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Huldenberg (Municipality, Province of Flemish Brabant, Belgium)

Municipal flag of Huldenberg - Image by Filip van Laenen, 28 October 2001

Presentation of Huldenberg
Municipal flag of Huldenberg

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Presentation of Huldenberg

The municipality of Huldenberg (9,261 inhabitants on 1 January 2007; 3,964 ha) is located south-east of Brussels, on the linguistic border between Dutch and French and the administrative border between Flemish Brabant an Walloon Brabant. The municipality of Huldenberg is made since 1976 of the former municipalities of Huldenberg, Loonbeek, Neerijse, Ottenburg and Sint-Agatha-Rode (in French, Rhode-Sainte-Agathe).

Huldenberg is a place of very ancient settlement, as shown by the archeological excavations made on the Ottenburg, in the hamlet of De Tomme, dated 2500 BC. In the Roman times, the region was still covered with woods but was already crossed by several roads, including the north-south main way, later known as the Walloon Way. Villages emerged near the crossroads of these way; the most important of them was probably built near the "great bridge", the only place where it was possible to cross the river IJse with a cart. The current village square of Huldenberg might have already existed there in the Frankish times, when the local economy relied on big farms built after clearing the woods.

The villages of the valley of the IJse belonged to the abbey of Corbie (Picardy, France); Neerijse was then the most important of the villages, with a big Romanesque church built by the abbey, from which only the two towers have been kept until today. The area was ruled by the Counts of Leuven, who had emerged around year 1000 and had progressively increased their power to the whole County of Brussels, and eventually took the title of Dukes of Brabant. The Dukes appointed several local lords as ministers in order to create a buffer between themselves and the "ordinary" lords. In the XIIIth century, the lords of Huldenberg, which had just seceded from Neerijse, built a castle on the marshy bank of the IJse.

The villages of the valley of the Dijle, including Ottenburg and Sint-Agatha-Rode, were grouped under the name of Sint-Achtenrode and shared a common history. Due to their strategic importance, they were supported by the Dukes of Brabant, which explains for instance the building of big village churches in the XIV-XVth centuries.

Source: Heemkundige Kring Huldenberg website

Ivan Sache, 28 July 2007

Municipal flag of Huldenberg

The flag of Huldenberg is horizontally divided green-white-red-white-blue.
According to Gemeentewapens in België - Vlaanderen en Brussel, the flag was adopted by the Municipal Council on 23 June 1988, confirmed by the Executive of Flanders on 9 May 1989 and published in the Belgian official gazette on 8 November 1989.
The five stripes represent the five components of the municipality, but the colours do not have any specific meaning.

Pascal Vagnat & Ivan Sache, 28 July 2007