ENAME

Normally, such a settlement would have been the nucleus of a new city. But local politics interfered with this destiny. When Baudouin IV gets 16 years old, he becomes count of Flanders in person in 993 (he was already count from 988 as boy of 11 years old). He re-organises his position and gives large military powers to the local lords in Ghent and Tournai, both at the river Scheldt. This forces the local trade settlement of Ename (see next blog post) at the river to improve its military capacity. Ename was founded by Godfrey and Mathilda around 965 as a trade settlement at the river Scheldt... The zone we are focusing on is the county Biest (comitatus Biest), which was one of the four counties in the pagus Bracbatensis, and extends from the row of hills at in the city of Ronse in the south to cities of Ghent and Dendermonde in the north. Velzeke, at 15 km of Ename, was a Roman vicus from the first to the fourth century AD and probably from the end of the 9th century the capital of..