Public Memory in the Low Countries:
The Ommegang Pageant in context of the Dutch Revolt
Diane C. Schumacher
Awty International School
Houston, TX
NEH Seminar For School Teachers, 2015, London and Leiden
The Dutch Republic and Britain
National Endowment for the Humanities
University of Massachusetts Dartmouth
Economic development and political changes disrupted medieval society in the Low
Countries during the early modern period. The Dutch Revolt, in particular, drastically altered the
region, splitting the provinces that were once united under the Burgundians, and then in the late
15th century under the Spanish Hapsburgs. The political revolts of the 16th and 17th centuries are
remembered in public rituals and ceremonies in many of the cities that participated in the Dutch
Revolt, such as Ghent and Leiden. Despite the revolts against the Catholic Church and the
Spanish monarchy, Brussels remained under the control of the church and the monarchy, and has
a lasting public celebration for both in a yearly pageant known as the Ommegang. The
contrasting memory of the 16th and 17th centuries of the cities in the Low Countries persists from
the tumultuous years of revolt to the present day.
From the time of the Duchy of Brabant in the 12th century, religious festivals were in
abundance in Brussels and the other Low Country cities. Brussels was a vibrant fortified city
known for cloth making. This highly urbanized city was advancing in trade due to the silting of
the port of Bruges. During the Hundred Years’ War, in 1348, a legendary event occurred which
was honored in a yearly festival known as the Ommegang (the go around). In Brussels, a wife of
poor cloth merchant named Béatrice Soetkens was purported to have a religious vision regarding
a statue of the Virgin Mary in Antwerp. The guild of the Crossbow Archers had built a Church
for the Madonna in the Sablon area of Brussels. Beatrice felt called to go to Antwerp to retrieve
the statue to Brussels where it would be properly cared for in the new church with the Crossbow
men who could protect it.1
The legend is that she and her cloth merchant husband ventured to Antwerp where they
obtained the statue in front of a priest who was, according to legend, struck dumb and motionless
Meanwhile, Beatrice and her husband snatched the statue and placed it in their boat where they
sailed toward Brussels. The couple was reported to miraculously sail against the current back to
Brussels where they were greeted by a group of the Guild of Crossbow Archers who were
1
"Ommegang Oppidi Bruxellensis" [Walk Around the town of Brussels]. Accessed August 14, 2015.
http://www.ommegang.be/index2.php?idx=5&lg=en.
2 training.2 The statue was brought into the new church and in honor of this miraculous journey
and statue the event was honored each year on the first Thursday of July and the preceding
Tuesday.3
The yearly procession turned into a city-wide procession and pageant which included the
city officials and the leaders of the guilds. Under the Burgundians, the processions from the
church continued through the streets into the Grand Place where the pageant included games and
food intertwined into the procession of the clergy, city officials and the guilds. The entire
society was represented and included in this yearly festival. The festival represented the color
and joy of pageantry during the Medieval and Burgundian era. After 1477 the Hapsburgs
inherited the Low Countries and the festival continued to eventually include Hapsburgs in the
procession.
In the 16th century the Reformation divided Europe and was used as a tool of the
ascending monarchs to gain power and wealth from the Church. During this era Protestantism,
especially Calvinism, was gaining converts in the Low Countries. In the early 16th century,
Antwerp, the printing center of the Spanish Netherlands, had fifty-six printing presses which
printed Bibles, religious texts, multi-lingual dictionaries, maps and scientific works.4 The press
allowed for easy expression of new religious ideas that were taking hold in the Low Countries,
especially amongst the urban merchants. Despite popular perceptions, Protestantism had a strong
influence in the southern provinces of the Spanish Netherlands including Antwerp, Ghent,
Bruges and Brussels.
In contrast to these free-flowing ideas and commerce was the incredible strength and
reach of the most powerful monarch of the 16th century, Charles V. Ghent, the birthplace of the
Emperor Charles V, was gaining Protestant converts as in other cities in the Spanish Netherlands.
Charles V who extended the Inquisition into the Spanish Netherlands tried to suppress the spread
of Protestantism in the Spanish Netherlands with brutal persecution. In fact, over 1,300 persons
were put to death during the reign of Charles V which was a larger number than from his even
more infamous son, Phillip II.5
The clash of Catholic power against the budding Protestant rebellion led to a major
conflict in Ghent. In 1537, during the unpopular Spanish war with France, the States-General
was asked to give Charles V additional funds and troops to continue the war. The wealthy textile
city of Ghent refused and began a tax revolt against Charles V. In 1540, the Emperor Charles V
went to Ghent with his troops to oversee the end of the rebellion. As a result, the city lost some
Leo Van Puyvedem L’Ommegange de 1615 à Bruxelles, (Brussels: Editions Du Marais S.A, 1960), 3
"Ommegang Oppidi Bruxellensis"
4 Jonathan Israel, Jonathan I. The Dutch Republic : its rise, greatness and fall, 1477-1806. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995), 81.
5 Israel The Dutch Republic, 100.
2
3
3 of its self-governing privileges, rebel leaders were killed and the nobility was forced to walk
through the streets of Ghent naked, wearing a hangman’s noose. Ghent became known as the
“Knot Bearers” (Stroppendragers in Dutch). In fact, each year during the city festival of Ghent
there is a procession of people who commemorate their city’s humiliation by the hand of Charles
V by walking with nooses around their necks. 6 Thus their rebellion and repression is
remembered and Charles V is remembered as a villain.
In nearby Brussels, Charles V ruled his vast Empire that stretched from Austria and Spain
to the Spanish provinces in the New World. The Spanish Inquisition followed Charles V into all
of his territories, including the Low Countries. Since he was often away from Brussels, he
appointed his sister Mary of Hungary as Regent of the Spanish Netherlands. During this period,
power was centralized in Brussels, undermining the local town councils, which were set up in the
Burgundian period. This centralization coupled with the Spanish religious repression would lead
to further revolts during the century. In Brussels, however, Charles V was lauded and invited to
its Ommegang festivities in 1528. Charles, his sister Mary, and the Stadholder of Brabant, the
Prince of Orange, were part of the procession in the Grand Place. Charles V also brought his
infant son Phillip II. Although Protestants resided in Brussels and Brussels would be affected by
the Dutch revolt, it had enough Catholic support amongst the nobles and guilds to evade a major
Protestant revolt.
After the death of Charles V in 1558, he was remembered in the Ommegang each year
during the procession from 1549 forward. Charles, his infant son Phillip II, his sister, Mary of
Hungary, and his protégé, the Stadholder of Brabant, William of Orange, were included in the
procession by participants who dressed and played as them as part of the history of the
procession and of the city.7 This is a clear contrast to the other cities in the Low Countries, which
celebrate their rebellion against either Charles V or the Spanish government. The city of Leiden
outlasted an epic Spanish siege from October 1573 until October 3, 1574. The people of Leiden
suffered starvation, but they were able to wait long enough for a rainstorm that would raise the
water level outside the city forcing the Spanish to retreat.8 This event is remembered each year
by eating a Spanish dish called hutspot, bread and herring.9
At the end of the 16th century as the Dutch Revolt progressed, Phillip II bequeathed the
southern Netherlands known as the “obedient provinces” to his daughter Isabella and her
Austrian Habsburg husband, the Archduke Albert.10 Although they ruled nominally, they
6
Raaijmakers, Reno Holland: Syllabus Excursions Amsterdam: (Amsterdam City Walks, 2015) 15. 7
Ommegang Oppidi Bruxellensis Israel The Dutch Republic, 181 9
Raaijmakers Holland, 52-53. 10
Israel The Dutch Republic, 254.
8
4 worked to make a peace deal to end the conflict with the Northern Provinces. The archdukes
conquered Ostend, but the Spanish troops were unable to subdue the Northern Provinces. In
1609 a 12-Year Truce was negotiated between Spain and the Northern Provinces, while Spain’s
will to reconquer them was diminishing.
In light of losing the Northern Provinces there wasn’t much for the Archdukes to
celebrate. Archduchess Isabelle was in attendance in 1615 during the yearly competition of the
Crossbow Archers Guild, in which men took turns in trying to kill a jay that was tied to a tower,
the Archduchess was offered an attempt to kill the jay. She pulled a crossbow, aimed and killed
small moving jay near the top of the tower. The audience was thrilled and the leaders of the
guild asked her to be the Queen of the Crossbow Archers in the upcoming Ommegang festival.11
The Regent Isabella was clearly elated by her accomplishment and by the anticipated public
recognition she would receive in the yearly Ommegang parade. Wanting to share the positive
event with other aristocrats in Spain, she commissioned a Flemish court painter named Denis
Van Alsloot to paint eight paintings in a series to document the Ommegang parade in 1615.
Although Van Alsloot only painted six out of the eight paintings, however, the details from the
paintings were helpful in the twentieth century when they attempted to recreate the Ommegang
parade in the traditional style. Of the original six paintings four survived into the twenty-first
century; two are in the Prado in Madrid, and other two are in the Victoria and Albert Museum in
London. 12
In the Northern Provinces, which were under Calvinist influence, monasteries were taken
over and Catholic processions were disbanded. In fact, in the Gomarist cities, such as Enkhuizen
and Edam, which opposed Oldenbarnevelt and the Arminians, disallowed overt Catholic
activities. As the 17th century progressed there was more religious toleration in these Protestant
cities. In the Northern provinces, which became the Netherlands, the society shifted from being
led by the Church and aristocrats to being led by the bourgeoisie. There weren’t as many
aristocrats in the Netherlands to begin with so the shift was not that drastic from aristocracy to a
republic. The types of leisure activities in the Netherlands shifted from Church festivals to the
consumption of consumer goods. The wealthy society, even in the countryside, purchased
luxury items like linens and artwork.13 Although in the 16th century there were Protestant
iconoclasts who destroyed art, 17th century Dutch society consumed “worldly art” rather than
religious art. They bought paintings of landscapes, seascapes, and still lifes to decorate their
homes. Due to the high wages in the Netherlands rural people were able to participate in this
consumer culture as well as the urban people. The Thirty-Years War in the Holy Roman Empire
11
Van Puyvedem L’Ommegange de 1615 à Bruxelles,4-5 L’Ommegange 7. 1313
Michael North Art and Commerce in the Dutch Golden Age 43-45 12
5 created a great deal of demand for Dutch grain and other agricultural products. This demand led
to high profits in grain which fueled consumer spending in the countryside. In fact, the Dutch
rural population was able to participate in this consumer culture as easily as urban workers. The
rural areas didn’t purchase as much art as those living in the cities, but they bought an abundance
of clothing, linens and consumer products.
The Ommegang procession and parades continued in the lower provinces until the
Jacobin invasion in 1795. Since the procession glorified the clergy and monarchs, it was
disbanded by the French revolutionary government. The Ommegang ceased to exist until it was
revived in 1930 by the City of Brussels and the Belgian Government. In order to celebrate the
one hundredth anniversary of Belgian independence from the Netherlands, the famed pageant of
the glory years under Charles V was brought back to the Grand Place. The Van Alsloot
paintings were valuable in the effort to recreate the Ommegang parade. The procession in
modern times was less religious and more of a nationalist show than the 16th century processions,
which were Catholic and particular to Brussels. In the past one hundred years it has been a show
that spectators pay to watch. Although it is a show, the detail in the costumes and the narration
of the procession tells the story not only of the Ommegang, but alsoof the history of Brussels.
There are over a thousand participants in the Ommegang who wear costumes in the style of the
16th century. Although there are other Catholic parades and festivals in the Low Countries, the
Ommegang was brought back to honor Belgium’s particular past when the strongest ruler in
Europe, Charles V, ruled from Brussels. Since Brussels became the capital of the European
Union, the recollection of when it was the seat of power under Charles V, who ruled Europe long
ago, is of particular significance to the city of Brussels.
The Ommegang parade was a stark contrast to the iconoclasm and the bourgeois society
that developed in the Dutch Republic during the 17th century. In the midst of the turmoil of the
Dutch Revolt and the Reformation, Brussels continued a medieval tradition that lauded the
Church, the guilds and the aristocracy. The story of the Ommegang also illustrates the unique
qualities of each city in the Low Countries. This particularism , which existed throughout the
Middle Ages persisted through Early Modern Europe even to the present.
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