Concept
Spanish Netherlands
Overview
The Spanish Netherlands were a collection of States of the Holy Roman Empire in the Low Countries, held in personal union by the Spanish Habsburgs, but not annexed to the Spanish Crown, thus encompassing the second period in history of the Habsburg Netherlands, that lasted from 1556 to 1714. This region comprised most of the modern states of the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg, as well as parts of northern France and western Germany, with the capital being Brussels. The Army of Flanders was given the task of defending the territory.
The Imperial fiefs in the former Burgundian Netherlands had been inherited by the House of Habsburg from the extinct House of Valois-Burgundy upon the death of Mary of Burgundy in 1482. The Seventeen Provinces formed the core of the Habsburg Netherlands, which passed to the Spanish Habsburgs upon the abdication of Holy Roman and Spain's emperor Charles V in 1556.
Spanish hegemony in the south of the Netherlands was solidified following their victory in the Fall of Antwerp during the Eighty Years' War. This war would lead to the northern part of Spanish Netherlands separating to form the autonomous Dutch Republic in 1581. The remainder of the area stayed under Spanish rule for over a century until the War of the Spanish Succession led to a handover to the Austrian Habsburgs, thus becoming Austrian Netherlands.
Overview adapted from Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0; see the article history for authors).
Philosophers who discussed Spanish Netherlands
Related ideas
- French language
- Germany
- German language
- House of Habsburg
- Latin
- Dutch language
- Netherlands
- Peter Paul Rubens
- Counter-Reformation
- Protestantism
- Spanish language
- Kingdom of France
- Belgium
- Low Countries
- Dutch Republic
- France
- Reformed Christianity
Place in the tradition
Part of Neostoicism.