastated the whole of Western Europe. A widespread famine arose in 1315 and raged until 1317. The Black Death claimed thousands of victims from 1347 until 1351. Only a few regions avoided the direct consequences of such disasters. The general crisis that thus arose was felt everywhere. Unlike in earlier periods, there was no growth in population, not even in the towns; and scarcely any new arable land was won.

The night passed and the sun arose. In the castle of Courtrai the Viscount of Lens waited impatiently to be liberated. Two full days had already passed since the Count of Artois had set up his camp on the Pottelberg hill, and the defender of the castle was in the dark about the plans of the French commander. He sought to point out to Artois how, and along which path, it would be possible to free the garrison rapidly. His soldiers carried a burning torch around the fortress walls to indicate that the Groeninge field was the most suitable place to free the castle. They stopped in front of the Flemish troops, near the Grey Nuns' abbey, and after giving a sign in that direction, they threw down the blazing torches beside the fortress ramparts. Other soldiers in the garrison tried to give signs with their swords, the steel of which shone in the morning sun. They all pointed to the low-lying area that was intersected by the Groeninge and Grote Beek streams and was bounded by the damp Lys marshes and the abbey buildings to the north. To the south the area was bounded by the Courtrai town ramparts. This was the only way left to the Count of Artois to set free the garrison.

The commander saw the signals of the garrison and rode towards the camp of the Flemings on the Groeninge field to take reconnaissance. He realised that he would have to engage in battle and at around 6 o'clock he gave the necessary orders. Trumpets sounded the call to arms, and the French troops were gathered together. The noblemen put on their coats of mail and plates; their horses were harnessed, saddled and completely prepared for battle. The feverish activity on the Pottelberg hill could not fail to escape the attention of the Flemings. On the Groeninge field and in the town of Courtrai the townsmen were called up. They broke down their tents and thousands of soldiers put on their armour, preparing themselves for the approaching battle.

There has been no complete and critical study of the terrain that deals with all problems arising from a reconstruction of the Battle of Courtrai. Almost all the material required was nevertheless gathered and examined in the valuable contributions presented by Sevens. However, the studies, which complement and correct each other, are not very well known. It thus comes as no surprise that several historians working after Sevens completely ignored his work.

Researchers who have examined the Battle of the Spurs were naturally very concise in dealing with the terrain. There were several solutions proffered on it that differ markedly from each other. For this reason there are now four viable reconstructions of the battlefield. The best known and most generally accepted reconstruction is that provided by Sevens and Fris, which is in reality a slight improvement on the map given by Moke, Köhler and Frederichs. Funck- Brentano established another version that was first accepted in 1892 by Sevens although he rejected it definitively in 1902. In 1931 the solution presented by Funck-Brentano was still seen as possible by Delfos.

Delfos did, however, propose another map. The most recent reconstruction of the battlefield has been proffered by Baron M. de Maere d'Aertrycke who did not follow his earlier opinions based on Sevens's studies. In order to avoid having to continually refer back to the four proposed solutions, they have been reproduced here in simple sketch form. In a concise summary of the versions, which sources the above historians relied upon will also be shown.

An unbridgeable chasm arose between the King of France and the Flemish town of Bruges in the early hours of 18 May 1302, known as the Bruges Friday. The blood of 120 noblemen and royal foot-soldiers destroyed all hope of peaceful settlement to the conflict that had broken out.

Simple weavers, fullers and other artisans suddenly became the powerful rulers of the richest town in Flanders. They were aware of the gravity of the massacre committed and of the crime of lèse majesté that called for revenge: it was clear to them that they could no longer avoid responsibility, and that the struggle would have to be waged to its very end. A victory, or terrible death as punishment, was for their leaders, as well as for a large number of the rebels, the only choice presented to them. They fought for classic ideals of the highest value through the ages, an inspiration to countless men of supreme sacrifice: equality, fraternity and liberty. From the beginning of the protest in Bruges, the members of the guilds gathered under the banner of Pieter de Coninc, the representative of the guild with the most members. The artisans of the wool industry – weavers, fullers, and shearers – wanted to become the equals of the members of rich trades, like brewers, sellers of wool cloth or butchers, and the equals of the patricians who were the masters of the town. The weavers wanted to buy their wool and to sell the cloth they had made.

On 11 July 1302, beneath the town walls of Courtrai, the most splendid army of knights in all Christianity, the flower of French nobility, was thoroughly defeated by Flemish rebels, by common workers and peasants. The superbly trained noblemen who had devoted their whole life to the military profession and were fully experienced in fighting on horseback in close ranks were led by an able commander, the Count of Artois, victor of various campaigns. They were defeated in three hours by men who had little experience of warfare and belonged to the lowest classes of society at that time, men who lived by the unremitting labour of their hands. This army of brave and robust workers – men with ‘dirty fingernails’: weavers, fullers, and peasants – all fighting on foot, was under the command of able leaders and possessed excellent weapons. They put a sudden end to the centuries-old myth of the invincibility of proud and wealthy knights. It was a major blow to the honour and glory of the French noblemen. They were the finest knights of that time, belonging to the most powerful state in Europe, and had not known defeat in the West since before their victory at Bouvines (1214).

‘It was an almost impossible event’ noted the Florentine banker, Villani, who deemed it necessary to detail closely this military exploit, as it was both new and remarkable. When the news of the Flemish victory reached Rome, Pope Boniface VIII was awakened in the middle of the night to read the report.

Anniversaries obviously matter. Exactly seven hundred years ago, Flemish townsmen crushed the chivalry of their French overlord in a dramatic and bloody encounter. Precisely half a century has passed since the best military historian of his era published this study in his native Flemish. J.F. Verbruggen's The Art of Warfare in Western Europe during the Middle Ages, published in English translation in 1997, the third book in this series, captures the broad sweep of his subject, while this present volume is a detailed case study. As my old tutor, R. Allen Brown, used to say, ‘All history is local history’, and Verbruggen's analysis supports this dictum perfectly.

For, to really understand a battle, it is essential to have a clear and accurate understanding of the ground over which it was fought. The author's close investigation of this matter enables him to draw conclusions about why and how the opposing commanders drew up their forces in the way that they did. Flowing from that is the issue of the tactics used by both sides – and flowing is an appropriate word because of the significance of the water-filled ditches and marshy areas which provided the Flemish foot-soldiers with a strong position to defend. But, contrary to frequently over-simplified views of the battle, the French did not charge heedlessly into a trap.

Stripped of all simplistic romanticism, the Battle of the Spurs still retains its prime importance in our history. One barely needs to be reminded of this: it is something that every Fleming is aware of. The event also had far-reaching consequences for the course of world history: the hegemonic position that France had attained in Western Europe during the thirteenth century received its first powerful blow.

For those interested in the study of history, conceived, first and foremost, as an attempt to understand past events, such an unforeseen and, for those living at the time, almost unbelievable occurrence demands explication. And this presumes serious historical research. Certainly, much has been written about the Battle of the Spurs. Amid the works and articles in journals devoted to the subject there are some very thorough scientific contributions. A few have even opened the way for further study, among them two critical studies by Henri Pirenne and the two works by Victor Fris. Nevertheless, many significant problems remained unsolved and certain conceptions of the events continued to be held as valid, even if difficult to reconcile with what is known of the art of warfare in the Middle Ages. Furthermore, our knowledge of the history of Flanders, France and the Low Countries in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries has progressed markedly in recent years. Common perceptions concerning the Battle of the Spurs, and the events with which the battle is associated, need to be corroborated with results gained.