Stavelot
From Free net encyclopedia
Stavelot is a municipality located in the Belgian province of Liège. On January 1 2005 Stavelot had a total population of 6,664. The total area is 85.07 km² which gives a population density of 78.33 inhabitants per km².
History
The town grew up around the Abbey of Stavelot, founded ca 650, out of what had been a villa, by the legendary Saint Remaclus (Saint Remacle). The Abbey of Stavelot was secularized and demolished at the time of the French Revolution: of the church just the west end doorway remains, as a free-standing tower. Two cloisters, one secular, one for the monks survive as the courtyards of the brick-and-stone 17th century domestic ranges, now housing the Museum of the Principality of Stavelot- Malmedy, and museums devoted to the poet Guillaume Apollinaire, who was a long-term resident, and to the Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps. The foundations of the abbey church are presented as a footprint, with walls and column bases that enable the visitor to visualize the scale of the Romanesque abbey.
Stavelot was the seat of the Principality of Stavelot-Malmedy, a small independent region of the Holy Roman Empire, ruled by the abbots of Stavelot. The principality was dissolved in 1794 during the French Revolution, and Stavelot, as part of Malmedy passed to Prussia in 1815. The region was made part of Belgium as part of war reparations after World War I.
In the mid-12th century the independent prince-abbot of Stavelot-Malmedy supported a group of goldsmiths' and metalworking workshops that produced champlevé enamels, among whom the name of Godefroid de Claire stands out. Abbot Wibald (ruled 1130–58) was one of the greatest patrons of the arts in the 12th century; during his rule the Stavelot Triptych was produced for the Abbey to contain pieces of the True Cross. The binding of the Stavelot Bible, and the remaining fragments from the retable at Stavelot are among the highpoints of medieval art. The Principality of Stavelot and Malmedy was abolished in 1795. (See Malmedy.)
The town's coat-of-arms, granted in 1819, are parted fess-wise -between the founding bishop, and the wolf, which in Stavelot's founding legend, carried bricks for the building of the Abbey.
Miscellaneous
Stavelot is part of the original course of the Circuit de Spa-Francorchamps, the famous venue of the Formula One Belgian Grand Prix and the Spa 24 Hours endurance race.
Stavelot also has a traditional carnival, the Carnaval de la Laetare des Blancs-Moussis. On the fourth Sunday of Lent, some 200 local men clad in white and masked with long red noses—the Blancs-Moussis— parade through town throwing confetti and beating bystanders with dried pig bladders.