Oosteeklo (formerly Oost-Eekloo) is a historic village in the

Flemish Flemish (''Vlaams'') is a Low Franconian dialect cluster of the Dutch language. It is sometimes referred to as Flemish Dutch (), Belgian Dutch ( ), or Southern Dutch (). Flemish is native to Flanders, a historical region in northern Belgium; ...

Belgium Belgium, ; french: Belgique ; german: Belgien officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a country in Northwestern Europe. The country is bordered by the Netherlands to the north, Germany to the east, Luxembourg to the southeast, France to th ...

, which since 1977 has been a subdivision of the municipality of

Assenede Assenede () is a municipality located in the Belgian province of East Flanders. The municipality comprises the towns of Assenede proper, , Boekhoute and Oosteeklo. On 1 January 2021, Assenede had a total population of 14,369. The total area is 8 ...

. The village is situated 9 km east of

Eeklo Eeklo () is a Belgian municipality in the Flemish province of East Flanders. The municipality comprises only the town of Eeklo proper. The name ''Eeklo'' comes from the contraction of "eke" and "lo", two Old German words meaning ''oak'' and ''sp ...

and 17 km north of

Ghent Ghent ( nl, Gent ; french: Gand ; traditional English: Gaunt) is a city and a municipality in the Flemish Region of Belgium. It is the capital and largest city of the East Flanders province, and the third largest in the country, exceeded i ...

, about 9 km from the border with the

Netherlands ) , anthem = ( en, "William of Nassau") , image_map = , map_caption = , subdivision_type = Sovereign state , subdivision_name = Kingdom of the Netherlands , established_title = Before independence , established_date = Spanish Netherl ...

, and lies approximately 9 metres above sea-level. A craft brewery, Den Tseut, is established in the village.

Heritage

From 1217 until 1577 Oosteeklo Abbey, a Cistercian nunnery, was located in the village, but the community relocated to Ghent for safety during the hostilities of the Dutch Revolt. The monastery did maintain some property rights in the village, and a guesthouse once owned by the nuns is now listed built heritage. So are a manor house, the parish church, a number of farmhouses, a war memorial and multiple

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

German bunkers. An 18th-century windmill was demolished in 1949. Historically, the kermesse of Oosteeklo fell on the Sunday after the

Feast of the Assumption The Assumption of Mary is one of the four Marian dogmas of the Catholic Church. Pope Pius XII defined it in 1950 in his apostolic constitution ''Munificentissimus Deus'' as follows: We proclaim and define it to be a dogma revealed by Go ...

History

The oldest mention of the village is in a charter of 1226. In 1264

Ename Abbey Ename Abbey (1063–1795) was a Benedictine monastery in the village of Ename, now a suburb of Oudenaarde. It was founded by Adele of France, wife of Baldwin V, Count of Flanders, and was confiscated during the French Revolutionary Wars. It was t ...

owned a stretch of marshland in the area. The soil was sandy and the landscape low-lying

heathland A heath () is a shrubland habitat found mainly on free-draining infertile, acidic soils and characterised by open, low-growing woody vegetation. Moorland is generally related to high-ground heaths with—especially in Great Britain—a coole ...

, granted to Oosteeklo Abbey and sublet to tenant farmers. Pasturage was supplemented with woodland and a limited acreage of arable land on which mostly rye and buckwheat were grown. Flax was grown for the production of linen. In the 18th century, the village was part of the lordship of the manor of Boekhoute.Frans De Potter and Jan Broeckaert, ''Geschiedenis van de gemeenten der provincie Oost-Vlaanderen'', 2nd series, vol. 3 (Ghent, 1872), pp. 1-12. From 1801 to 1977, Oosteeklo was an independent municipality. In 1801 the population was 1,528. During the Eighty Years' War, Oosteeklo saw action in 1577 and 1645. During the wars of

Louis XIV , house = Bourbon , father = Louis XIII , mother = Anne of Austria , birth_date = , birth_place = Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Saint-Germain-en-Laye, France , death_date = , death_place = Palace of Ver ...

troops were frequently billeted in the village. On 18 October 1790 a corps of volunteers from Oosteeklo was sworn into the army of the

United Belgian States The United Belgian States ( nl, Verenigde Nederlandse Staten or '; french: États-Belgiques-Unis; lat, Foederatum Belgium), also known as the United States of Belgium, was a short-lived confederal republic in the Southern Netherlands (modern-da ...

in Ghent.

Gallery

File:Onroerenderfgoed 76348 Oosteeklo2012.jpg, Heilig Kruis en Onze-Lieve-Vrouw Church File:Onroerenderfgoed 76354 Oosteeklo2012.jpg, Former rectory File:Voormalige herberg - Oosteeklo-Dorp - Oosteeklo - januari 2021.jpg, Former inn File:Onroerenderfgoed 76313 Oosteeklo2012.jpg, Estate in Oosteeklo

References

{{Reflist Assenede Populated places in East Flanders