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Flag of Hensies - Image by Arnaud Leroy, 29 April 2006
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The municipality of Hensies (6,731 inhabitants on 1 January 2006; 2,603 ha; municipal website) is located on the border with France, 15 km north-east of Valenciennes and 20 km south-west of Mons. The municipality of Hensies was established 1976 as the merger of the former municipalities of Hensies, Hainin, Montrœul-sur-Haine and Thulin.
There are very few ancient documents about Hensies. It is said, without
firm evidence, that Haisentice listed in the share of the Kingdom of
Lotharingia in 870, must be read Hensies. The first clear mention of
Hensies dates back to 1180, as Hancioe. In lower Latin, Aisentioe or
Esentioe means both "a colonists' estate and land used in common by a
village" (in French, aisance), but nothing proves that this word is
the root of Hensies. The name of the village has also been related to
Hen (= hem, "a hamlet") and to the river Haine, which waters the village. The
suffix -chies means "a home".
Remains of an old Roman way have been found in the place called La
Malmaison, as well as tiles, coins and vases. The secondary way
Hensies-Quarouble linked the Bavay-Boulogne and Bavay-Flanders ways.
Hensies later depended on Quiévrain.
The Hensies-Pommerœul colliery was opened short after the end of the
First World War. The shaft of Sartis was the last active coal mine in
Borinage, being closed on 31 March 1976.
Hainin depended in the Middle Ages of Thulin. In the middle of the
12th century, his lord was Guillaume, also lord of Dour and Thulin.
Later, the domain of Hainin, which was biggest than the current
village, was ran by the family of Haynin on behalf of the abbey of
Florennes. At the end of the Ancient Regime, Hainin was purchased by
the Leduc family, whose descendant Count de Clerfayt, Feldmarschall of
the Imperial Army, was one of the commanders of the Austrian troops
defeated in Jemappes by the French army in 1792.
Coal was extracted in Hainin from the 16th century to 1745; there were
four different collieries in 1670. Hainin was mostly a rural village
but several of its inhabitants worked in the factories and coal mines
of Boussu and Dour and in the factories of Crespin and Blanc-Misseron, in France.
Montrœul-sur-Haine is a very ancient settlement. In 1846, four stocks
of more than 3,000 Roman coins buried in the 3rd century were found,
as well as remains of buildings of the same period. More than 200
Gallo-Roman tombs have yielded wine and oil amphoras, funerary urns,
vases, dishes, etc. In the Middle Ages, the domain of Montrœul was
owned by a local family and later transferred to the lords of Le
Roeulx, Condé, Werchin and Ligne.
King of France Louis XI burnt down
the castle of Montrœul in 1477. The domain of Thirisart, owned by
Count de Croÿ, existed in Montrœul until the French Revolution.
The village is made of several hamlets scattered along a main road; it
was for long threatened by the the floodings of the Haine. Until 1742,
the villagers owned collectively with Thulin and Elouges a marsh with a
permanent right of pasture; the marsh was then shared among the three
villages.
Thulin is also a very ancient settlement. Funerary urns filled with hundreds of Roman coins have been found there. The domain of Thulin, a fief of Boussu, successively belonged to Guillaume de Dour, to the Aspremont family (middle of the 12th century) and to the Ligne family (from 1513 to the French Revolution). The village was sacked by the Huguenots commanded by Louis de Nassau in 1572. From the 17th to the 19th century, Thulin was a village of significance, bigger than the neighbouring ones and even bigger than Saint-Ghislain. Thulin was a rural village with rich soils. In 1920, two coal shafts employed some 100 workers, and there were a few small industries such as the Cartonneries and Papeteries du Hainaut.
Ivan Sache, 29 April 2006
The flag of Hensies is yellow with a blue bend sinister (ascending diagonal)
overlaid by a red engrailed bend (descending diagonal) and a yellow quitefoil in the center of the saltire.
According to Armoiries communales en Belgique. Communes wallonnes, bruxelloises et
germanophones [w2v03], the flag, adopted on 22 October 1993 by the Municipal Council, is prescribed by a Decree issued on 6 October 1994 the Executive of the French Community.
The flag is a banner of the municipal arms. The flower is specified as
a medlar (Mespilus germanica L.) flower. The simplified representation
of the flower is botanically correct.
The arms of the former municipality of Hensies, granted by on 22 November 1924, had an odd lozengy shape, as "A lozengy shield: per pale firstly quartered 1. and 4. argent three fesses gules (Croÿ); 2. and 3. counterquartered a) and d) azure three fleurs de lis or (France) b) and c) ermine (Brittany); escutcheon gules three roses or (Arenberg); second like the escutcheon of the first. The shield surmounted by a crown with five florets."
The Gelre Armorial shows "Or three cinquefoils gules" for Eberhard III of Marck, lord of Arenberg (Here v. Aerberch, #20, folio 27r) and his "usual colours" as "Gules three cinquefoils or".The Arenberg (aka Aremberg) family emerged in the castle of Aremberg,
seat of the County of Arenberg, located in the German Eifel, near
Cologne. The oldest known lord of Arenberg is Heinrich ("Heinrich II.
de Arberg", 1166/67-1197). In 1299, the last heiress of the first house of
Arenberg, Mechthilde (Mathilda) married Count Engelbert II of Marck.
The aforementioned Eberhard III ruled the house from 1480 to 1496. In
1541, Count Robert III of Marck-Arenberg died withouth heir and in 1547
his sister Margarethe married Count Johann of Ligne. In 1576, Count
Karl of Arenberg (1568-1616) was made Prince of Arenberg by Emperor
Maximilian II. In 1644, Philipp-Franz of Arenberg (1640-1674) was made
Duke of Arenberg by Kaiser Ferdinand III. On 8 May 1826, King of
Hanovre Georges IV set up the Duchy of Arenberg-Meppen for Duke
Prosper-Ludwig of Arenberg. On 16 July 1953, King of the Belgians
Baudouin I granted the title of Prince (for Belgium) to
Eberhard-Engelbert-Anton of Arenberg; the Prince was granted arms
including the historical shield of Arenberg.
[Arenberg Foundation]
Arnaud Leroy, Pascal Vagnat, Christopher Southworth & Ivan Sache, 17 June 2007
