"Depend upon it; there is no such place."

[franceslievens]

Currently I'm reading Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell. A remarkable book, especially the numerous footnotes, that give the book an air of non-fiction, what I like.
It is but an air of non-fiction because what does my eye spy on page 430? We are in 1815 (June). Napoleon has returned from Elba and wishes to regain his power and "is sure to begin by invading Belgium" being such a little country and all. Sure someone has her dates mixed up here. This year Belgium exists 175 years. A little math tells us that this means the country became independent in 1830. What would Napoleon start invading a non-existent country for? He wasn't that deluded, was he?
What does exist in 1815 are the Belgian provinces, part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands. This was an outcome of the Treaty of Vienna that drew the map of Europe after Napoleon. Before that these parts were made up of counties and provinces and whatever that paid tribute to whatever lord who seemed fit to call this part of Europe his own, being the French king, a German prince, a Spanish king, an Austrian emperor... We just kept going quite fine, managing our cabbages, our beer and our farm animals.
It wasn't until the start of the nineteenth cenutry with the upsurge of nationalism that something of a "Belgian nationality" came to be. After 1815 the French speaking nobility didn't like the Dutch king very much, so decided to found their own country. Historically speaking we never had much to do with the Dutch kingdom anyway and most people on this side of the border are Catholic, whereas most Dutch people are protestant. Come 1830 the Belgian provinces declare their independance from the Kingdom of the Netherlands. The Dutch king doesn't like this very much. There's a bit of a struggle and Belgium doesn't get recognised by the Dutch until 1839. England and France agree with it though, on the sole condition Belgium will be neutral in further European conflict (which it is, until World War 1).

Funny thing is that, although Belgium became independent in 1830 we didn't have a king before 1831. This was partly because it had to be decided first this country should have a king and not a president and second because they couldn't find a willing king at first. A Greek fellow was asked, but he didn't want to because he declared the Belgian constitution a constitution for a republic and he couldn't live with that. The second fellow that eventually said yes was a German guy who was previously married to some British girl that might inherit the British throne, hadn't she died. So if you can't rule the British empire, go for Belgium, that's what I always say!
What's even more funny is that by using the name of Belgium this kingdom ties a bond with some long forgotten Celtic tribe that lived here during the Roman invasions by Julius Ceasar. Remember the line in De Bello Gallico that goes like this: "The fiercest among these tribes are the Belgians." Unfortunately the Belgians have long since gone. All Celtic tribes have been chased away during Germanic invasions at the end of the Roman rule. Belgica is the name the Romans gave to these parts and it stuck, but historically speaking these Belgians aren't living here anymore.

I don't mind Susanna Clarke uses a wrong date. This is actually the second time I'm confronted with this mistake. It makes me wonder if abroad "Belgium" is used more general to talk about the Belgian provinces and not as the country per se. Hey, Belgium might have come into existence following the treaty of Vienna. Maybe it was on the table, but considered too small to be a significant threat to keep the French expansion at bay. In Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell's universe the proposal probably made it.

Comments

[candlelightfrot.livejournal.com]

HA!! I would have caught that too. But I'm going to take exception with you on the idea that there are no more of the Celtic Belge still existing in Belgium. While the French side of Belgium owes much to a Frankish invasion, I always thought that the very idea that a Wallon dialect existed was that the Celts modified the incoming language. French is an amalgam of the Celtic root with Germanic and Latin overtones isn't it? So Wallon is much the same as Occitan in Languedoc of southern France? At least that is how I thought of it. While an invasion occurs, it always infuses less blood into a population than was already there. Somewhat like the Norse invasions in Britain (Danelaw) and France (Normandy).

BTW... France did control part of what became Belgium before Napoleon was deposed the first time. That part of Brabant from which my BOULANGER/FLEMAL ancestors came was known as le Department de Dyle (after the small river). Did that rule stop in 1812 or so? And then was Austria back in charge from 1812-1815?

[frances-lievens.livejournal.com]

Well, I'm not a linguist, but I'd say French has (what we call) Roman roots. Just like Dutch, it hasn't got a hint of Celtic in it. The languages considered Celtic I know of are Bretonne, Gaelic and Welsh.
Dutch belongs to the Germanic group and is very much related to German. Dutch, Flemish and German people living near the border can communicate in their dialect. I'm from Limburg (which is East) and we're known for using ich, mich and dich in our dialect. My friends from Ghent and Ostend keep saying I talk German. ;-)
What you have with the Germanic invasions is that they actually drove people away. It is known that throughout Europe in that time there were widespread movements of populations because of lack of food, invasions from other even more Eastern tribes and other reasons. Those tribes went looking for another place to live. The Norse invasions otoh hardly infused any blood in a population, because they went home again. (Some of them did at least.)
You're probably right in saying the Germanic tribes fused with the Celts, but I do think we're correct in assuming their language took the overtone in what is now a Dutch-speaking part of Europe. In the South there is what we call a language border. Languages on both sides of this border have historically no links whatsoever. The border goes straight through Belgium. But again there's the thing with the dialects. The language border is set in our constitution, but is actually artificial. People actually choose their standard language and it is very well possible they speak something that's linguistically a dialect of Dutch, but because they watch French tv they only talk and understand standard French and not standard Dutch. (Are you still with me here?)
I always considered Walloon (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walloon_language) like Flemish (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flemish_%28linguistics%29): a dialect of French and not a language. It seems there is a grammar etc. for it. I think that's mainly a consequence from decisions made by people. When standardized Dutch came into existence there was a movement to make a standardized Flemish -- but it never made it.

Now about these parts of Europe: Under Napoleon's reign we were of course French (before that it was Austria). If you check a historical atlas you'll see that in 1814 (when Napoleon was banished to Elba) the French empire went as far as big parts of what is Germany. The Congress of Vienna (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congress_of_Vienna) was meant to dissolve this vast empire and took almost a year to do this. One of the outcomes was that the Belgian provinces (then called the Southern Netherlands) went to the Dutch Prince of Orange and thus making the United Kingdom of the Netherlands. Right after the congress ended Napoleon came back and was -- once and for all -- defeated at Waterloo (at that point: Dutch kingdom). The treaty was already signed, so the boundaries weren't redrawn after that defeat.
Like I said in my post some noblemen weren't at all pleased with this -- partly because they had had more to say under French reign, so they decided to they'd rather be independent... All in all the United Kingdom of the Netherlands only existed for 15 years or so. They did pester us for quite a while, those Dutchmen. See to get to the port of Antwerp one needs to take the Schelde through the Netherlands and they blocked it.

[candlelightfrot.livejournal.com]

Ah... 1814, of course. I thought there was an interim period there when someone else held power. Yeah, my ancestors from Baden and Hanover in Germany weren't too happy from the French occupation either. Prussia became pre-eminent in much of Germany after that. As I remember it Hanover came under Prussian rule but not Baden. Even my French/German ancestors in Canton Jura of Switzerland were under the French thumb of empire - as the Department de Mont Terrible.

I too consider Walloon/Wallon to be a dialect of French; but you also consider Flemish a dialect of French? I've always thought of French as a Latinized Celtic tongue that was later Germanized and Wallon to have been a less 'Latinized' Celtic root. I dunno, should ask a linguist maybe. All I know is the Walloon spoken by my cousins up in Wisconsin and the way we pronounced family names around here. And the older people who speak Walloon in Wisconsin have a hard time understanding French. Seems like we put a lot of long "e" sounds at the end of words.

For instance, our family name Boulanger (from Bonlez/Chaumont-Gistoux in Brabant), instead of the French pronunciation of boo-LAHN-jay, our Wisconsin family pronounced it beh-lon-GEE. One set of brothers even wanted to spell it Belongie when their father died in Green Bay; luckily the other family prevailed with the correct spelling. Even down here in Indiana our French/Belgian Walloon family name of De Buisseret was not pronounced strictly by the French rules of day-BWEE-suhr-ray and is instead inflected duh-bis-sir-REE.

Then there is the mix of Lorrain and Lutzenburguesch that my Belgian ancestors from Meix-le-Tige (west of Arlon) spoke. The family name there was Rosman; but they often added a 'T' to the end because they really inflected that last consonant. Then if you go east of Arlon the name has the double-S of the German language, but of course still the long 'o' sound. But over here the Americans started putting the short 'o' sound in and the family struck back by adding an 'e' - Roseman. But that, of course, completely changes the meaning of the name from horseman (and knight) to rose-man. Silly Americans.

[frances-lievens.livejournal.com]

No, my sentence came out wrong. I consider Flemish a dialect of Dutch -- or an amalgam of dialects actually. We had a lot of influences from French, like saying casserole for a pot to cook in and facteur for the mailman etc.

Ros is also a Dutch word for horse, but mainly with the specific meaning of a horse that is used in battle (strijdros).

Hmm, these pronunciations remind me of the strange word sudderans, sometimes used in cafés in the Netherlands. It's a mispronunciation of jus d'orange.

Respelling your name? That actually means you don't know where it came from, I guess. Although it was in earlier days quite common to change the spelling of a name according to the way it's pronounced. It's a concequence of not having a strict spelling yet. I think Arabs that move to western countries get confronted with that now. The first to immigrate simply chooses a way to "translate" their name to the roman writing.
My grandmother's last name made some changes over the centuries and from my own last name there are a couple of related versions quite common over here.

[candlelightfrot.livejournal.com]

I thought so on the Flemish/Dutch... I didn't know Ros was also Dutch for horse. I knew Rossman (with the epset) was German for horseman or knight; I figured the nearness to Luxembourg and Germany might mean the names origin lies with the German. I do know there are Rosman people in the Vlaams side of Belgium.

As to the spelling, we knew the origin of our name. Early on family has gone back to Meix-le-Tige (other families from that area also settled here - Theis, Bouvy, Bezy) and there have been a few letters between the families. People just added the 'e' over here to force the Americans into a more correct pronunciation, and I hate to admit, because they didn't want to be thought of as Jewish.

I have run into phonetic spellings in a lot of parish registres for surnames. Jacques is frequently missing the last 's.' I have an ancestral family named Willaume (a Lorrainian amalgam between the French Guillaume and the Germanic Wilhelm) which was spelled Villaume by French clerics. I have a French-speaking Swiss family from Ct Jura (they lived on the linguistic frontier) named Mertenat, but the name must be spoken with such a Germanic brouge that it has been spelled Merttnatt and there was bold emphasis on the "tees."

As I understand the Boulanger/Belongie debacle up in Wisconsin, one side of the family (sons of one brother out of 3 brothers in the family) was actually spelling the name Belongie until their father's name came out in his obituary in the newspaper that way. The family all met at their sister's family men's clothing store (she married a Belgian named Muller) in Green Bay and had a big fight over it. LOL! It's a family story that has been repeated over and over from up there.

I just wish I could find my DeBuisseret family in Belgium or France. I promised mom I would before she died. But I have pretty much exhausted all lines of inquiry (except maybe looking through every Ten-Year Index of births for Hainaut) including looking through the existing Paris marriage records for the 1850s. I have a bone to pick with Chani for her Parisians burning their records when they rioted at the end of the Franco-Prussian War. Dangit!