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General Knowledge :: HISTORICAL EVENTS BY COUNTRY :: BELGIUM

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Belgium

Belgium: Historical Dates

AD 768-814	Belgium was an important part of Charlemagne's empire.
1384-1477	Belgium was under the control of the House of Burgundy.
1516	Belgium and the Netherlands came under Spanish control.
1581	Belgium remained under Spanish rule, but the Netherlands declared independence. The Belgian economy was hurt by lost trade with the Netherlands.
1713	Austria assumed control of Belgium after the War of the Spanish Succession.
1794	French troops drove the Austrians from Belgium. Austria formally ceded Belgium to France in 1797.
1815	Napoleon I of France met his final defeat at Waterloo in central Belgium. Belgium became part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands.
1830	Belgium declared its independence from the Netherlands.
1885	King Leopold II established the Congo Free State. The colony supplied Belgium with raw materials for its growing industrial sector.
1914	Germany violated Belgium's neutrality by invading at the start of World War I. Many battles of the war were later fought in Belgium.
1940	Belgium was again invaded and defeated by Germany during World War II. It was liberated in 1944.
1952	Belgium was a founding member of the European Coal and Steel Community, which became the European Economic Community in 1957, with headquarters in Brussels.
1971	A new constitution formally recognized Belgium's French-, Dutch-, and German-speaking communities.
1993	A constitutional revision made Belgium a federal state. Flanders, Wallonia, and Brussels each became semi-autonomous regions.