Silva Carbonaria

As Kohlwald (Latin silva carbonaria, Dutch Kolenwoud, French Forêt Charbonnière ), a forest zone in Belgium and northern France called, which stretched from the Sambre at Charleroi in the east to the Scheldt between Tournai and Cambrai in the north to the south; according to others he believes that even touched Arras in the west or in the east of Liege. The forest had thus an extension of at least 80 km in west-east and at least 40 km in north-south direction. He was first mentioned by the late antique historian Sulpicius Alexander.

Because of this size presented the Kohlwald in antiquity and in the Middle Ages is a natural tribal, linguistic and national borders; in the Thidrekssaga he is referred to as a retreat for robbers.

  • The forest carbon was in the time of the Roman Empire border between the provinces of Belgica and Germania II II
  • It was at this time a language boundary: in the south spoke to the forerunner of today's French language in the north of the present-day Dutch.
  • At the beginning of the 5th century the Franks invaded from the northerly Toxandria prior to Kohlwald; He now formed the southern border of the Frankish Empire.
  • In the Merovingian period the carbon forest was considered as the boundary between the Salian Franks in the west and the ripurarischen francs in the East, and later as part of the border between Neustria and Austrasia
  • In the year 640 was of Itta, wife of Pepin the Elder, in the coal forest, founded in what is now the monastery Nivelles Nivelles.
  • The Kohlwald formed the boundary between the dioceses of Cambrai and Maastricht.
  • The country east of the forest carbon ( Lommegau, Haspengauw and southern Toxandria ) was home to the Carolingians.
  • The Treaty of Ribemont (880 ) laid the forest carbon fixed as part of the border between the West Frankish and the East Frankish kingdom.
  • This line has inventory substantially as the border between France and Belgium today.

Over the centuries, the carbon forest was gradually depleted. Remains of which are:

  • The Zoniënwoud or Soignes forest south-east of Brussels ( about 4400 hectares)
  • The Hallerbos ( Forest Hall, about 550 acres southeast of Halle),
  • The forest of Buggenhout,
  • The forest of Heverlee,
  • The forest of Meerdaal and
  • The forest of La Houssière.
  • Forest area in Europe
  • Forest area in France
  • Geography (Belgium )
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