County of Hainaut in the context of "Mons, Belgium"

The County of Flanders was one of the most powerful political entities in the medieval Low Countries, located on the North Sea coast of modern-day Belgium and north-eastern France. Unlike the neighbouring states of Brabant and Hainaut, it was within the territory of the Kingdom of France. The counts of Flanders held the most northerly part of the kingdom, and were among the original twelve peers of France. For centuries, the economic activity of the Flemish cities, such as Ghent, Bruges and Ypres, made Flanders one of the most affluent regions in Europe, and also gave them strong international connections to trading partners.

Up to 1477, the core area under French suzerainty was west of the Scheldt and historians call this "Royal Flanders" (Dutch: Kroon-Vlaanderen, French: Flandre royale). Aside from this, the counts, from the 11th century onward, held land east of the river as a fief of the Holy Roman Empire, and this is referred to as "Imperial Flanders" (Rijks-Vlaanderen or Flandre impériale). From 1384, the county was politically united to the Duchy of Burgundy, and it formed the starting point for more acquisitions in the area, and the eventual creation of the Burgundian Netherlands. The expansion of Flemish ("Burgundian") power deep into the Holy Roman Empire further complicated the relationship between Flanders and France, but reinforced the connections with Brabant, Hainaut, Holland and other parts of the Low Countries. The link to the empire was strengthened even more when the Burgundian Netherlands came into the hands of the imperial Habsburg dynasty in 1477. Most of Flanders became part of the empire after the Peace of Madrid in 1526 and the Peace of the Ladies in 1529, although it came to be ruled under the Habsburg crown of Spain. The territories of the old county are now the only part of the late medieval French kingdom outside of modern-day France, Catalonia having been renounced in 1258.

Jan van Eyck (/væn ˈaɪk/ van EYEK; Dutch: [ˈjɑɱ vɑn ˈɛik]; c. before 1390 – 9 July 1441) was a Flemish painter active in Bruges who was one of the early innovators of what became known as Early Netherlandish painting, and one of the supreme figures of the Early Northern Renaissance. Such was his legacy, that he has been called “the inventor of oil-painting” by Vasari, Ernst Gombrich, and others, although this claim is now considered an oversimplification.

Surviving records date his birth at around 1380 or 1390, in Maaseik (then Maaseyck, hence his name), Limburg, which is located in present-day Belgium. He took employment in The Hague around 1422, when he was already a master painter with workshop assistants, and was employed as painter and valet de chambre to John III the Pitiless, ruler of the counties of Holland and Hainaut. Some time after John's death in 1425, he was appointed as court painter to Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy, and worked in Lille before moving to Bruges in 1429, where he lived until his death. He was highly regarded by Philip, and was dispatched on several diplomatic visits abroad, including one to Lisbon in 1428 to discuss the possibility of a marriage contract between the duke and Isabella of Portugal.

The Burgundian Netherlands were those parts of the Low Countries that were ruled by the House of Valois-Burgundy between 1384 and 1482. During the Burgundian Age, those lands were also parts of the wider Valois-Burgundian State, which itself belonged, in terms of suzerainty, partly to the Kingdom of France and partly to the Holy Roman Empire. The Valois Dukes of Burgundy gradually acquired and united those lowlands into a political union that went beyond a personal union establishing central institutions for the first time (such as the States General).

The period began with Duke Philip the Bold taking office as count and lord of Antwerp, Artois, Flanders, Mechelen, and Rethel in 1384, and lasted until the death of Duchess Mary of Burgundy in 1482, after which the Valois-Burgundian State was dissolved, as Mary's titles and lands were inherited by her son Philip the Handsome, from the House of Habsburg, thus initiating creation of the Habsburg Netherlands.

For most of its history, what is today Belgium was either a part of a larger territory, such as the medieval Carolingian Empire, or was divided into a number of smaller states. In the Middle Ages, the territory of present-day Belgium was fragmented into numerous feudal principalities, including the Duchy of Lower Lorraine, the Duchy of Brabant, the County of Flanders, the Prince-Bishopric of Liège, the County of Namur, the County of Hainaut and the County of Luxembourg. Belgium's modern shape can be traced back at least as far as the southern core of the medieval Burgundian Netherlands. The Eighty Years' War (1568–1648) later led to the split between a northern Dutch Republic and the Southern Netherlands from which Belgium and Luxembourg developed. The area, long a Habsburg stronghold, briefly came under Bourbon control during the War of the Spanish Succession. The resulting Peace of Utrecht transferred the area back to Habsburg control, creating what is now known as the Austrian Netherlands. The French Revolutionary wars led to Belgium becoming part of France in 1795. After the defeat of the French in 1814, the Congress of Vienna created two new states, the United Kingdom of the Netherlands and the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg, which were placed in dynastic union under the House of Orange-Nassau. The Southern Netherlands rebelled during the 1830 Belgian Revolution, establishing the modern Belgian state, officially recognized at the London Conference of 1830. The first King of Belgium, Leopold I, assumed the throne in 1831.

The first half of the twentieth century was tumultuous. Its historic neutrality was violated in each of the World Wars. During World War I, frustrated German invaders launched the Rape of Belgium. During the 1940 invasion, the quick surrender by Leopold III of Belgium to German forces drove a wedge between the King and his people. The King's attempt to return led to a constitutional crisis in 1950, which led to his abdication in favor of his son Baudouin. Belgium entered the second half of the twentieth century showing an unprecedented era of economic growth, as Belgium took an active role in the formation of the Benelux customs union with its neighbors. Ultimately, the Benelux union would serve as a model for the European Economic Community, a precursor to the European Union; to this day Brussels serves as the seat of many of the European Union institutions.

The Nervii or Nervians were one of the most powerful tribes of the Belgae in northern Gaul at the time of its conquest by Rome. Their core of their territory corresponded to the medieval County of Hainaut and contained a significant part of modern central Belgium, including Brussels and Mons, as well as stretching southwards to Cambrai in what is now France. During his first century BC Roman military campaign, Julius Caesar's contacts among the Remi reported that the Nervii were the most warlike of the Belgae, trekking long distances to take part in battles. Like the other tribes of northern Gaul, including the Menapii to the west, and the Eburones to the east, the Nervii were considered by Caesar to be relatively uncorrupted by civilization.

Philip III the Good (French: Philippe le Bon; Dutch: Filips de Goede; 31 July 1396 – 15 June 1467) ruled as Duke of Burgundy from 1419 until his death in 1467. He was a member of a cadet line of the House of Valois, to which all 15th-century kings of France belonged. During his reign, the Burgundian State reached the apex of its prosperity and prestige, and became a leading centre of the arts.

Duke Philip has a reputation for his administrative reforms, for his patronage of Flemish artists (such as Jan van Eyck) and of Franco-Flemish composers (such as Binchois), and for the 1430 seizure of Joan of Arc, whom Philip ransomed to the English after his soldiers captured her, resulting in her trial and eventual execution. In political affairs, he alternated between alliances with the English and with the French in an attempt to improve his dynasty's powerbase. Additionally, as ruler of Flanders, Brabant, Limburg, Artois, Hainaut, Holland, Luxembourg, Zeeland, Friesland and Namur, he played an important role in the history of the Low Countries.

The first plague pandemic was the first historically recorded Old World pandemic of plague, the contagious disease caused by the bacterium Yersinia pestis. Also called the early medieval pandemic, it began with the Plague of Justinian in 541 and continued until 750 or 767. At least fifteen to eighteen major waves of plague following the Justinianic plague have been identified from historical records. The pandemic affected the Mediterranean Basin most severely and most frequently, but also infected the Near East and Northern Europe, and potentially East Asia as well. The Roman emperor Justinian I's name is sometimes applied to the whole series of plague epidemics in late antiquity.

The pandemic is best known from its first and last outbreaks: the Justinianic Plague of 541–549, described by the contemporary Roman historian Procopius, and the late 8th century plague of Naples described by Neapolitan historian John the Deacon in the following century (distinct from the Naples Plague of the 17th century, during the second plague pandemic). Other accounts from contemporaries of the pandemic are included in the texts of Evagrius Scholasticus, John of Ephesus, Gregory of Tours, Paul the Deacon, and Theophanes the Confessor; most seem to have believed plague was a divine punishment for human misdeeds.

The House of Valois-Burgundy (French: Maison de Valois-Bourgogne, Dutch: Huis van Valois-Bourgondië), or the Younger House of Burgundy, was a noble French family deriving from the royal House of Valois. (It is distinct from the Capetian House of Burgundy, descendants of King Robert II of France, though both houses stem from the Capetian dynasty.) The Valois-Burgundy family ruled the Duchy of Burgundy from 1363 to 1482 and eventually came to rule vast lands including Artois, Flanders, Luxembourg, Hainault, the county palatine of Burgundy (Franche-Comté), and other lands through marriage, forming what is now known as the Burgundian State.

The term "Valois Dukes of Burgundy" is employed to refer to the dynasty which began after King John II of France granted the French Duchy of Burgundy to his youngest son, Philip the Bold in 1363.