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Flag of Wallonia

Location of Wallonia in Europe

Wallonia (French: Wallonie, German: Wallonien, Dutch: Wallonië, Walloon: Waloneye) is the French-speaking southern part of Belgium. This region makes up about 31% of the Belgian population.

Since 1970, Wallonia has approximately coincided with the territory of the Walloon Region, which is a federated component of the Belgian state and provides a government and a parliament to both Wallonia and the smaller German-speaking Community of Belgium (73,000 inhabitants). Wallonia is therefore also the name colloquially given to the Walloon Region ¹. The inhabitants of Wallonia are belonging to the French Community of Belgium also referred to as Wallonia-Brussels Community² which includes both Wallonia and the French-speaking inhabitants of Brussels-Capital Region (a little less than one million inhabitants).

Wallonia takes its name from the Walloons (from the Germanic word Walha, the strangers), the population of the Burgundian Netherlands speaking Romance languages. In Middle Dutch (and French), the term Walloons also included the French-speaking population of the Prince-Bishopric of Liège ³ and hence the whole population of the Romanic sprachraum within the medieval Low Countries.

The Ardennes

Ardennes in Wallonia

Provinces of Wallonia

High Fens in the winterWallonia's Major Heritage A Walloon poet wrote about it as Our Siberia, located in the East of the Province of Liège

L' Ardenne (Wallonian spelling), is an old mountain formed during the Hercynian orogeny as for instance in France the Armorican Massif, the Massif Central and the Vosges. At the bottom of these old mountains, coal, iron, zinc, and other metals are often found in the sub-soil. This geologic fact explains the greatest part of the geography of Wallonia and its history. In the North and West of the Ardennes lie the valleys of the Sambre and Meuse rivers, forming an arc Sillon industriel going across the most industrial provinces of Wallonia, for example Hainaut, along the river Haine (the etymology of Hainaut) : the Borinage, the Centre and Charleroi along the river Sambre, Liège along the river Meuse.

The Ardennes is the most popular region of Wallonia for tourism. This geological region is also very important in the history of Wallonia because this old mountain is at the origin of the economy, the history, and the geography of Wallonia. Wallonia presents a wide range of rocks of various ages. Some geological stages internationally recognized were defined from rock sites located in Wallonia : e.g. Frasnian (Frasnes), Famennian (Famenne), Tournaisian (Tournai), Visean (Visé), Dinantian (Dinant) and Namurian (Namur)⁴ The Tournaisian excepted, all these rocks are in the Ardennes viewed as a geological area.

The Ardennes includes the greatest part of the province of Luxembourg (number 4), the south of the province of Namur (number 5) and the province of Liège (number 3), and a very small part of Hainaut (number 2). There were the first furnaces in the four Walloon provinces, using, before the 18th century, charcoal which was made in the Ardennes forest. This industry was also in the extreme South of the Luxembourg, in the region called Gaume. After this century, the most important part of the Walloon steel industry, using then coal, was built around the coal-mines, principally in the region around the cities of Liège, Charleroi, La Louvière, the Borinage, and further in the Walloon Brabant (in Tubize). Wallonia became the second industrial power of the world in proportion to its territory and to its population (see further).

L' Ardenne is the origin of the most important event in the history of Wallonia : the industry. This region had also a very important strategic role during World War I and World War II.

The Battle of the Bulge [French: La bataille des Ardennes]

The Ardennes is well known because of the 1944 Battle of the Bulge, which is named in French La bataille des Ardennes.

Rock Bayard of Dinant, on the right back of the Meuse: the magic horse was jumping from the top of this rock to the left bank of the river, with the Quatre Fils Aymon fleeing Charlemagne.

Official U.S. Army illustration: The German offensive progressed creating the nose-like bulge shape (salient) between the 16th and 26th of December 1944. The salient was mainly in the Ardennes. Its nose (in the Condroz next to the Ardennes) was not far from Dinant and the Meuse at this town. Indicated in dark red, the elevation (more than 400 meters) which is the heart of the Ardennes. In May 1940, the German armored troops quickly crossed this old mountain and the River Meuse as far as Abbeville, leading to the Fall of France...

In The Song of Roland, Charlemagne had a nightmare the night before the Battle of Roncevaux Pass. This nightmare took place in the Ardennes' forest where he had his most important battles. Wallonia has plenty of rivers, villages and other places linked to another song about Charlemagne: Old French twelfth century chanson de geste Quatre Fils Aymon. One of these places, in Dinant, is the rock named Bayard for the magic bay horse which, according to the legend, did a huge jump from the top of the rock as far as the other bank of the Meuse).

The most advanced position of the German army during the Battle of the Bulge was not far from the town of Dinant, along the river Meuse. In May 1940, the German army was able to go across the Meuse, despite the resistance of the French army, not further than Dinant in Houx (Wallonia) (as well as in Sedan). On the command of General Erwin Rommel, the German armoured divisions were also able to go across the river in a neighbourhood of Dinant named Leffe (as the Abbey beer linked to this abbey in this neighbourhood). In December 1944, the German army could not go across the river. Local residents say that a German vehicle exploded just before the Bayard rock, possibly when it triggered a mine laid by American soldiers, and that this is following this legend. Dinant's Rock was thus the most advanced position of the German army during this battle

Geopolitical position of the Ardennes and Wallonia during the World War II (1940 and 1944)

Battle of France (1940) German offensive in May 1940. The German armoured divisions have just gone across the Meuse (16 May), (principally in Dinant) and Sedan and the Ardennes. This last region is just at the east of the red blob (which is pointing out the German advance). On the 16th of May, General Maurice Gamelin said he could no longer protect Paris, because he lost the Ardennes.

Battle of France (1940) The German advance (red blob) until 21 May, as far as the Channel to Abbeville. They isolated the Allied troops of the North (Some French Divisions, the Belgian Army and the British Expeditionary Force). They won at this moment the Battle of France.

Battle of the Bulge. In 1944, the Germans again wanted to go across the Ardennes and the Meuse but they failed to completely cross the Ardennes. Their most advanced position was the nose of the salient, just in front of Dinant and the Meuse. In 1944 they wanted to join Antwerpen and the North Sea (not the Channel), i.e. the great Flemish Port of Antwerp, the North Sea just between Belgium (or Flanders) and The Netherlands,

The North Sea, between the coast of Belgium and of The Netherlands, Danmark, Norway and Great-Britain. The objective of the German offensive in 1944 was Antwerpen (Belgium) not far from Rotterdam (The Netherlands). The Channel is at the South of the North Sea and at the West of the Ardennes

The second industrial Power of the World

Jean-Pierre Rioux drew the following table in his book la révolution industrielle (Industrial revolution). The table is based on several levels of development (i.e. consumption of cotton in the rough state, of cast-iron, cast-steel, coal, the development of the railway network⁵).

Thus, this table is not based on absolute figures (or is not pointing out the absolute ranks), but the hierarchy of the industrial powers is based on their levels of development. And if Wallonia is not pointed out on this table, Wallonia may be used instead of Belgium.

According to many authors, the word Belgium may be exchanged for Wallonia as for instance Herbert Lüthy, quoted by Maurice Besnard: Belgium and its Walloon part was the first country to become an industrial country after England. Herbert Lüthy did not agree with the theory of Max Weber on the link between capitalism and protestantism and, on the contrary, underlined the fact that Wallonia was a catholic country⁷ Philippe Destatte wrote that Wallonia was the second industrial power of the world, in proportion to its population and its territory ⁸. Hervé Hasquin thought that the development of the Walloon industrial regions contributed to make of Belgium one of the main industrial powers in Europa, if not in the world... ⁹ Philippe Raxhon wrote about the period after 1830,: It was not propaganda but reality that the Walloon regions were becoming the second industrial power all over the world after England ¹⁰ Marc Reynebau said the same thing ¹¹ Michel De Coster, Professor at the University of Liège wrote also:The historians and the economists say that Belgium was the the second industrial power of the world, in proportion to its population and its territory (...) But this rank is the one of Wallonia where were concentrated the coal-mines, the blast furnaces, the iron and zinc factories, the wool industry, the glass industry, the weapons industry... ¹². The Professor is pointing out this possible confusion (Belgium/Wallonia), as a good example of the difficulties of the Walloon identity. There are many other references about that: The Walloon iron and steel industry came to be regarded as an example of the radical evolution of industrial expansion. Thanks to coal (the French word “houille” was coined in Wallonia), the region geared up to become the second industrial power in the world after England. In fact, despite the protectionism of neighbouring states, in 1833 Belgian industry boasted 5 times more steam machines per inhabitant than a country such as France. It also exported them to over 25 countries. ¹³The sole industrial centre outside the collieries and blast furnaces of Walloon was the old cloth making town of Ghent. ¹⁴

Lift no. 3 among a series of four hydraulic boat lifts of Lifts on the old Canal du Centre near the town of La Louvière in the Walloon province of Hainaut a Walloon Major Heritage and a World Heritage Site (end of the 19th century).

Ronquières inclined plane in the second half of the 20th Century

Strépy-Thieu boat lift The modern boat lift, built in the beginning of the 21th century

The new Liège-Guillemins railway station

The Sillon industriel

The Sillon industriel is in the North of the Ardennes as the geological phenomenon, the whole old mountain formed during the Hercynian orogeny (a Company making zinc in Verviers was named Vieille montagne, Old mountain).

A 1968 CIA map of resources in Belgium. The sillon industriel runs from Mons in the west to Verviers in the east. The Meuse is labelled, the Sambre flows into it but is not labeled, while the Haine and Vesdre are too minor to be shown.

The Wallonian industrial revolution took place here in the 18th and the 19th century and also the place of the Wallonian industrial power, second in the world during the 19th century. This industrial area was the breeding grounds of the European socialist movement.

The Country of the General strike

Tony Cliff wrote:

Belgium has a long tradition of mass industrial strikes. In 1886 a great series of strikes broke out, first in the neighbourhood of Charleroi, then in Liege and over a large part of the Walloon provinces. The main demand was universal suffrage; but there were economic demands as well in some places. Then in May, 1891, a mass strike of some 125,000 workers put forward a demand for changes in the electoral system. In April, 1893, another strike, embracing about a quarter of a million workers, broke out for a similar demand. The outcome was universal, but unequal, franchise, the votes of the rich and “cultured” counting for two or three times those of workers and peasants. The workers, dissatisfied, carried out another mass strike nine years later, demanding a complete revision of the Constitution.An even bigger strike – in which 450,000 workers took part – was called by the Socialist Party and trade unions to achieve electoral reform in 1902, and again in 1913. Another general strike took place in 1936 which wrested from the capitalists a forty-hour week and paid holidays. In 1950 a general strike led to the abdication of King Leopold. In 1958-9 the coal-miners of the Borinage spontaneously began a general strike not merely for wage demands but for the nationalisation of the mining industry.¹⁵

Major and general strikes took place along this sillon in 1885, 1893 (for universal suffrage), 1902, 1913, 1932, 1936, 1950 (against King Leopold III because of his relationship with the Germans during the World War II). Wallonia was never dominating Belgium. Belgium was dominated by a Francophone elite from Brussels, Flanders and Wallonia. The historian Philippe Destatte wrote: It is true that the Walloon movement, which has never stopped affirming that Wallonia is part of the French cultural area, has never made this cultural struggle a priority, being more concerned to struggle against its status as a political minority and the economic decline which was only a corollary to it. ¹⁶ Jules Destrée fought against this situation which it is not rather known : the Wallonian people were always a minority in Belgium, firstly dominated by the Frenchspeaking elite and afterward by the Dutchspeaking elite. André Renard fought against this economic decline when he became the leader of the strike of 1960-1961, a struggle for a self-governing Wallonia, a renardist strike.

The Walloon Parliament in Namur (in rose), at a symbolic place: the confluence of the Meuse (in front of the Parliament) and the Sambre (at the left of it) which are the main rivers defining the Sillon industriel, the most inhabited part of the country (about two milions inhabitants)

Walloon Decline versus Reconversion

The two world wars curbed the continuous expansion that Wallonia had enjoyed up till that time. Then everything changed dramatically in 1958. The factories of Wallonia were by then antiquated, the coal was running out and the cost of extracting coal was constantly rising. It was the end of an era, and Wallonia had to redefine itself as a dynamic industrial heartland. The key to the region's future was state-of-the-art technology. ¹⁷ In December 1960, a strike gripped the country, but it succeeded only in Wallonia. The movement became a renardist strike. Renée C.Fox explained all the affair in a few words:

At the beginning of the 1960s (...), a major reversal in the relationship between Flanders and Wallony was taking place. Flanders had entered a vigorous, post-World War II period of industialization, and a significant percentage of the foreign capital (particularly from the United States), coming into Belgium to support new industries was being invested in Flanders. In contrast, Wallony's coal mines and time-worn steel plants and factories were in crisis. The region had lost thousands of jobs and much investment capital. A new Flemish-speaking, upwardly mobile "populist bourgeoisie" was not only becoming visible and vocal in Flemish movements but also in both the local and national policy [The strike of December 1960 against the austerity law of Gaston Eyskens ] was replaced by a collective expression of the frustrations, anxieties, and grievances that Wallony was experiencing in response to its altered situation, and by the demands of the newly formed Mouvement populaire wallon for (...) regional autonomy for Wallony...¹⁸.

Now, Wallonia is managing interregional cooperation with its neighbours ¹⁹, centres of excellence and-state-of-the-art technologies ²⁰ and business parks ²¹. The Region is not yet at the level of Flanders and is suffering many difficulties.

Nevertheless fourty Walloon companies are number one in Wallonia and worlwide following the Union Wallonne des Entreprises ²², for instance: in glass production ²³ lime and limestone production ²⁴ Cyclotrons ²⁵aviation industry ²⁶ etc.

In the North of the Sillon industriel

The Walloon Brabant

Butte du lion in Waterloo

The Westwork of Saint Gertrude in Nivelles

Louvain-la-Neuve Science Park, aerial view

The North of the Sillon industriel is also the South of Brussels, the old capital of the Duchy of Brabant and the capital of the old Belgian province which was fragmentend in three parts: the Flemish Brabant, Brussels itself (Brussels Capital Region) and the Walloon Brabant.

The Walloon Brabant was created in 1995 when the former province of Brabant was split into the three parts. The split was made to accommodate the federalization of Belgium in three regions (Flanders, Wallonia and Brussels, but Walloon Brabant is also a very old name of this region in the North of Wallonia. Walloon in Walloon Brabant is likely one of the first use of the word. Louis de Haynin wrote un 1628 Belgium is a great country between France, Germany and the North Sea (...) This country is divided in two regions, Flanders and Wallonia (...) Wallonia is divided in (the following provinces...) Tournesis Flandre wallonne; Haynaut, Comte de Namur, Principauté de Liège Walloon Brabant ²⁷

The Université catholique de Louvain is located in this province. A part of the Walloon industrial power was out of the Sillon industrail as the steel industry of Clabecq where there is until now some activities. The Battle of Waterloo took place also in this province, the smallest province of Wallonia. Piétrain is a breed of domestic pig taking its name from Piétrain, a little village of Jodoigne in the walloon Brabant and the most important town of this province is Nivelles with its Collegiate Church of Saint Gertrude and its westwork.

The Ronquières inclined plane is on the Brussels-Charleroi Canal which is joining (through the province), one of the main City, of the Sillon industriel (Charleroi) with the Capital of Belgium and the Port of Antwerp.

In Rixensart, the company Recherche et Industrie Thérapeutiques (changed in GlaxoSmithKline Biologicals in 2000) is one of the world’s leading vaccine manufacturers, supplying around 25% of the world’s vaccines:

GSK Biologicals employs a little over 5,300 persons on the Walloon sites of Rixensart, Wavre and Gembloux. The company distributes 36 doses of vaccines every second. ²⁸

The castle of Corroy-le-Château, one of the best conserved castles of this period in North Europe was bought by a Flemish artist Wim Delvoye for EUR 3.3 million. He is planning to convert the Corroy-le-Château into a museum of modern art.²⁹

The Louvain-la-Neuve Science Park is developing cooperation between industry and the Université catholique de Louvain and is contributing to regional economic development. It covers 231 hectares spread over the area of the town of Ottignies-Louvain-la-Neuve and the municipality of Mont-Saint-Guibert (30 km away from Brussels). The main area of activity are: Life sciences, Fine chemistry; Information technologies, Engineering, 135 innovative companies, 4,500 employees, one business incubator.

In the North-West of Hainaut

Tabula Peutingeriana. Tournai (Turnaco) on the right side

Iguanodon bernissartensis compared in size to a human.

China lacquered pannel of the Chineese Room of the Castle of Enghien, Wallonia's Major Heritage

The name of the North-West part of Hainaut was generally Hainaut occidental. Since the creation of an autonomous Wallonia, it is also named Wallonie Picarde, underlining by this appelation Wallonia includes the Hainaut occidental and the regional language of its inhabitants (Picard language). The name Wallonia doesn't mean a country where the Walloon language is spoken but in a wide sense, a country where Romance languages were spoken for a long time vis-à-vis the other inhabitants of the Low countries where Germanic languages were spoken.

The most important city of the Wallonie picarde is Tournai which is also the oldest city of the Low countries. The Tournai Cathedral, has been classified both as a Wallonia's major heritage and as a World Heritage Site.Tournai is labelled on Tabula Peutingeriana. Tournai gives its name to the Tournaisian: The “Calcaire de Tournai” comprises the limestone forma-tions cropping out in the Mélantois-Tournaisis Anticline (...) which have been quarried since the Roman conquest. Its relationship with the succession of the Dinant area was only understood following study of the Asile d’Aliénés borehole at Tournai and the Vieux-Leuze borehole at Leuze [...] These boreholes exhibited a rather typical middle Tournaisian succession below the “Calcaire de Tournai” that was easy to correlate with the succession of the Dinant area.³⁰

The largest find of Iguanodon remains to date occurred in 1878 in a coal mine at Bernissart, at a depth of 322 m (1056 ft).³¹

Casterman, an important company based in Tournai. published Franco-Belgian comics In 1934, Casterman took over the Le Petit Vingtième editions for the publication of the albums of The Adventures of Tintin. And after the great success of Hergé's albums, authors such as Jacques Martin, François Craenhals and C. & V. Hansen, the first albums of Corto Maltese by the Italian author Hugo Pratt? The company established its monthly magazine (A Suivre), which was to have an impact on the comics revival of the 1990s. It is now part of the Flammarion Publishing group.

Saluk in Calenelle (Péruwelz) produces and distributes billiard balls under the registered trademark Aramith in more than 85 countries, and has a marketshare of 80 % worldwide (90 % of the US market) ³²

History: Two longue durée events

The language border

The moving of the Language Border is easy to read for the French part of this map (the dark blue blot at the left oft the yellow and the light blue). The moving of the Language border in Belgium is the principally the moving of the grey blot both in Flanders (yellow and the grey blot on the yellow blot) and in Wallonia (light blue, but becoming dark when this grey blot includes Wallonia). This area was a bilingual area following the map and was gradually erased.

Following Fernand Braudel himself, the most important event of the Walloon history (and of the Belgian history), is the so-called Barbarian invasions. For the great French historian, it is one interesting example of the longue durée event. He wrote that the result of the germanic invasions - the language border in Belgium - is a contemporary and living trait (see, for instance, Belgium divided into two parts along a language border ³³ . This border, separating the Germanic and Roman sprachraums, moved over the centuries which preceded the establishment of the Belgian state over an area between the Ardennes and the more or less straight line going from Aachen to Calais on the one hand and the much less populated frontier from Aachen to Arlon via Malmedy. However this frontier has not much changed since the 18th century, perhaps since 1000³⁴

Flanders is in the North of the red line and Wallonia in the South. The shape of the border between France and Wallonia is easy to recognize (in the light blue blot).

Gaul conquered by Julius Caesar was a part of the Roman Empire. The result of that is the French-speaking Europe: France, Wallonia, Brussels French-speaking Switzerland, with their regional languages ( the following map).	Languages of France. Wallonia is in the N-E: almost the whole Walloon language (dark green), little part of the Picard language (light green in the West), more little part of Lorrain language (light green in the South)	Regional languages of Wallonia: Walloon language (yellow), Picard language (green) and Lorrain language (brown), little area of the Champenois (and smaller germanic areas [blue or white))	Area of the Walloon language (the most important one): the white coloured areas are the one of Picard language, Lorrain language, Champenois. Some old smaller current Germanic areas
Regional languages of Wallonia and Wallonia in the south of the Benelux countries.	Wallonia into Belgium and the neighbouring countries: France, Germany etc.	Political Wallonia among the others Regions       Flemish Region     Brussels-Capital Region     Walloon Region	The five provinces of Wallonia : Walloon Brabant (number 1), Hainaut (2), province of Liège (3) province of Luxembourg (4), province of Namur (5).

The industry before the industrial Revolution

The Flemish economy was bound up with the production of cloth, particularly of linens. It is not the case for Wallonia except three Walloon arrondissements : Arrondissement of Ath, Arrondissement of Tournai (in the Hainaut occidental), and Arrondissement of Verviers in the East of the Province of Liège ³⁵.

From the Roman Empire to the industrial Revolution

The industrial revolution in the Sillon industriel has other origins. Wallonia is different from Flanders even on the economic plan. The Sillon industriel includes four industrial basins (Borinage, La Louvière - called Centre - Charleroi, Liège) and a semi-industrial basin in Namur ³⁶:

During ancient times these fourth basin was a major center of iron manufacture and one of the important industrial areas of the Roman Empire. With the fall of the Empire, however, iron was more or less displaced by various types of brass or bronze, and the local centers of medieval metalworking in Belgium moved to Huy and out of the iron regions, on up the Meuse river to the forested areas around Dinant and Chimay. In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries the iron masters of Liège evolved a method of refining iron ore by the use of a blast furnace. Called the Walloon Method, this development was instrumental in making possible the re-substitution of iron for brass after the fifteenth century. Apart from increasing the industrial importance of Liège, however, it apparently did not otherwise relocate the centers of metal production. There were a few coalmines around Liège, Charleroi, and the Boringae as early as the thirteenth century but their production was small. The main medieval use of coal was neither for household heating nor for metalworking. Rather, it was principally consumed as a fuel by various industries such as breweries, dyeworks, soap and brick factories, and by the important glassmaking industry that sprang up in the Charleroi basin during the fourteenth century. Coal was mined in those days as a kind of rural, part-time enterprise to supplement peasant incomes.

³⁷

The Walloon Method

During the Middle-Age within the context of the demand for iron for artillery, important technological developments in iron working occurred in Wallonia (...) of particular importance in the County of Namur County of Hainaut (...) Principality of Liège, called Walloon method (usually in English Oregrounds iron) ³⁸. Peter N.Stearns defined this Waloon method and its dissemination: The "Walloon Method" entailed raising the hearths of the furnaces, mixing iron and charcoal together, and subjecting the whole to an air blast. Whereas previously impurities had been removed by heating the ore to a pasty mass and then beating it; thisd new process got rid of them by actually melting the metal. The procedure rapidly spread fromLiège throughout Europe and revolutionized Pig iron production ³⁹This method ⁴⁰ will be revealed in Sweden ⁴¹, England and Germany by Walloon workers.⁴²

The Beginning of the industrial Revolution

Peter N.Stearns wrote:The improvement of the blast furnace and the development of the puddling process, both originating in England during the last half of the eighteenth century, accelerated the substitution of coke for charcoal. The first puddling furnace was not installed in Belgium until 1821, while the first coke-fed blast furnace didnot appear until two years later. By 1850, however, there were as many furnaces using coke as charcoal, and by 1870 the extensive use of charcoal in metalworking had been discontinued almost everywhere but in a few small establishments in Luxembourg and Namur provinces. Under the impact of these developments metalproduction moved out of the forested areas into the coal-producting vicinities of Charleroi and Liège. It was the perfection of the steam engine, however, which troggered the Industrial revolution in Belgium. In many ways the growth of steam power can serve as an index for the develoment of that revolution itself, since it was both a major cause and a major effect of its continuance. The earliest kind of steam-operated machine,a Newcomen-type steampump, was in use in mines near Liège as early as 1723 an dat Charleroi by 1725. THe first steamengines, bases on Watt's modifications, appeared on the continent in a cannon foundry at Liège in 1803. The meager four horsepower produced by the two machines installed there grew to 1,400 by 1830, to 30,000 by 1840 and to 100,000 by 1860.⁴³

Font of Renier de Huy (Mosan art): The baptism of the catechumens. A kind of an old Walloon know-how in making the brass i (12th century).

The rich house of Curtius in Liège, one of the first capitalist (Weapons industry:17th century).

Statue of the Walloon Louis de Geer (1587-1652) in Norrköping Sweden (1945 : the sentence at the bottom of the statue speaks of him as the father of the industry in Sweden

View of the oval courtyyard and the statue of H. de Gorge who built this industrial mining complex of Grand Hornu in the Walloon municipality of Boussu (in the beginning of the 19th century). A unique example of functional town-planning. Walloon Major Heritage

The industrial Revolution: a rich Wallonia depending on Brussels

Professor Michel Quévit wrote Wallonia has been a prosperous country depending on the financial powers in Brussels ⁴⁴ . When arriving at the end of the first stage of the industrial revolution, Walloon captains of industry took huge risks because of the large increase of the production. The result was that the High Bank in Brussels took very important financial participation in the Walloon companies. In 1847, it is done. Brussels became the dominating structure of the Belgian space ⁴⁵

The Belgian State: Wallonia depending politically on the North

The language of Belgium's elites, Government, Monarchy, Bourgeoisie was French in 1830. And if Wallonia is now defined as a French speaking country, the French choice of the elites in 1830 was not a Walloon choice, in favour of this southern part of Belgium and to the northern part. French speaking elites at the head of the companies, the industry, the politics were all coming from both Flanders and Wallonia. It was not an ethnic choice but a social choice.

Quickly, Wallonia found it to its cost:In the history of Belgium, the legislative elections held on 11 June 1884 represent a pivotal point for the total victory of the Catholic Pary over Walthère Frère-Orban's liberals opened the way for thirty years of homogeneous governments, thirty years of domination by that party , whose main power was in Flanders. Above all, this 1884 victory had the effect - to quote Robvert Demoulin - of shifting the country's political centre of gravity from the South to towardd the North.⁴⁶

Etymology

The french word Wallonie comes from the term Wallon, itself coming from Walh. Walh is a very old germanic word used to refer to a speaker of Celtic or Latin.⁴⁸

The first apparition recognized of the French word Wallonie dates from 1842⁴⁹ in the Essai d'étymologie philosophique of the philologue and anthropologist Honoré Chavée who use it to refer to the romance word in opposition to Germany. Its «true» meaning, according to Albert Henry⁵⁰, happens two years later under the quill of François-Charles-Joseph Grandgagnage who by this name refers «this time, more and less neatly, the romance part of the young unitary State Belgium.»⁵¹ It is in 1886, with the writer and walloon militant Albert Mockel, that the word takes «its political meaning of cultural and regional affirmation»⁵², in opposition with the word Flanders used by the Flemish Movement.

Symbols

The emergence of a Walloon identity and a Walloon Movement organized has produced different symbols representing Wallonia and events celebrating it. The main symbol is the coq hardi (bold rooster, also named coq wallon) which is widely used, particularly for flags. This emblem was chosen by the Walloon Assembly on April 20, 1913 and formalized the same year by the painter Pierre Paulus. A hymn, Le Chant des Wallons [The Song of the Walloons], composed in 1900, was also adopted. On September 21, 1913, the feast of Wallonia first took place in Verviers, the date is to commemorate the participation of Walloons during the Belgian revolution of 1830. There is also a motto of Wallonia, which is "Always Walloon ("Walon todi" in Walloon).

Except the motto, those symbols chosen by the Walloon Movement were set by the Walloon Parliament as official emblems and events of the Walloon Region in 1998. The French Community of Belgium chose the coq hardi for its flag in 1991.

Language

Romance People or Land

The historians committed to the Belgian unity cause stressed the duality of Belgium. Léon Vanderkindere was speaking about the striking difference of the two parts of the Belgian population ⁵³. Henri Pirenne, recognized the same duality in his books and also in several lectures as, for instance, at the Walloon Congress of 1905: The two people, the Walloon people and the Flemish people, who are in Belgium [...] made great things in different domains and different actions, with various capacities [...] Each of these people may have for the other the greatest admiration... ⁵⁴. He speaks also of two national feelings There is undoubtless at home two other feelings, perfectly perceptible: the Flemish national feeling and the Walloon national feeling ⁵⁵

The point of view of the official website of the Walloon Region is the following: Julius Caesar conquered Gaul. Our ancestors became the Gallo-Romans and were called the "Walha" by their Germanic neighbours. Hence the name Wallonia. The "Walha" abandoned their Celtic dialects and started to speak Vulgar Latin. Already at that time, Wallonia was on the border between the Germanic world and the Latin world. ⁵⁶The historians committed to the Walloon cause are emphasizing the land of the Walloon people: Léopold Genicot⁵⁷, Francis Dumont etc.⁵⁸. For Félix Rousseau, Wallonia has always been a romance land since Gallic Wars and constitutes a Latin avant-garde in the Germanic Europe. Félix Rousseau's book La Wallonie, Terre Romane [The Wallonia, Romance Land] begins like :

For centuries, the land of the Walloons has been and has never stopped to be a romance land. That's the capital fact of the history of the Walloons that explains their way to think, to feel, to believe.
Moreover, in the whole romance world, the land of Walloons, stuk between germanic territories, occupies a special position, a position of avant-garde. Indeed, the 300km long border separate those extremi Latini of the Flemish at the North, of the Germans at the East.⁵⁹.

The maps of the regional languages in France and Wallonia and in the regions of the neigbbouring countries illustrates these facts as same as the map of the regional languages in Wallonia itself:

The official language of Wallonia is French, the Belgian French variety which differs from the standard French of France to various degrees depending on the speaker. That was the decision of the National Congress elected in November 1830 (some weeks after the democratic revolution against The Netherlands who pulled Belgium from this country), but Wallonia was the only region of Belgium which remained loyal to this decision even if both in Wallonia and Flanders the languages spoken by the upper classes was only French. This language was not the language of the low classes in Wallonia but rather the dialects, Walloon, Picard and Lorrain were spoken, as you can see it on the following maps. In Flanders, this decision of the upper classes only represented in the National Congress was the origin of a Flemish movement. There was not such a political movement in Wallonia. In this part of Belgium, the interests of the low classes will be defended by the trade unions and the socialist movement (and some parts of the Liberals and the catholic party). When the Flemish movement became successful at the end of the nineteenth century, the socialist party (for instance Paul Pastur Jules Destrée and some other leftist movements, as the communists, the christian-democrats, the liberals...), began to defend Wallonia in itself, not only their leftist programms. During the sixties that will be also the case of the Walloon Trade Unions with André Renard. The most important justification of the Walloon movement is the fact that the Walloon population is a minority in Belgium (since 1830), even if the French-spaking upper classes dominated the Belgian state in the beginning.

Linguistic characteristics of Wallonia

The French language used in the administration and in the media is very similar in Belgium and in France. One notable difference is the use of the words septante (70) and nonante (90) in Belgium, as opposed to soixante-dix and quatre-vingt-dix in France. The other romance languages used are langue d'oïl regional languages : Walloon, Picard, Champenois, and Gaumais (a variety of Lorrain language).

The official language in Wallonia remained French. Nevertheless, the regional languages of Romance Belgium are more important than in France.

The concepts of francité ou romanité are widespread in the Walloon Movement today. They aime a romance linguistic community to which Walloon have always belong, that is to say since the Gallo-Roman period. It is in this context that the Wallingants have never fought for the recognition of the Walloon language as a standard language. Indeed, certainly since the 19th century the nations should have at their disposal their own territory but also a language unified and prestigious. A dialect labelled as a linguistic variant is not enough. The prestige of French language presented a certain advantage in the fight against the Flemish Movement.⁶⁰

Champenois, Gaumais, Picard and Walloon (and also the germanic dialects present in Brussel and the French linguistic area) have only been officially recognized as regional languages since 24 December 1990 by a decree of the French Community of Belgium.

Walloon and Picard dialects were the predominant languages of the Walloon people until the beginning of the 20th century; French was the language of the upper class. With the development of education in French, these dialects have been in continual decline. There is currently an effort to revive Walloon dialects: some schools offer language courses in Walloon, which is also spoken in some radio programmes, but this effort remains very limited.

Francophone unity, respect for diversity

Some Wallingants consider Wallonia as linguistically united and want to keep that linguistic unity. For example, the liberal and wallingant François Bovesse in 1929 said in one of his speeches :

Walloons, we should pay attention to that aspect of the problem. The prolific Flanders is invading us slowly; if those who come to us and that we welcome fraternally isolate themselves in flemish linguistic groups, if some fanatisms help them to not being absorbed, if an administrative legislation unclear about languages favors this non-absorption, Walloons, beware, in fifty years your land will not be yours anymore.
It is hard, it is bitter to "drop" the Frenchmen (sic) of Flanders. It would be much harder and more dangerous to sacrifice our linguistic unity.⁶¹

Some other Wallingants, as for instance seven representatives of the Walloon Parliament in may 2006 made a proposal of a Walloon Constitution ⁶², speaking of the inhabitants of the German-speaking municipalities (70.000 inhabitants at the East of the Province of Liège in Wallonia), as a very important link for Wallonia with the germanic countries of Europa ⁶³

Voeren

Some wallingants, as the Chairmain of the Walloon Parliament José Happart, claim that the municipality of Voeren should belong both to Wallonia and Flanders ⁶⁴

Culture

Mosan art

Cinema

Walloon films are often characterized by social realism, like those of the Dardenne brothers or Benoît Mariage, and the social documentaries of Patric Jean. On the other hand, films such as Thierry Zéno's "Vase de noces" (1974), "Mireille in the life of the others" by Jean-Marie Buchet (1979), "C'est arrivé près de chez vous" (English title: Man bites dog) by Rémy Belvaux and André Bonzel (1992) and the works of Noël Godin and Jean-Jacques Rousseau are influenced by surrealism, absurdism and black comedy. Wallonia does not have an Anthology Film Archive Museum. No theater projects pointed cinema (experimental cinema, underground, or simply different, unusual test in the content or the form.) There is however the network of the theater known as "Art and essai" but, in practice, they diffuse only cinema subsidized "general public".

References