1.
Belgium
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Belgium, officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a sovereign state in Western Europe bordered by France, the Netherlands, Germany, Luxembourg, and the North Sea. It is a small, densely populated country which covers an area of 30,528 square kilometres and has a population of about 11 million people. Additionally, there is a group of German-speakers who live in the East Cantons located around the High Fens area. Historically, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg were known as the Low Countries, the region was called Belgica in Latin, after the Roman province of Gallia Belgica. From the end of the Middle Ages until the 17th century, today, Belgium is a federal constitutional monarchy with a parliamentary system of governance. It is divided into three regions and three communities, that exist next to each other and its two largest regions are the Dutch-speaking region of Flanders in the north and the French-speaking southern region of Wallonia. The Brussels-Capital Region is a bilingual enclave within the Flemish Region. A German-speaking Community exists in eastern Wallonia, Belgiums linguistic diversity and related political conflicts are reflected in its political history and complex system of governance, made up of six different governments. Upon its independence, declared in 1830, Belgium participated in the Industrial Revolution and, during the course of the 20th century, possessed a number of colonies in Africa. This continuing antagonism has led to several far-reaching reforms, resulting in a transition from a unitary to a federal arrangement during the period from 1970 to 1993. Belgium is also a member of the Eurozone, NATO, OECD and WTO. Its capital, Brussels, hosts several of the EUs official seats as well as the headquarters of major international organizations such as NATO. Belgium is also a part of the Schengen Area, Belgium is a developed country, with an advanced high-income economy and is categorized as very high in the Human Development Index. A gradual immigration by Germanic Frankish tribes during the 5th century brought the area under the rule of the Merovingian kings, a gradual shift of power during the 8th century led the kingdom of the Franks to evolve into the Carolingian Empire. Many of these fiefdoms were united in the Burgundian Netherlands of the 14th and 15th centuries, the Eighty Years War divided the Low Countries into the northern United Provinces and the Southern Netherlands. The latter were ruled successively by the Spanish and the Austrian Habsburgs and this was the theatre of most Franco-Spanish and Franco-Austrian wars during the 17th and 18th centuries. The reunification of the Low Countries as the United Kingdom of the Netherlands occurred at the dissolution of the First French Empire in 1815, although the franchise was initially restricted, universal suffrage for men was introduced after the general strike of 1893 and for women in 1949. The main political parties of the 19th century were the Catholic Party, French was originally the single official language adopted by the nobility and the bourgeoisie
2.
Wallonia
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Wallonia is a region of Belgium. Wallonia is primarily French-speaking, and accounts for 55% of the territory of Belgium, unlike Flanders, the Walloon Region was not merged with the French Community of Belgium which is the political entity that is responsible for matters related mainly to culture and education. The German-speaking minority in the east forms the German-speaking Community of Belgium, during the industrial revolution, Wallonia was second only to the United Kingdom in industrialization, capitalizing on its extensive deposits of coal and iron. This brought the wealth, and, from the beginning of the 19th to the middle of the 20th century. Since World War II the importance of industry has greatly diminished. Wallonia now suffers high unemployment and has a significantly lower GDP per capita than Flanders. The economic inequalities and linguistic divide between the two are major sources of conflict in Belgium and is a major factor in Flemish separatism. The capital of Wallonia is Namur but the city with the greatest population is Charleroi, most of Wallonias major cities and two-thirds of its population lie along the Sambre and Meuse valley, the former industrial backbone of Belgium. To the north lies the Central Belgian Plateau, which, like Flanders, is relatively flat, in the south-east lie the Ardennes, hilly and sparsely populated. Wallonia borders Flanders and the Netherlands in the north, France to the south and west, Wallonia has been a member of the Organisation Internationale de la Francophonie since 1980. The term Wallonia can mean different things in different contexts. One of the three regions of Belgium is still constitutionally defined as the Walloon Region, but the regions government has renamed it Wallonia. In practice, the difference between the two terms is small and what is meant is usually clear, based on context, the root of the word Wallonia, like the words Wales, Cornwall and Wallachia, is the Germanic word Walha, meaning the strangers. Wallonia is named after the Walloons, the population of the Burgundian Netherlands speaking Romance languages, in Middle Dutch, the term Walloons also included the French-speaking population of the Prince-Bishopric of Liège or the whole population of the Romanic sprachraum within the medieval Low Countries. Julius Caesar conquered Gaul in 57 BC, the Low Countries became part of the larger Gallia Belgica province which originally stretched from southwestern Germany to Normandy and the southern part of the Netherlands. The population of territory was Celtic with a Germanic influence which was stronger in the north than in the south of the province. The ancestors of the Walloons became Gallo-Romans and were called the Walha by their Germanic neighbours, the Walha abandoned their Celtic dialects and started to speak Vulgar Latin. The Merovingian Franks gradually gained control of the region during the 5th century, the language border began to crystallize between 700 under the reign of the Merovingians and Carolingians and around 1000 after the Ottonian Renaissance
3.
Fountain
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A fountain is a piece of architecture which pours water into a basin or jets it into the air to supply drinking water and/or for a decorative or dramatic effect. Fountains were originally purely functional, connected to springs or aqueducts and used to drinking water and water for bathing and washing to the residents of cities, towns. Until the late 19th century most fountains operated by gravity, and needed a source of higher than the fountain, such as a reservoir or aqueduct. In addition to providing drinking water, fountains were used for decoration, Roman fountains were decorated with bronze or stone masks of animals or heroes. In the Middle Ages, Moorish and Muslim garden designers used fountains to create versions of the gardens of paradise. King Louis XIV of France used fountains in the Gardens of Versailles to illustrate his power over nature, the baroque decorative fountains of Rome in the 17th and 18th centuries marked the arrival point of restored Roman aqueducts and glorified the Popes who built them. By the end of the 19th century, as indoor plumbing became the source of drinking water. Mechanical pumps replaced gravity and allowed fountains to recycle water and to force it high into the air, the Jet dEau in Lake Geneva, built in 1951, shoots water 140 metres in the air. The highest such fountain in the world is King Fahds Fountain in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, fountains are used today to decorate city parks and squares, to honor individuals or events, for recreation and for entertainment. A Splash pad or spray pool allows city residents to enter, get wet, the musical fountain combines moving jets of water, colored lights and recorded music, controlled by a computer, for dramatic effects. Drinking fountains provide clean drinking water in buildings, parks. Ancient civilizations built stone basins to capture and hold precious drinking water, a carved stone basin, dating to around 2000 BC, was discovered in the ruins of the ancient Sumerian city of Lagash in modern Iraq. The ancient Assyrians constructed a series of basins in the gorge of the Comel River, carved in rock, connected by small channels. The lowest basin was decorated with carved reliefs of two lions, the ancient Greeks were apparently the first to use aqueducts and gravity-powered fountains to distribute water. In the 6th century BC the Athenian ruler Peisistratos built the fountain of Athens. It had nine large cannons, or spouts, which supplied drinking water to local residents. Greek fountains were made of stone or marble, with water flowing through bronze pipes, most Greek fountains flowed by simple gravity, but they also discovered how to use principle of a siphon to make water spout, as seen in pictures on Greek vases. The Ancient Romans built a system of aqueducts from mountain rivers and lakes to provide water for the fountains
4.
Conservation-restoration of cultural heritage
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The conservation-restoration of cultural heritage focuses on protection and care of tangible cultural heritage, including artworks, architecture, archaeology, and museum collections. Conservation activities include preventive conservation, examination, documentation, research, treatment and this field is closely allied with conservation science, curators and registrars. Conservation of cultural heritage can be described as a type of ethical stewardship, Conservation of cultural heritage applies simple ethical guidelines, Minimal intervention, Appropriate materials and reversible methods, Full documentation of all work undertaken. Often there are compromises between preserving appearance, maintaining original design and material properties, and ability to reverse changes, reversibility is now emphasized so as to reduce problems with future treatment, investigation, and use. The care of cultural heritage has a history, one that was primarily aimed at fixing and mending objects for their continued use. Until the early 20th century, artists were normally the ones called upon to repair damaged artworks, louis Pasteur carried out scientific analysis on paint as well. The society was founded by William Morris and Philip Webb, both of whom were influenced by the writings of John Ruskin. He not only developed an approach to the care of objects in the collections. The early development of conservation of heritage in any area of the world is usually linked to the creation of positions for chemists within museums. Lauries interests were fostered by William Holman Hunt, the creation of this department moved the focus for the development of conservation theory and practice from Germany to Britain, and made the latter a prime force in this fledgling field. In the United States, the development of conservation of heritage can be traced to the Fogg Art Museum. Importantly he also brought onto the staff chemists. Rutherford John Gettens was the first of usch in the US to be employed by an art museum. He worked with George L. Stout, the founder and first editor of Technical Studies, Gettens and Stout co-authored Painting Materials, A Short Encyclopaedia in 1942, reprinted in 1966. This compendium is still cited regularly, only a few dates and descriptions in Gettens and Stouts book are now outdated. George T. Oliver, of Oliver Brothers Art Restoration and Art Conservation-Boston invented the vacuum hot table for relining paintings in 1920s, taylors prototype table, which he designed and constructed, is still in operation. Oliver Brothers is believed to be the first and the oldest continuously operating art restoration company in the United States, the focus of conservation development then accelerated in Britain and America, and it was in Britain that the first International Conservation Organisations developed. Art historians and theorists such as Cesare Brandi have also played a significant role in developing conservation science theory, in recent years ethical concerns have been at the forefront of developments in conservation
5.
Tournai
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Tournai, known in Dutch as Doornik, is a Walloon city and municipality of Belgium located 85 kilometres west-southwest of Brussels, on the river Scheldt, in the province of Hainaut. Tournai is part of the Eurometropolis Lille-Kortrijk-Tournai, which had 2,155,161 residents in 2008, along with Tongeren, Tournai is the oldest city in Belgium and it has played an important role in the countrys cultural history. Tournai is located in the Wallonia region of Belgium, at the limit of the Flemish plain, in the basin of the River Scheldt. Administratively, the town is part of the Province of Hainaut and it is also a municipality that is part of the French-speaking Community of Belgium. Tournai has its own arrondissements, both administrative and judicial and its area of 213.75 square kilometres makes it the largest municipality in size in Belgium, it is also the largest in population in Western Hainaut. Rocks from the Tournai area date from the Carboniferous Period and have used to define the Tournaisian Age. Tournai stone is a limestone which takes a polish and was used particularly in the Romanesque period for sculpted items such as Tournai fonts. It is also enough to have been used locally for pavements. It is sometimes called Tournai marble, though this is geologically inaccurate, Tournai, known as Tornacum, was a place of minor importance in Roman times, a stopping place where the Roman road from Cologne on the Rhine to Boulogne on the coast crossed the river Scheldt. It was fortified under Maximian in the 3rd century AD, when the Roman limes was withdrawn to the string of outposts along the road and it came into the possession of the Salian Franks in 432. Under king Childeric I, whose tomb was discovered there in 1653, in 486, Clovis moved the center of power to Paris. In turn, a son of Tournai, Eleutherius, became bishop of the newly created bishopric of Tournai. In 862 Charles the Bald, first king of Western Francia and still to become Holy Roman Emperor, after the partition of the Frankish empire by the Treaties of Verdun and of Meerssen, Tournai remained in the western part of the empire, which in 987 became France. The city participated in 11th-century rise of towns in the Low Countries, with a cloth industry based on English wool. An ambitious rebuilding of the cathedral was initiated in 1030, the stone Pont des Trous over the Scheldt, with defensive towers at either end, was built in 1290, replacing an earlier wooden structure. During the 15th century, the textile trade boomed and it became an important supplier of tapestry. The art of painting flourished too, Jacques Daret, Robert Campin and it was captured in 1513 by Henry VIII of England, making it the only Belgian city ever to have been ruled by England. It was also represented in the 1515 Parliament of England, the city was handed back to French rule in 1519, following the Treaty of London
6.
France
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France, officially the French Republic, is a country with territory in western Europe and several overseas regions and territories. The European, or metropolitan, area of France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, Overseas France include French Guiana on the South American continent and several island territories in the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian oceans. France spans 643,801 square kilometres and had a population of almost 67 million people as of January 2017. It is a unitary republic with the capital in Paris. Other major urban centres include Marseille, Lyon, Lille, Nice, Toulouse, during the Iron Age, what is now metropolitan France was inhabited by the Gauls, a Celtic people. The area was annexed in 51 BC by Rome, which held Gaul until 486, France emerged as a major European power in the Late Middle Ages, with its victory in the Hundred Years War strengthening state-building and political centralisation. During the Renaissance, French culture flourished and a colonial empire was established. The 16th century was dominated by civil wars between Catholics and Protestants. France became Europes dominant cultural, political, and military power under Louis XIV, in the 19th century Napoleon took power and established the First French Empire, whose subsequent Napoleonic Wars shaped the course of continental Europe. Following the collapse of the Empire, France endured a succession of governments culminating with the establishment of the French Third Republic in 1870. Following liberation in 1944, a Fourth Republic was established and later dissolved in the course of the Algerian War, the Fifth Republic, led by Charles de Gaulle, was formed in 1958 and remains to this day. Algeria and nearly all the colonies became independent in the 1960s with minimal controversy and typically retained close economic. France has long been a centre of art, science. It hosts Europes fourth-largest number of cultural UNESCO World Heritage Sites and receives around 83 million foreign tourists annually, France is a developed country with the worlds sixth-largest economy by nominal GDP and ninth-largest by purchasing power parity. In terms of household wealth, it ranks fourth in the world. France performs well in international rankings of education, health care, life expectancy, France remains a great power in the world, being one of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council with the power to veto and an official nuclear-weapon state. It is a member state of the European Union and the Eurozone. It is also a member of the Group of 7, North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, the World Trade Organization, originally applied to the whole Frankish Empire, the name France comes from the Latin Francia, or country of the Franks
7.
Nord (French department)
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Nord is a department in the far north of France. It was created from the halves of the historical counties of Flanders and Hainaut. The modern coat of arms was inherited from the County of Flanders, Nord is the countrys most populous department. It also contains the region of Lille, the fifth-largest urban area in France after Paris, Lyon, Marseille. Within the department is located the part of France where the French Flemish dialect of Dutch is still spoken as a native language, tribes of the Belgae, such as the Menapii and Nervii were the first peoples recorded in the area later known as Nord. In effect, the area known later as Nord became an isogloss between the Germanic and Romance languages and this has remained evident in the place names of the region. After the the County of Flanders became part of France in the 9th century, during the 14th Century, much of the area came under the control of the Duchy of Burgundy and in subsequent centuries was therefore part of the Habsburg Netherlands and the Spanish Netherlands. Areas that later constituted Nord were ceded to France by treaties in 1659,1668, and 1678, becoming the Counties of Flanders and Hainaut, on 4 March 1790, during the French Revolution, Nord became one of the original 83 departments created to replace the counties. Nord is part of the current Hauts-de-France region and is surrounded by the French departments of Pas-de-Calais and Aisne, as well as by Belgium, situated in the north of the country along the western half of the Belgian frontier, the department is unusually long and narrow. Other important cities are Valenciennes, Douai, and Dunkirk. The principal rivers are the following, Yser, Lys, Escaut, Scarpe, Sambre Nord is the most heavily populated department, with a population of 2,617,939, the President of the Departmental Council is the unaffiliated right-winger Jean-René Lecerf. The first President of the Fifth Republic, General Charles de Gaulle, was born in Lille in the department on 22 November 1890, until recently, the department was dominated economically by coal mining, which extended through the heart of the department from neighbouring Artois into central Belgium
8.
Ath
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Ath is a Belgian municipality located in the Walloon province of Hainaut. Ath is known as the City of Giants after the Ducasse dAth festivities which take place every year on the weekend in August. Huge figures representing Goliath, Samson, and other figures are paraded through the streets. Archeological records show the existence of several Gallo-Roman settlements in the Ath area, the origin of the city of Ath, however, dates from around 1160, when Count Baudouin IV of Hainaut, bought some territory from his liegeman, Gilles de Trazegnies. A few years later, Baldwin built the Burbant Tower – which can still be seen today – to protect his new acquisition, the new city was soon given privileges and its newly built market hall on the Grand-Place began to attract residents. Ath was the setting of the Peace of Ath, signed on June 4,1357, by then, the weekly Ath market, which took place – and still takes place – on Thursdays, had started attracting sellers from a much larger region. The production of linen, cloth, hide, and luxury items such as gold ware, cabinets, the population growth necessitated the building of a second wall, which was completed at the end of the 14th century. In 1416, the city built a school for the study of Latin, the city counted then about 5,000 people. In 1667, Ath was conquered in a day by the army of Louis XIV. Soon after, Vauban built new fortifications, which included eight bastions, the city suffered again at the hands of the French army in 1745. At the end of the 18th century, Ath counted about 7,300 inhabitants, in 1816, two military engineering surveys concluded that Ath defences should be improved, the British survey recommended a garrison of 3,000 troops and the building cost would be £143,599. The Dutch wished to spend an additional £266,000, the Duke of Wellington agreed to the Dutch plan. The funding was paid for by England, Holland and by French war reparations, in 1824, the Dutch under King William I, built the Féron Fort, and the city once more gained strategic value. A treaty drafted in London on 15 November 1831, which the Netherlands refused to sign, was followed by the Treaty of London, part of the terms of the treaty required the fort, amongst others, to be dismantled. The freed up land assisted the town for the activities of a growing population, a new growth period took place between 1850 and 1914 driven by the forestry, agricultural and textile industries. In the 20th century, most of these went into decline and were replaced by commercial, administrative. In the last 30 years, several neighbourhoods have been revitalized and developed, the Ghislenghien industrial park near Ath was the scene of one of Belgiums worst ever industrial disasters on July 30,2004. Around 8,30 am local time, workers constructing a new factory for abrasives firm Diamant Boart reported a smell of gas
9.
Charleroi
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Charleroi is a city and a municipality of Wallonia, located in the province of Hainaut, Belgium. By January 1,2008, the population of Charleroi was 201,593. The inhabitants are called Carolorégiens or simply Carolos, the municipality of Charleroi straddles both banks of the river Sambre in an area marked by industrial activities, which has been nicknamed the Pays Noir, part of the larger sillon industriel. Even though most of the factories have closed since the 1950s, Charleroi lies around 50 kilometres south of Brussels. Several public buildings, temples and villas were built in the area in the Roman period, burial places, with jewels and weapons, have been found. The first written mention of a place called Charnoy dates from a 9th-century offering in the Lobbes abbey, during the Middle Ages, Charnoy was one of the many small hamlets in the area, with no more than about 50 inhabitants, part of the County of Namur. The history of the city of Charleroi began in 1666, in September of that same year, the name Charnoy was officially replaced by that of the newly founded city of Charles-Roi, so named in honor of Charles II. The chronogram FVNDATVR CAROLOREGIVM can be found in the register of the parish of Charnoy for the year 1666, a year later, Louis XIV’s armies, under the command of the Vicomte de Turenne, besieged the unfinished fortress. Sébastien Le Prestre de Vauban completed the work, the future city was granted its privileges, a bridge was built over the river. The French Prince of Conti took the city again in 1745, glass, steel and coal industries, which had already sprung up a century earlier, could now flourish. Trouble began again in 1790, the year of the uprising that eventually led to the United States of Belgium. The Austrians occupied the city, were forced out by the French after the Battle of Jemappes on November 6,1792, and took it back again four months later. On June 12,1794, the French revolutionary Army of Sambre-et-Meuse under the command of Jean-Baptiste Jourdan, invested Charleroi, the city took the revolutionary name of Libre-sur-Sambre until 1800. After Frances defeat in 1814, the area was annexed to the Netherlands. Napoleon stayed in Charleroi for a couple of days in June 1815, after the Industrial Revolution, Charleroi benefited from the increased use of coke in the metallurgical industry. People from across Europe were attracted by the opportunities. Following the Industrial revolution in Wallonia, Charleroi from the 1850s–1860s became one of the most important places where labor strikes broke out, in 1886,12 strikers were killed by the Belgian army in Roux. In the 1880s, miners in Hainaut were recruited by the Dominion Coal Company in Glace Bay and these miners were anxious to flee the repression following bloody strikes and riots in Liège and Charleroi during the Walloon Jacquerie of 1886
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