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Overijse (Municipality, Province of Flemish Brabant, Belgium)

Municipal flag of Overijse - Image by Andy Weir & Ivan Sache, 18 September 2007

Presentation of Overijse
Flag of Overijse

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Presentation of Overijse

The municipality of Overijse (24,164 inhabitants on 1 January 2007; 4,443 ha; municipal website) is located between Brussels and Wavre.

Overijse is named after the river IJse that waters the municipality. The oldest known form of the name is Isca, the Latinized form of a Celtic root that means "water", mentioned in a charter dated 832.
Overijse was granted its first charter in 1001/1005 by Duke Otto of Lorraine. Accordingly, the merchants of Overijse did not pay tax on the grain market of Brussels. In 1234, Duke Henri granted the burghers of Overijse a freedom charter. They had therefore the same status as the burghers of Brussels, Leuven and Wavre, which were then the three richest towns in Brabant.
The rule of the sleazy lords of Witthem, which started in 1345, was a period of decline for Overijse. In 1488, the village was burned down by the troops of Maximilian of Austria. Between 300 and 400 inhabitants were killed in the church. The decline of the vineyards started around 1500.
The 14 century was a period of rebirth. A colossal building site allowed the reconstruction of the center of the village. The St. Hubert Hospital was built and the famous architects Keldermans, father and son, drafted the plans of the market hall.

On 10 October 1677, Overijse became the seat of a Principality granted to Eugene-Maximilian of Horne and would have to face another difficult period. Under the French rule and until the Dutch rule, the heirs of the Horne family (Salma) lost the principality. After having retrieved their domain, they were forced to sell it in 1817. In 1832, Overijse was awarded a Honour flag, the horizontally divided Belgian flag granted to the municipalities who had sent volunteers in the independence war in 1830.

Overijse contributed to the Golden Age of humanism, thanks to its most famous citizen, the humanist Justius Lipsius (1547-1606).
Lipsius (Joost Lips) was borne in Overijse on 18 October 1547. He lived during the so-called "golden century", which was, however, also the era of the Inquisition and of the stakes. A contemporary of Kings Charles V and Philip II, the Duke of Alva and Don Juan of Austria, Lipsius lived in a dramatically changing world, which was affected by the Reformation, the Council of Trent and the Counter-Reformation.
Lipsius' career can be divided into three periods. During his Brabantian period, Lipsius studied in Brussels, Ath, Cologne and Leuven, did a study trip in Roma and taught for a short time in the Protestant University of Iena. In Rome, Lipsius was the secretary of Cardinal de Granvelle (1517-1586, Vice-Roy of Naples, 1571-1575 and Archbishop of Besançon, 1584), and met the French humanist Marc-Antoine Muret (1526-1585, mostly known for his Latin poems). Muret deeply influenced Lipsius but the two humanists fell out because of Lipsius' edition of Tacitus' Annals in 1574.
In 1578, Lipsius left Leuven because of the repression exerted by the Spaniards, abjured Catholicism and moved to the Calvinist university of Leiden. The exile to Leiden was the second period of Lipsius' career, during which he developed his own philosophy, often labelled as Christian neo-Stoicism [De Constantia, 1583). He was appointed several times Rector of the university.
In 1591, Lipsius came back to his homeland and Catholicism and supported the Counter-Reformation. Lipsius' decision caused a huge international sensation. During that third period of his career, Lipsius worked on Seneca's Stoicism. He reached the top of his career in Leuven, where he was the eminence grise of Archdukes Albert and Isobel until his death in 1606. In his last writings, Lipsius, combining erudition and eloquence, developed the so-called "terse style" and the theory of imitatio adulta. This theory was coined by J.B. Giraldi in 1543 but Lipsius systematized it in his Epistolica Institutio (1591). The imitatio adulta corresponds to the model that an experienced humanist must find in Seneca or Tacitus, instead of reproducing Cicero's school exercises. It requires variety and density, and was the basis of the European mannerism (illustrated for instance by Tintoreto, Arcimboldo, El Greco, Jan Metsys etc.) and a very important means of propagating the Counter-Reformation. The imitatio adulta also includes a notion of "progress in literature", as applied by the French Jesuit predicators, who fed the antique models with contemporary poets such as Ronsard.
Lipsius was nicknamed Lumen seculi sui (His century's light) and was called by the French humanist Montaigne le plus scavant homme qui nous reste (Today's most learned man).

Ivan Sache, 30 March 2004

Flag of Overijse

The flag of Overijse is yellow with a bunch of six blue grapes placed 3, 2 and 1.
According to Gemeentewapens in België - Vlaanderen en Brussel [w2v02a], the flag, adopted on 7 July 1982 by the Municipal Council, is prescribed by a Decree issued on 3 December 1984 by the Executive of Flanders and published on 8 July 1986 in the Belgian official gazette.
The six grapes stand for the six parts of the municipality, Overijse downtown and five hamlets. The bunch stem and axis recall the facade and the rooftop of a hothouse.
The flag of Overijse is one of the few Belgian municipal flags that has nothing to do with the matching municipal arms.

Growing of eating grape has always been a major activity in Overijse. In 1903, a report by the Municipal Council stated that most of the production (from hothouses) was shipped to Brussels and also to other big towns. A few big grape growers shipped their production to England, Germany, and even to Russia and America. In the 1920s, grape growing made of Overijse, together with Hoeilaart, the richest municipality in Belgium.
Three cultivars of white grapes are grown in Belgium (Baidor, Canon Hall and Muscat of Alexandria) as well as four cultivars of black (called "blue" in Dutch) grapes (Leopold III, considered as the best eating grapes in the world, Colman, Ribier and Royal).
The Grapes' Festival (Druivenfeesten) takes place every year in Overijse at the end of August, the period of harvest. The main event of the festival is the election of the Queen of Grapes (Druivenkoningin).

Ivan Sache, 30 March 2004