European Kingdoms

Diocese of Liège (Belgium) (Low Countries)

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The European city of Liège forms part of the wider Low Countries region of Western Europe. The city is otherwise referred to as Luik or Lüttich in Flemish and German respectively, and sits in modern Belgium's Walloon region in the east of the country, with a marginal extension into modern France.

Lining the Meuse at the confluence of the Ourthe, the Romans knew it as Leodium, after having conquered the nearby Condrusi and Tungri tribes. As a medieval episcopal city and the capital of the Diocese of Liège, it was the undisputed ecclesiastical, administrative, and cultural centre of the Meuse region, being known as the 'Land of Liège'. Its territory extended marginally into areas of what are now the Netherlands and Germany.

The diocese of Liège (or Tongeren-Maastricht-Liège) was, to some extent, based upon Roman and pre-Roman territories. At the start of the tenth century it was attached to the then-powerful Lorraine which wanted to control it fully, in opposition to imperial German sovereignty.

To prevent this, at the end of the tenth century the 'Prince-Bishopric of Liège' evolved from the diocese, becoming a state in the Low Countries in Lower Lorraine (see feature link, right). At the beginning, the principality of Liège was fragile and relatively unimportant. The prince-bishop was fully independent and remained the emperor's vassal. From the end of the twelfth century it expanded considerably.

From about 1250 onwards social conflict increased alongside the collapse of imperial Germany. Civil war broke out. Peace agreements and periods of struggle alternated between each other as they did throughout most of the German-controlled lands in this period.

It was social struggles throughout successive centuries which resulted in a gradual reduction of the prince-bishop's power, while external conflicts seeped into his territory, causing bouts of destruction and chaos. French revolutionary ideals also infected the territory, with revolution in 1789 and a successful French invasion in 1795 ending the prince-bishopric for good (see feature link).

(Information by William Willems, with additional information from Histoire du diocèse et de la principauté de Liége, Joseph Daris (1890-1899, in French), from Liège et les principautés ecclésiastiques de l'Allemagne occidentale. Les relations de Liège avec Aix, Cologne et l'Empire - La fin, J E Demarteau (Tome XXVIII, 1899, in French), from Biographie nationale, Académie royale des sciences, des lettres et des Beaux-arts de Belgique (Bruxelles, 1897, in French), from Notger de Liége et la civilisation au Xe siècle, Godefroid Kurth (Tome I et II, 1905, in French), from Précis d'histoire liégeoise, Félix Magnette (1924, in French), from Bisdommen, kapittels, kloosters en kerken in de Volle Middeleeuwen, Arnoud-Jan Bijsterveld (2015, in Dutch), from La destruction de la ville de Liège et sa reconstruction, Alain Marchandisse, Jean-Louis Kupper, & Irène Vrancken-Pirson  (1996, in French), from Liège et ses bonnes villes, Eugène Wahle (Ed, 1980, in French), and from External Links: Catholic Encyclopaedia, and Archives de l'Université Catholique de Louvain, Michel Schooyans (dead link, but the page is still available via the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine, in French), and Histoire de la Principauté de Liège, Joseph Grandjean (dead link, in French), and Liège Révolution (in French), and Le Prince Evêque de Liège - Origine du pouvoir princier dans la principauté de Liège, Germaine Williot (in French), and Notger and his time, Henry Dupuis (Université Liège, in French), and Les Belges, leur histoire (in French).)

c.280

Although Christianity is rapidly spreading throughout Gaul, persistent persecutions and continual conflicts prevent the organisation of the Catholic Church during the first few centuries AD. Adopting the administrative divisions of the Roman empire, the Catholic ecclesiastical authorities make Civitas Tungrorum a diocese (bishopric).

The Machiavellian Septimus Severus continued to increase the glory of Rome (this surviving arch is named after him) but he continued the imperial practice of Christian persecution

The diocese at Tongeren (capital of the Tungri tribe, in what is now the province of Limburg in Belgium, to the north-west of Liège) originally forms part of the larger archdioceses of Trier and Cologne, and will later become the initial nucleus of the prince-bishopric of Liège.

c.384

Saint Servatius is the first confirmed 'Bishop of the Tungri'. Shortly before his death in 384, he possibly transfers the seat of the diocese from Tongeren to Maastricht (Dutch Limburg).

c.675

Lambert of Maastricht becomes bishop of the diocese of Tongeren-Maastricht. He is assassinated on his estate, a Gallo-Roman (Frankish) villa from which the city of Liège will emerge. He becomes the holy Bishop Saint Lambert and the major symbol both of Liège, the city which he had helped to create, and of the ecclesiastical 'Principality of Liège'.

c.720

Liège becomes a centre of pilgrimage and the diocese rapidly increases its number of acquisitions thanks to generous donations from Merovingian kings and emperors, resulting in a religious effect as well as a political one. Most of these 'church lands' will also benefit from a level of immunity.

c.800

Due to the rapid growth of the city, the seat of the bishopric is transferred from Maastricht to Liège. The diocese is now referred to as the 'Diocese of Liège'.

King Louis 'the Pious' of the Frankish empire attempted to leave the empire intact for his eldest son, Lothar, but the others rebelled at the idea. The treaty of Verdun in AD 843 confirmed the official division of the empire between Charlemagne's three surviving grandsons (click or tap on map to view full sized)

870/880

The Treaty of Meerssen (or Mersen) arises due to the death of Lothar II of Lotharingia. His territory is subsequently divided fairly by his uncles under the terms of the treaty, those uncles being Louis 'the German' of the Eastern Franks and Charles 'the Bald' of the Western Franks.

Territory which belongs to the diocese of Liège finds itself partially within the western Frankish administrative borders, with the rest being within eastern Frankish borders.

894 - 900

The diocese becomes part of the kingdom of Lotharingia, but a period of confusion begins in 895/6 when the German king hands Lotharingia to his illegitimate son, Zwentibold. In 900 it remains part of Lotharingia which is attached to the German kingdom under Gebhard of Franconia.

The River Lahn ran through the gau or district of the same name, forming an important part of the origins of medieval Hesse even though, in the eighth century it was part of Rhenish Franconia (western Franconia)

911/923

The bishopric of Liège is part of the territory of the Western Franks, although it is enclaved and incorporated within the political system of the evolving German kingdom.

The principal act for this evolution is East Francia passing to Conrad 'the Younger' in 911 as the first elected native king of Germany, ruling what had formerly been the eastern section of the Carolingian empire. Conrad is duke of Franconia and also count of Oberlahngau in the lands of the Hessi.

959

The diocese becomes part of the duchy of Lorraine in 959 principally, it seems, due to events in 953 when Ludolph of Swabia had joined forces with his brother-in-law, Conrad 'the Red', duke of Lorraine, in revolt. Otto I of Saxony and Henry I of Bavaria had defeated them, and Conrad had been deprived of his title in favour of Otto's brother. The duchy is heading towards division in 975.

Germany in AD 962 may have had its new emperor to govern those territories which are shown within the dark black line, but it was still a patchwork of competing interests and power bases (click or tap on map to view full sized)

980

In a move which is repeated elsewhere across German-controlled lands in this period, a medieval holding is created out of the diocese of Liège. It does not consist of the entire diocesan territory but nevertheless covers an extensive proportion of it, and is known as 'Fürstbistum Lüttich', or the 'Prince-Bishopric of Liège'.