Charles
the Bald, King of the Franks, at this crisis called to his aid the
strong arm of Baldwin, a Flemish chief of whose ancestry we know
little, but who soon became famous as Baldwin Bras-de-Fer--Baldwin
of the Iron Arm, so called because, in peace or war, he was never
seen without his coat of mail. This grim warrior had fallen in
love with the daughter of Charles the Bald, Judith, who had been
already twice married, first to the Saxon King Ethelwulf (after
the death of his first wife Osberga, mother of Alfred the Great) and
secondly to Ethelbald, on whose death she left England and went
to live at Senlis. Baldwin persuaded the Princess to run away with
him; and they were married without the knowledge of her father, to
escape whose vengeance the culprits fled to Rome. Pope Nicholas I.
brought about a reconciliation; and Charles not only pardoned his
son-in-law, but appointed him ruler of Flanders under the title of
Marquis, which was afterwards changed into that of Count. It is to
the steel-clad Baldwin Bras-de-Fer that the Counts of Flanders trace
the origin of their title; and he was, moreover, the real founder of
that Bruges which rose to such glory in the Middle Ages, and is
still, though fallen from its high estate, the picturesque capital
of West Flanders, whither artists flock to wander about amidst the
canals and bridges, the dismantled ramparts, the narrow streets
with their curious houses, and the old buildings which bear such
eloquent testimony to the ruin which long ago overtook what was
once an opulent and powerful city.
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