Bruges

Bruges (Flem. Brugge), a city of Belgium, capital of the province of West Flanders, is situated in a fertile plain about 8 miles from the sea, with which it is connected by the three canals from Ghent, Sluys, and Ostend, the latter admitting ships of 500 tons. By rail it is 14 miles E. of Ostend, and 62 WNW. of Brussels. Bruges derives its name from its many bridges, all opening in the middle to admit of the passage of vessels. The inhabitants depend, nevertheless, for their supply of water principally upon rain-water, which is collected in large cisterns, public and private. The ramparts form an agreeable promenade, and the streets have a venerable and picturesque yet deserted aspect, the population being now scarcely a quarter of what it was during the middle ages. Among the most interesting buildings are Les Halles (1364), a cloth and flesh market, with the famous Belfry (q.v.); the Gothic hôtel-de-ville (1377), with a library of 100,000 volumes; the church of Notre Dame, with a spire 442 feet high, many valuable paintings, exquisite wood-carvings, a statue of the Virgin (said to be by Michael Angelo), and monuments of Charles the Bold and his daughter Mary, wife of the Emperor Maximilian; the cathedral of St Sanveur, with an ugly brick exterior, but a fine interior, containing the stalls of the knights of the Golden Fleece (q.v.); and St John's Hospital, with Hans Memling's masterpieces adorning the reliquary of St Ursula's arm. Bruges has manufactures of lace, woollens, linen, cotton, leather, soap, starch, and tobacco; and distilleries, sugar and salt refineries, and shipbuilding yards. During the 19th century its position on the railway and canal system has to some extent restored its commercial importance, and a ship-canal to Heyst is proposed. Pop. (1890) 47,497, of whom almost half are in extreme poverty, the excellent charitable institutions being accordingly heavily taxed. Dating from the 3d century, Bruges by 1200 was the central mart of the Hanseatic League; and a hundred years later it may be said to have become the metropolis of the world's commerce. Commercial agents from seventeen different kingdoms resided here, and no less than twenty ministers from foreign courts had mansions within its walls. Its population at this time amounted to upwards of 200,000. In 1488 the citizens rose in insurrection, and imprisoned the Archduke Maximilian, and with the harsh measures of repression which ensued commenced the commercial decline of Bruges. Many of the traders and manufacturers, driven forth from their own country by the religious persecutions of the following century, settled in England, and brought with them their manufacturing superiority. In the 16th century, however, the tapestry of Bruges was still celebrated. Taken by the French in 1794, in 1815 the city became a part of the kingdom of the United Netherlands, and in 1830 of the Belgian monarchy. At Bruges lived John van Eyck (1428-41), Caxton (1446-76), and Memling (1477-94). See James Weale, Bruges et ses Environs (4th ed. 1887).