Van Artevelde’s Vexation and Disquietude

It is possible that, as some historians have thought, Froissart, being less favorable to burghers than to princes, did not deny himself a little exaggeration in this portrait of a great burgher-patriot transformed by the force of events and passions into a demagogic tyrant.

Continuing The King of England Claims Throne of France,
our selection from History of The Civilization of France by François P. G. Guizot published in 1830. The selection is presented in three easy 5 minute installments. For works benefiting from the latest research see the “More information” section at the bottom of these pages.

Previously in The King of England Claims Throne of France.

Time: 1337
Place: Flanders

Three articles following regulated in detail the principles laid down in the first two, and, by another charter, Edward III ordained that “all stuffs marked with the seal of the city of Ghent might travel freely in England without being subject according to ellage and quality to the control to which all foreign merchandise was subject.”

Van Artevelde was right in telling the Flemings that, if they treated with the King of England, the King of France would be only the more anxious for their alliance. Philip of Valois and even Count Louis of Flanders, when they got to know of the negotiations entered into between the Flemish communes and King Edward, redoubled their offers and promises to them. But when the passions of men have taken full possession of their souls, words of concession and attempts at accommodation are nothing more than postponements or lies. Philip, when he heard about the conclusion of a treaty between the Flemish communes and the King of England, sent word to Count Louis “that this James van Artevelde must not, on any account, be allowed to rule or even live, for if it were so for long, the Count would lose his land.” The Count, very much disposed to accept such advice, repaired to Ghent and sent for Van Artevelde to come and see him at his hotel. He went, but with so large a following that the Count was not at the time at all in a position to resist him. He tried to persuade the Flemish burgher that “if he would keep a hand on the people so as to keep them to their love for the King of France, he having more authority than anyone else for such a purpose, much good would result to him; mingling, besides, with this address, some words of threatening import.”

Van Artevelde, who was not the least afraid of the threat, and who at heart was fond of the English, told the Count that he would do as he had promised the communes. “Hereupon he left the Count, who consulted his confidants as to what he was to do in this business, and they counselled him to let them go and assemble their people, saying that they would kill Van Artevelde secretly or otherwise. And, indeed, they did lay many traps and made many attempts against the captain; but it was of no avail, since all the commonalty was for him.” When the rumor of these projects and these attempts was spread abroad in the city, the excitement was extreme, and all the burghers assumed white hoods, which was the mark peculiar to the members of the commune when they assembled under their flags; so that the Count found himself reduced to assuming one, for he was afraid of being kept captive at Ghent, and, on the pretext of a hunting-party, he lost no time in gaining his castle of Mâle.

The burghers of Ghent had their minds still filled with their late alarm when they heard that by order, it was said, of the King of France — Count Louis had sent and beheaded at the castle of Rupelmonde, in the very bed in which he was confined by his infirmities, their fellow-citizen Sohier of Courtrai, Van Artevelde’s father-in-law, who had been kept for many months in prison for his intimacy with the English. On the same day the Bishop of Senlis and the Abbot of St. Denis had arrived at Tournai, and had superintended the reading out in the market-place of a sentence of excommunication against the Ghentese.

It was probably at this date that Van Artevelde in his vexation and disquietude assumed in Ghent an attitude threatening and despotic even to tyranny. “He had continually after him,” says Froissart, “sixty or eighty armed varlets, among whom were two or three who knew some of his secrets. When he met a man whom he hated or had in suspicion, this man was at once killed, for Van Artevelde had given this order to his varlets: ‘The moment I meet a man, and make such and such a sign to you, slay him without delay, however great he may be, without waiting for more speech.’ In this way he had many great masters slain. And as soon as these sixty varlets had taken him home to his hotel, each went to dinner at his own house; and the moment dinner was over they returned and stood before his hotel and waited in the street until that he was minded to go and play and take his pastime in the city, and so they attended him to supper-time.

And know that each of these hirelings had per diem four groschen of Flanders for their expenses and wages, and he had them regularly paid from week to week. And even in the case of all that were most powerful in Flanders, knights, esquires, and burghers of the good cities, whom he believed to be favorable to the Count of Flanders, them he banished from Flanders and levied half their revenues. He had levies made of rents, of dues on merchandise and all the revenues belonging to the Count, wherever it might be in Flanders, and he disbursed them at his will, and gave them away without rendering any account. And when he would borrow of any burghers on his word for payment, there was none that durst say him nay. In short there was never in Flanders, or in any other country, duke, count, prince, or other who can have had a country at his will as James van Artevelde had for a long time.”

It is possible that, as some historians have thought, Froissart, being less favorable to burghers than to princes, did not deny himself a little exaggeration in this portrait of a great burgher-patriot transformed by the force of events and passions into a demagogic tyrant.

While the Count of Flanders, after having vainly attempted to excite an uprising against Van Artevelde, was being forced, in order to escape from the people of Bruges, to mount his horse in hot haste, at night and barely armed, and to flee away to St. Omer, Philip of Valois and Edward III were preparing on either side, for the war which they could see drawing near. Philip was vigorously at work on the Pope, the Emperor of Germany, and the princes neighbors of Flanders, in order to raise obstacles against his rival or rob him of his allies. He ordered that short-lived meeting of the states-general about which we have no information left us, save that it voted the principle that “no talliage could be imposed on the people if urgent necessity or evident utility should not require it, and unless by concession of the estates.”

Philip, as chief of feudal society rather than of the nation which was forming itself little by little around the lords, convoked at Amiens all his vassals great and small, laic or cleric, placing all his strength in their coöperation, and not caring at all to associate the country itself in the affairs of his government. Edward, on the contrary, while equipping his fleet and amassing treasure at the expense of the Jews and Lombard usurers, was assembling his parliament, talking to it “of this important and costly war,” for which he obtained large subsidies, and accepting, without making any difficulty, the vote of the commons’ house, which expressed a desire “to consult their constituents upon this subject, and begged him to summon an early parliament, to which there should be elected, in each county, two knights taken from among the best landowners of their counties.”

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