Antwerp

Antwerp (ⁱ/ˈæntwɜːrp/, Dutch: Antwerpen [ˈɑntʋɛrpə(n)], French: Anvers [ɑ̃vɛʁ(s)]) is a city in Belgium which is the capital of Antwerp province. With a population of 510,610, it is the most populous city in Flanders. Its metropolitan area houses around 1,200,000 people.

Antwerp is on the River Scheldt, linked to the North Sea by the Westerschelde estuary. The Port of Antwerp is one of the biggest in the world, ranking second in Europe and within the top 20 globally.

Antwerp has long been an important city in the Low Countries, both economically and culturally, especially before the Spanish Fury (1576) in the Dutch Revolt. The inhabitants of Antwerp are nicknamed Sinjoren, after the Spanish honorific señor or French seigneur, "lord", referring to the Spanish noblemen who ruled the city in the 17th century.

History

Origin of the name

According to folklore, notably celebrated by a statue in front of the town hall, the city got its name from a legend about a giant called Antigoon who lived near the Scheldt river. He exacted a toll from passing boatmen, and for those who refused, he severed one of their hands and threw it into the river. Eventually the giant was killed by a young hero named Silvius Brabo, who cut off the giant's own hand and flung it into the river. Hence the name Antwerpen, from Dutch hand werpen, akin to Old English hand and wearpan (to throw), which has evolved to today's warp.

Antwerp (province)

Antwerp (Dutch: Antwerpen [ˈɑntʋɛrpə(n)]) is the northernmost province both of the Flemish Region, also called Flanders, and of Belgium. It borders on (clockwise from the North) North Brabant province of the Netherlands and the Belgian provinces of Limburg, Flemish Brabant and East Flanders. Its capital is Antwerp which comprises the Port of Antwerp. It has an area of 2867 km² (1107 sq mi) and with 1.8 million inhabitants it is the country's most populous province. The province consists of 3 arrondissements: Antwerp, Mechelen and Turnhout. The eastern part of the province comprises the main part of the Campine region.

History

During the early Middle Ages the region was part of the Frankish Empire, which was divided into several pagi. The territory of the present day province belonged to several pagi of which the region around Antwerp belonged to the Pagus Renesium. The Pagus Toxandria stretched from North Brabant into the Campine region. To the south there was the Pagus Bracbatinse and the Pagus Hasbaniensis. In 843 the Carolingian Empire of Charlemagne was divided among his sons and the river Scheldt became the border between West Francia and East Francia. In 974 Otto II established the Margraviate of Antwerp as a defence against the County of Flanders.

Antwerp (novel)

Antwerp (Amberes in Spanish) is a novella by the Chilean author Roberto Bolaño. It was written in 1980 but only published in 2002, a year before the author's death. An English translation by Natasha Wimmer was published in 2010.

Considered by Bolaño's literary executor Ignacio Echevarría to be the big bang of the Bolaño universe, the loose prose-poem novel was written when Bolaño was 27. Antwerp is short and fragmentary, composed of 56 pieces (which could be seen as vignettes or sketches) with a loose narrative structure. Though there are some recurring characters and story lines, there is no central narrative. Many of the subjects dealt with become Bolaño's common material for his other works of fiction - crimes and campgrounds, drifters and poetry, sex and love, corrupt cops and misfits.

Bolaño had once stated that "The only novel that doesn't embarrass me is Antwerp.". In the introduction he wrote for the book in 2002 Bolaño claimed:

"I wrote this book for myself, and even that I can't be sure of. For a long time these were just loose pages that I reread and maybe tinkered with, convinced I had no time. But time for what? I couldn't say exactly. I wrote this book for the ghosts, who, because they're outside of time, are the only ones with time."