Heart of Europe by Ralph Adams Cram

In a study such as this tries to be, it is, of course, impossible to consider in any degree the history of those portions of the chosen territory that joined themselves to, or were by force incorporated in, the great surrounding states. The Rhineland, in spite of its minor vicissitudes of lordship, is and has always been Germanic, and its annals are part and parcel of those of the Teutonic Holy Roman Empire and of the German Empire that succeeded it. The marshes of the mouth of the Rhine early differentiated themselves both from Germany and from the Gallic provinces farther south; Dutch they were and Dutch they will ever remain; their history and their culture and their art are by themselves. The same is true of Champagne, Picardy, Burgundy, Bar, and of the lands between them and the Seine. This is France, and its history is the history of France even if its art takes enduring colour from a persistent quality in its people that is its own and not simply that of the Franks and Normans and Celts who coalesced around the old Île de France to the building of one of the great peoples and one of the great states in history. Each gave more than it received when it became a part of a state that was slowly building itself out of assembling races and peoples, but each was like the daughter of a house; however much she might bring to some alliance, of fortune or character or power, she became merged in her new family, forsaking her name and accepting that of her chosen spouse, together with his ambitions, his interests, and his fortunes.

We may then consider the outlying lands of our central district as so many fair daughters who have allied themselves with suitors from neighbouring territories; remembering them with affection, taking pride in the dowries they have carried with them, but confining ourselves to the fortunes of the men of the line who have preserved the family name and defended its honour in the field. In this sense Flanders, Brabant, and Luxembourg are the three princes to whom was given the defence of the patrimony that has been theirs from the ancient times of the earliest beginnings of the house amongst the Gallic and Germanic tribes of the Rhine valley, the meadows and uplands of the Scheldt and the Meuse and the Sambre, and in the Forest of Ardennes.