Last modified: 2008-01-19 by ivan sache
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![[Flag of Lichtervelde]](../images/b/be-vwvli.gif)
Municipal flag of Lichtervelde - Image by Arnaud Leroy, 25 June 2006
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The municipality of Lichtervelde (8,438 inhabitants on 1 January 2007;
2,593 ha) is located 10 km north of Roeselare.
The name of Lichtervelde appeared for the first time in 1127 in the
description of the murder of Charles the Good, written by the
chronicler Galbertus van Brugge. There are different hypotheses on the
origin of the name of the town. Some say that Lichtervelde comes from
Lifterfelde, from old Dutch lift, "links"; other say it must be read
lichte velden, "coloured light"; Verscheurens' dictionary relates
Lichtervelde to lichte grond, "light soil". Anyway, the name has
nothing to do with small lights seen in the fields. Emigrants from
Lichtervelde are said to have found a settlement named Lichterfelde
near Berlin but there is no concrete evidence of that.
The north of the municipal territory is mostly a moor area, already
settled in the Roman times, as proved by the Roman coins found there in
the XIXth century. The lords of Lichtervelde had several fishponds
there and peet was extracted. In the second half of the XIXth century,
the ponds disappeared and trees, today also disappeared, were planted.
The south of the municipal territory has always been a woody area, the
Huwynbossen being colloquially called Colpaertse Bossen. These woods
disappeared after the Second World War.
The domain of Lichtervelde belonged to the free land (Vrije) of Bruges. The lord's castle was destroyed in 1491 by the troops of the Count of
Nassau and again in 1584, together with the church, during the religious
unrest. It was never rebuilt and the lords of Lichtervelde lived in
Bruges or Ghent from 1600 onwards. In his Flandria Illustrata,
published in 1641, Sanderus describes the castle of Lichtervelde,
probably on the basis of earlier observations.
The oldest known members of the Lichtervelde family are Sigher van
Lichtervelde and his son Walter, who both disappeared during the
Crusade in 1205. In 1302, Jan, Pieter and Lodewijk van Lichtervelde
fought on the Groeningheveld near Kortrijk during the Battle of the
Golden Spurs. The most famous member of the lineage is Jacob van
Lichtervelde, who was a main councillor of three Dukes of Burgundy,
Philippe le Hardi / Filips de Stoute (1384-1404), Jean sans Peur / Jan
Zonder Vrees (1404-1419) and Philippe le Bon / Filips de Goede
(1419-1467). Among his titles are Lord of Kortrjik (1391), Lord of
Antwerp (1394), Grand Bailiff of Flanders (1396), Envoy of the Duke to England (1404), Governor of Brabant (1409) and Count of Lichtervelde (1411). He died in 1431 and was buried in the church of Koolskamp, the
village (today part of the municipality of Ardooie), where he had lived. His vault bears the writing Die van Lichtervelde, Heeren van Coolscamp whereas his tombstone bears the writing Ridder die starf in't jaer 1431, den letsten dagh van Maerte
(Knight who died in 1431, on the last day of March).
Around 1400, Marie van Nevele van Lichtervelde married Roger Botelinck, lord of Heule, and Lichtervelde was transferred to the Heule family,
that kept it until the end of the XVIth century. Antoon van Heule
founded in 1554 the still active St. Sebastian's Ghilde. The Heule were
succeeded by the Claerhout in 1600, themselves succeeded by the
Haveskercke. Lichtervelde was split in 1622 between the families of
Maulde (19/36) and Haveskercke (17/36). In 1744, the part owned by the
Maulde came into the hands of Karel Francis van Lichtervelde, so that
more than half of Lichtervelde was taken back by the original family.
The Haveskercke part was transferred to the Abeele.
Lichtervelde developed at the end of the XIXth century as a busy railway crossroads. The station was inaugurated in 1847, with a branch to Veurne (via Kortemark, Zarren and Diksmuide), opened in 1858, and a branch to Tielt and Ghent, opened in 1877. The yearly horses' market was then very famous. Lichtervelde was severely damaged during the two World Wars.
Felix Callewaert (1862-1918) moved in 1890 from Zwevezele to
Lichtervelde, where he set up his clock-making workshop. In Zwevezele,
he manufactured accordions with his brother Charles; the production of
accordions peaked in Lichtervelde. The former accordion manufacture is
today included in a chocolate factory, whose owners have fortunately
decided to keep the most striking elements of the former accordion
manufacture. The trekzak made in Lichtervelde was extremely popular
and was sold in Canada and the United States. After the First World
War, Felix' son, Eugène (1894-1944), increased the production of the
Lichterveldenaar. He was shot by the Germans during the Second World
War, which ended the production of the Callewaert accordions.
The famous inventor Karel Van De Poele (1846-1892) was born in
Lichtervelde. Aged 23, he moved to the United States where he
specialized in electricity and lighting. He registered hundreds of
patents and is the inventor of the trolley system.
Lichtervelde is the birth town of the cyclist Henri "Ritte" Van
Lerberghe (1891-1966), the famous winner of the 1919 Tour of Flanders.
Van Lerberghe won the fifth stage of Tour de France in Bayonne in 1913
and ranked second in Tour of Flanders in 1914. When Tour of Flanders
resumed in 1919, Van Lerberghe came directly from the battlefield of
Yser to the start of the race. He had to lend a bicycle and shouted
before the start that he would ride all his competitors to hell; they
laughed and did not care until Van Lerberghe attacked on the hill of
Ichtegem. Arriving close to the finish line in Gentbrugge, he stopped
at a pub and ordered "a few" beers; the director of the race finally
commissionned Ritte's coach to fetch him in the pub, which was made
with a bit of force. Completely drunk, Ritte crossed the finish line
walking and told the spectators to go home because he had half a day
advance on the others. His advance was indeed 14 minutes, not
including those lost in the pub.
In 2004, Lichtervelde was elected "Village of the Tour" and a
well-deserved commemorative plaque celebrating Vanlerberghe was
inaugurated.
The cyclist Gilbert Desmet (b. 1931), known as Smetje van Lichtervelde was a subtopper (below the top) in the late 1950s - early 1960s. He won several local races, but also Paris-Tours and Kuurne-Brussels-Kuurne (1958), the Flèche Wallonne and the Quatre Jours de Dunkerque (1964); he wore the yellow jersey in Tour de France for two days in 1956 and twelve days in 1963, and ranked fourth in 1962.
Sources:
Ivan Sache, 25 June 2006
The coat of arms of Lichtervelde is "Azure a chief argent seven ermines 4 + 3".
The municipal website says that until the end of the Ancient Regime, the municipality used the arms of the Lichtervelde family, which has in chief two rows of seven and eight
ermine spots. In 1841, an administrative mistake made that the coat of
arms of Lichtervelde has in chief two rows of four and three ermines;
the error was never corrected.
The Gelre Armorial, shows:
- "Azure a chief ermine", for Roger of Lichtervelde (Die He. v. Lichtervelt, #948, folio 80v);
- "Azure a chief ermine (Lichtervelde) a dove rising argent", for Louis
of Lichtervelde, lord of Koolskamp (Die H. v. Coolscamp, #967, folio
81v);
- "Halluin, the lions armed and crowned or an escutcheon azure a chief
ermine (Lichtervelde)", for Gerard of Halluin, lord of Lichtervelde (v.
Haellwyn, #990, folio 82r).
The coat of arms still used by the Lichtervelde family is
indeed shown with a chief ermine, that is a non-defined number of ermine
spots.
It is possible that the Lichtervelde municipal website misinterpreted the
Lichtervelde family arms, since it claims that the "true" arms of
Lichtervelde are used by the municipality of Koolskamp (now part of
Ardooie, which uses the former Koolskamp arms in the second and third
quarters of its arms). Servais indeed shows the arms of Koolskamp with
a not-defined number of ermine spots (and gives 7 May 1840 as the date
of the grant to Lichtervelde). To make the things even simpler, the
arms of Koolskamp also experienced an administrative mistake: the chief was
replaced by a white field as height as the blue field in 1824 and the
error was not corrected by the grant of 1846.
Anyway, the Lichtervelde 1840-1 mistake was probably the specification
of a number of ermine spots in the chief of the arms.
The Lichtervelde family arms have inspired other municipal arms representing places they ruled in the past: Koolskamp, Esen (now part of Diksmuide), Moerzeke (now part of Hamme) and Zarren (now part of Kortemark).
Arnaud Leroy, Pascal Vagnat & Ivan Sache, 25 August 2007
