De Leeuw van Vlaanderen (book)
An early edition of De Leeuw van Vlaenderen
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| Author | Hendrik Conscience |
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| Country | Belgium |
| Language | Dutch |
| Subject | War, Romance |
| Genre | Historical novel |
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Publication date
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1838 |
| Media type | |
| 839.3 | |
De Leeuw van Vlaanderen (Dutch; originally: De Leeuw van Vlaenderen, of de Slag der Gulden Sporen. In English: The Lion of Flanders, or the Battle of the Golden Spurs) is a historical novel written by the Flemish writer Hendrik Conscience in 1838. The book, written in Dutch, focuses on the Medieval Franco-Flemish War, especially the Battle of the Golden Spurs of 1302, in a style typical of literary romanticism. It is considered one of the founding texts of Flemish literature and confirmed Conscience's own reputation as a novelist.
Hendrik Conscience was born in the Flemish city of Antwerp into a mixed French-Flemish family in 1812. Conscience was brought up speaking both French and Dutch. After working as a teacher briefly, he joined the Belgian Revolution in July 1830 and later served in the Belgian army during the Ten Days' Campaign of 1831. He left the army in 1836, when he moved to the Kempen region. At the time, French predominated in Belgium as the language of the upper classes, literature and government. While Dutch dialects were widely spoken as a vernacular, it was considered vulgar and little had been written in it. Conscience, however, felt the language appealing and decided to work in it.
Conscience, who was already developing an interest in the Dutch language and Romanticism, published his first book, In 't Wonderjaer ("In the year of wonder") in 1837. The work explored the Beeldenstorm of 1566 and the revolt by Calvinists of the Spanish Netherlands against Spanish Catholic rule in a heavily romanticized way. Conscience was only able to publish the work with the support of friends, including King Leopold I, and its success made him little money.
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